In Praise of a Noble Failure

I love Meet Joe Black. Absolutely love it.

Yes, the movie where Brad Pitt plays Death. Yes, the one with the viral car accident. Yes, the one critics still dismiss as long, bloated, and self-indulgent.

For many, it was a fiasco. For me — and for its cult following that’s only grown with time — it’s something else entirely. Meditative. Patient. Willing to linger in moments others would cut, precisely because those moments matter.

I once sang its praises to my sister-in-law. When I finally stopped, she just said:

“I hate that movie. So long. So boring.”

And that’s the paradox. To some, interminable. To others, transcendent.

Defining Failure

By Hollywood’s ledger, Meet Joe Black was a failure. A $90 million prestige picture that made less than half that domestically. Its opening weekend propped up by Star Wars fans who walked out after the trailer.

But the numbers don’t matter anymore. What endures is Martin Brest’s willingness to follow his vision. He knew how to make a hit — Scent of a Woman proved that. Instead, he made something slower, stranger, and spiritually ambitious. If success is box office, yes, he failed. If success is realizing a singular vision, no, he didn’t.

That distinction matters for my own work, too.

The Wake Parallel

The Wake of Expectations isn’t a “noble failure.” Not yet, anyway. Sales haven’t been spectacular, but it’s gotten its flowers. (Thank you again, Maxy Awards!)

But in the sense that it refuses to do what a “well-written” book is supposed to do, then yes, it fails — deliberately.

The “plot” sets up in part one and only returns at the very end. The middle — long stretches of lived life, frustrations, humiliations, diversions — is the point. Just as Meet Joe Black’s corporate subplot reframes Bill Parrish’s final stand, those digressions build the architecture of Calvin’s motivation. The middle is what makes the end matter.

I knew that when I wrote it. I knew I was flouting convention. And I did it anyway.

Too long. Too dense. Too crass.

It wasn’t designed to succeed on anyone’s terms but my own.

Marketability vs. Vision

If I wanted to maximize marketability, I never would have written Wake. I’d have written a trope-heavy romantasy or some other crowd-pleaser. But that was never the goal.

The goal was to write the book I needed to write. Long. Messy. Raunchy. Reflective. Literature disguised as slice-of-life comedy.

And here’s the irony: the very qualities that count against Wake in some contests are what set it apart in others. It’s been ignored in places that prize genre fit or commercial polish. But then came the Maxys — where what others called flaws were recognized as features. That’s when I knew: there are readers who see the book as I meant it.

The Lineage of Noble Failures

That’s why I see Wake in the lineage of misunderstood works that dared to break form.

Moby-Dick. (Yeah, I said it!) Longer than Wake. Dismissed in its time as tedious and self-indulgent. Sales flopped, critics mocked, and Melville died in obscurity. Only later did it emerge as the American novel.

Meet Joe Black. A Hollywood “disaster” in 1998. Too long, too slow, too indulgent. And yet, with time, it endured. It resonates with those willing to sit with it.

The Wake of Expectations. Refuses to obey convention. Refuses to be tidy, efficient, or what a debut novel is “supposed” to be. And that’s precisely what makes it mine.

No Mistake

Some would say — as they do about Brest’s film — that choosing vision over convention was a mistake. But that assumes the wrong objective.

If the goal is sales, broad market fit, or box office, then sure, it looks like failure. But if the goal is to make the work only you could make, then it’s no mistake at all.

That’s what connects Meet Joe Black, The Wake of Expectations, and yes, Moby-Dick in Melville’s day. Each flouts convention. Each risks dismissal. And each, in its own way, lingers.

The Noble Contradiction

So maybe “noble failure” isn’t the right phrase for Wake. It hasn’t failed. (And unlike Brest, I’m not spending anyone else’s money, so I have every right to “fail” financially, if it does.) But it does belong to that tradition of works that risk failure — that resist the safe choice, that reject the formula, that insist on being slower, stranger, harder than the market wants.

That’s the noble part.

Of course, I hope Wake proves more successful than Meet Joe Black. Who wouldn’t? But by the time the jury is fully out, I’ll be on to the fourth book anyway.

That’s the beauty. The work stands. The writing keeps moving. Success, failure, or noble contradiction — the next story is already waiting.

Javier

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🎬 For Further Viewing

If you’re interested in a deeper look at the film’s reception, this video essay is worth watching:
Why Meet Joe Black Failed But Became a Cult Classic