LOST? Sopranos? Game of Thrones? The Prisoner? Battlestar Gallactica? Seinfeld? MASH? Mad Men? Breaking Bad? X-Files? Cheers? Babylon 5?

Which ones did you think were smashing, and which ones do you think SUCKED?  Did any live up to the great series you loved and watched for years?  Were any so bad that it ruined your whole day?  Was the ending of the Sopranos brilliance or sh*t?

Just a thread to discuss all series endings, and hopefully you can think of some obscure ones along with the famous shows.

For now, I'll start with one I actually liked.  Cheers.  I thought it was perfect. Unassuming, unpretentious, pretty much what I loved about the show's best moments. The guests leave one by one. A mystery guest tries to stop at closing time. Sammy straightens the painting and heads to the pool room. Cheers lives even after the camera stops. No corny event like what Seinfeld tried.  Seinfeld should have written a great dialogue piece that never left the Coffee Shop.

I'm pretty surprised at the hate that the Game Of Thrones finale is getting. I mean, yeah, the whole last season wasn't that great overall (aside from the cinematography and such), but I guess it just didn't subvert expectations enough. 

The best series finale I've ever seen just happened last week...Veep. Other various thoughts: General consensus seems to be Six Feet Under is the gold standard for series finales, but I don't watch that show so I can't comment. Cheers' was quite nice, but perhaps a little inflated to an hour and a half. I also enjoyed Frasier's finale, but I wouldn't put it on a pedestal of greatness. Peep Show, my favorite show ever, end was a bit anticlimactic, but I feel like it had to end like that (or a complete 180 and kill off all the major characters). I suppose MASH is probably highly lauded too, but again, I don't watch that.

I didn't mind Seinfeld's ending...not great but pretty in the middle for me. I didn't care for the Sopranos. It was a fine episode, but I just prefer an actual ending. Lost seems to be the general consensus on how not to do an ending. The one that is most reactionary in my immediate circle is How I Met Your Mother. I didn't particularly mind it, but I have a friend who says it ruined the whole series for her. 

Icarium wrote: this should probably have a SPOILER ALLERT tag becouse season finale of GOT is so reasent probably smart.

Good point, thanks!  OP has been revised. 

Most of the MASH finale also feels wrong to me.

The Cheers finale was perfect. 

Thanks for a few ideas there on series to check out. I've not seen all of these.

Veep is one we're slowly working through. Politics is a hard sell for me because I'm so sick of it IRL, but my friend keeps telling me to soldier on, that Veep will pay off. So I do a few eps here and there. It's okay but doesn't strike me as being as funny as either Curb or Seinfeld...mostly insults.  I'll try though. I'll look into Peep Show too. thanks!

Sopranos seemed pretty clear to me that Tony was clipped. There's a few web breakdowns on the show that laboriously piece together the reasons for that conclusion. I liked it a little better after reading those, agreeing that Tony did indeed have his head blown off, but I agree with you generally that I want a real ending on shows....not a pass. That is what made LOST so frustrating as a series, though I had mixed feelings on the ending itself. 

Thrones ending will probably be fine with me. From what I've heard about, I don't expect to be bothered by aspects that are pissing people off.  The darkness of the show, literally, can be a problem on our old TV that exacerbates the issue.  I can't see half the sh*t on that show.  

Meltdowner wrote: I didn't hate the ending of Lost like most people did. It's not like they tried to make sense before.

I was frustrated by the last three seasons having so many head fakes that would never pay off. But I agree about the finale. I rather enjoyed the spiritual component.  Leaving so many threads unresolved things back on the island was frustrating, but overall the series was really fun.

I can't even remember MASH's ending. Seinfeld felt so contrived and, basically, just a hugely squandered opportunity to do something way cooler. But it's still one of the greatest series all time. 

It's better than some shows these days that seem to be written according to reactions on social media.

^

Absolutely "what a journey it was." We both loved it despite some of my issues with it.  There is a fantastic YT analysis by a hater though. It's like 8 parts and this dude just painstakingly addresses every grievance...it's an anti-LOST manifesto written by a guy who was a fanboy for the first couple seasons. 

