New Storyboards for the End

So, we had the big seminar thing with all the crits. Very helpful. Except about half the people seemed a tad bewildered by the ending. How does he get into the tavern? Why is he in a tavern? What happened to the fairies? Etc.

It's something I was always a little worried about. Last year when we were first figuring out the stories, there was an idea kicked around that I ended up feeling wasn't true to what I wanted to do. However, I don't really want to sacrifice good storytelling to try to squeeze in a story that doesn't quite fit. So the alternative ending would involve a little bit of a change towards the beginning as well. Here's how the story would play:
The guy is walking through the woods with his cows but they don't really stay together as a herd that well. His playing wouldn't be very good here. A couple run off the road, and he has to chase them down. He tries to go after them both, but gets distracted by the fairy music. The middle would be the same. When he wakes up after the fairies, he'd be a bit befuddled, but start to play. He stands to play, his eyes are closed. As he plays, all of his cows come out of the woods and carry him towards town. You would see a couple fairies pop out of the woods behind him and do a little dance before flying off into the woods. The End.

Here're the boards for the new ending.


I'm not really sure I like it better... but I think that it might pull the story together more neatly? Should it still go back to the tavern? There will be a town in the distance that you can see. You can sort of see it in the last couple frames of the boards.

Also, just for fun, here's what my boards look like just in pencil. I like it, it's just harder to see.