Contrary to what Tom Petty may have said, ending is actually the hardest part. The past few weeks have seen quite a few shows bid adieu to audiences—some in their twilight years (ER), some still critically acclaimed (Battlestar Galactica), and some taken before their time (Life on Mars). For each of these shows, you will inevitably see bloggers and message boarders fuming about endings they found unsatisfying or praising what they see as the perfect culmination of a long journey. The finale is often the most divisive episode of a series—and for good reason.
How does one go about summing up the time and effort that people invest in their favorite television shows? Obviously, there is no uniform answer, which is why there never will be a uniformly praised series finale.
There is, however, a common thread that runs through all of the finales that I’ve loved: each continued to tell the story and convey the themes present throughout the entire series. This might seem like a no-brainer, but all too often writers craft the finale as a self-indulgent, elegiac coda to the show in which they’ve invested so much of their time. More often than not, such episodes fall flat. Writers cheat by making one character have a great epiphany in the closing minutes of the show, resulting in an immediate moment of “Awwww.” Then, as the warm glow subsides, you begin to realize how ridiculous what just happened truly was (I’m looking at you, Rachel on Friends). The closing summation is fine, but the characters can’t abandon seasons worth of growth and development just to be placed, quite literally like pawns, right where the writers want them to be.
The best finales don’t feel like finales at all, and refuse to speak down to the audience. Perhaps the best example of this was the finale of the WB’s Angel, aptly titled “Not Fade Away,” which saw a few major characters get knocked off and ended in the middle of a huge confrontation with no clear outcome. At the end of the day, evil wasn’t defeated and good didn’t triumph—fitting, since the show was more about struggling to do the right thing no matter the odds.
Most shows could learn a thing or two from that “life goes on” approach. The finale of the 15-year-old former juggernaut ER perfectly illustrated this. The major conflicts of the current cast were wrapped up in the lead-up to the finale, which brought the focus back to the inner-city hospital and away from the individual doctors.
However, as much as the finale of a show will stick with you—likely longer than any other episode—it would be foolish to judge a series on its final bow. Like life, television shows need to be judged holistically; a single poor outing should not necessarily mar what was a great run.