This is a long time commitment, but it is hilarious and entertaining. And I learned a lot about stuff I missed during the show. Dude put in a lot of work.  Each part gets a little better as he finds his voice.  I don't agree with him obviously, but it was a great watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_DGamgvcXw&list=PLR-Yx2zNLl3m4R42-Z4fwybpdUwb4u-KI" rel="nofollow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_DGamgvcXw&list=PLR-Yx2zNLl3m4R42-Z4fwybpdUwb4u-KI

 

+/- in chronological order

 

MASH

WKRP in Cincinnati

Cheers

Married With Children

Ally McBeal (yeah, I admit liking it... at first)

Sex In The City (all men should watch this)

Sons Of Anarchy

Californication (all women should watch this)

Vinyl (only one year, but I was riveted)

 

 

 

worth mentioning

One Day at a Time (for Valerie Bertinelli )

Happy Days (despite the corniness seen from nowadays)

Hung

 

Did they end well???

TBH, I don't remember many finale, except for MASH, Cheers & Californication ...

And BTW, I did see on TV those two horrible SitC movies   .

 

All I know is that Valerie ended up with EVH instead of me, that stupid twat... so that one ended up the worst 

 

 

in recent years, you ask?: none

I never finished season 5 of GOT, didn't get to the end of S1 of Lost, never cared for Seinfeld or Friends, etc...

 

I honestly can't remember most series finales anymore from many moons ago. A more recent one that stuck with me was The Middle. I enjoyed that ending. Recently saw The Big Bang Theory. It seemed like a nice enough ending, but the last few seasons were on-and-off bland to me. The Office had a decent ending. ST:TNG had a decent ending too. The 2004 Battlestar Galactica series ending was decent enough, but seemed a bit anticlimactic to me. I can't remember anything else off the top of my head.

To my younger eyes, the ending to Blake's 7 was a bit of a surprise.

'ALF' season four two part finale which never aired Part 2.  In the final broadcast of ALF, ALF is captured by federal agents.  The fifth season opener was to be Part 2 but 'ALF' was canceled and Part 2 never aired.

 

The Middle? Really? I'll have to go back and watch. I haven't seen the show since Brick was tiny.

BG was a huge bummer to me. I'm into emotional connections, and after five years of intensity between these people, the parting felt strangely detached. I didn't feel anything between them really. 

The Next Generation was pretty good...a nice timey-wimey story and a satisfying (yet open ended) conclusion. 

This also remind me that people hated Star Trek: Enterprise's ending. (I didn't really care for the show, but I do recall being underwhelmed at the least and I can understand how people who invested much time into it thought they were cheated)

Understandable about the politics...with how things have turned in America most political satire isn't that funny to me anymore because the real world is just that much more absurd. That said, a) I watched the majority of the series before 2016 and b) the writing and story development keeps it interesting. (That said, it does get better as it goes...seasons 3-5 are the best IMO)

Yeah...I assumed Tony died in the show, but it was unsatisfying. And lol...yeah. GOT really does embrace the darkness. 

Hi,

(Sorry ... soapbox moment and probably too long!)

I have a problem with these comments, and some folks upset that the ending did not go the way they wanted.

I find this bizarre, specially in these times, when the show ends making a call for PEACE ... not HATRED, and continuing carnage all over the place, by people that sometimes feel their religion is right, and everyone else's is wrong ... off with their heads!

We have to make a statement ... and standing up for what is "right" is valuable and strong, and the ending of "GoT" makes sense ... after so many years of fighting, it was time someone said that .... look, it's over ... we are all in shambles, in small pieces, and have no families anymore thanks to so much this and that ... and the worst ... it means NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING, to a bunch of idiots that is simply looking for a complete meltdown and carnage that only leaves one horse up in the middle of the field, and everyone else dead ... what a grand victory that is ... EMPTY ... TOTALLY EMPTY!

We might as well, start saying worse things than what "GoT" finished with ... we don't like the history of the native American, so we write them off the books, because they are ulgly. We don't like them blacks, because they make out history look bad, so we make sure they _____________ ... whichever. We don't like laws that give people their own rights, like abortion, because we think that we have the right to make the laws for every one else ... like religions, who have been known to kill for it, and then some, in many places in the world, not that it did not happen in America many years, back, and BTW, they were not the only ones suffering ... at one time, even the US Government approved the ethnic cleansing in a few northern states to get rid of some foreigners ... like most Americans, were not foreigners in the first place, but they had God's Right to kill all the indians they found and take their land!

