Spoilers for events following the end of AW1 below the cut (no AW2 spoilers don't worry):

I love how the conceit of "Alan Wake is trapped in the Dark Place for an indeterminate amount of time, slowly going mad and losing all sense of self" hinges on Alan being the kind of self-serious wiener who, upon realizing that the Dark Place's foul magicks turn his literary works into reality, wouldn't just plonk out a quick 10,000 words about blasting his way out of there on the wings of a million Gundams while blowing anatomically-unlikely loads inside a version of Lulu from Final Fantasy X with cat ears. Alan is a hack who very clearly only knows how to write one kind of thing somewhat-passably and the fact that he can't possibly envision a world in which he works outside that narrowly-defined (and wholly self-imposed) vision of himself is what makes the story work (I think this is also why the Andersons were basically able to convincingly beat the Dark Presence into submission - their chosen medium, heavy metal music, DOES deal with themes of dark otherworldly forces, but as often as not deals with them in the sense of "we are going to pummel the fuck out of these dark otherworldly forces with naught but the heft of our sacks". The Dark Presence was an idiot for thinking it could come out on top there.)