The same group of people complaining, is really out of it ... they are not even human enough to stand up to the bigger movie studios for creating comic book heroes and convincing you that these are great movies, with great meaning ... or that Walt Disney is really for the kids, when it has been for the money for more than 50 years ... but you won't look at that ... it's so much fun to spend your money on this and that Disney ... or to pay for a big screen movie of the next Marvel BS hero.

To complaint about GoT, is like saying that Melville is an a****le, for writing his opus. That Shakespeare is a jerk, for messing up all those stories that we don't like and everyone calls them tragedies ... heaven forbid that one of those idiots goes to see a Macbeth production! Or a Richard III driving off in a Jeep ... or some idiotic Spanish writer, putting together a child story about a man losing his head in his old age ... that's a story? Crap ... it's all around us during the whole day!

I am not sure what the answer is, but my concern is that one of these groups will end up, one day, full of guns, and starting another religious this and that, and start "destroying" history and all the arts, because they don't like it, and its lessons.

I want to tell you something ... the one this or that which will destroy a Vatican and its symbolism, and or the Mecca, will face an end and destruction that will be so cataclysmic that it is not funny ... and maybe that is the best thing ... maybe we need to start all over and get our priorities straight ... and at least have the aability to know what is a "novel", and what is "reality" ... because right now, a band of idiots, can not tell the difference, and thinks their children are being taught incorrectly in our schools and that all the science, literature and arts in the world ... is just crap ... 

You know, sometimes I'm glad that my time is closer to the end, than not ... things like this, not to mention the cynicism that will follow this article, just are not what I would love to see for everyone ... who, in their own american way ... will stand up and hate everything ... with one problem ... they do not have a replacement for it ... it's all about destruction and more destruction and ... more destruction. 

I wonder what is the point of "life" ... in that world!

Those two shows never got a proper series finale episode. They just ended. 

The A-Team never got a finale, only a sucky 5th season. 

Comedies, and almost all funny material, is well known to not be able to have a good/clean ending ... because our sensitivities ended up spread around too much on gags and jokes, and funny this and that, to the point that ... how do you end this? Like we do in life? Hit by a truck? Or, just make it simple ... turn out the lights.

MASH, for example, would always "end" when the war ends, and its folks are gone. So why does it need an ending? The best moments are gone and we want replacements? CHEERS and FRIENDS made it too much about the stars, to the point that when the money was not going to be there, and the shows were no longer a CASH COW to the studios, it was much easier to call it a night, with or without end. 

That's usually the way things are in our lives, anyway ... so what is the screaming all about? 

About the only "comedy" that I have seen that has an ending, is BEDAZZLED, the original by PC and DM ... which has a magnificent ending ... PC is looking to get his job done so he can go back to the big house and be one of God's favorites again ... and when he gets there? He's not wanted ... and his revenge? Advertising! And more corporate cheating and what not ... there is nothing else to see after that ... except, go back to the same old story ... which this time Stanley does not want ... even that side of the story gets resolved!

WKRP was a very funny show.  They did a reunion series that lasted about a season.   Never a big fan of Married w/ Children.

A better, and less funny story would be that of the ... KMET in Los Angeles. On a certain, day, out of the blue, the number one rock station on the FM dial in LA ... went dark for a few minutes and came up five minutes later playing elevator new age music ... and the media did not say a whole lot ... because the biggest media conglomerate owned the station ... and the DJ's? They all disappeared ... for the most part. Radio Waste ... my friends! Now you know about that album!

Jim Ladd can probably tell you more about all this, but I think he is too cool and rich to say anything these days ... besides, he can have dinners with Roger, and you and I can't! And, these days, that is more important than some of the bad things that many of us got to see. 

The stories around Space Pirate Radio that Guy had written about in his blog, are even worse than what happened in LA.

 

No wonder I didn't remember them, then....

 

Though I think that WKRP did have somewhat of a goodbye episode.... But it's all very blurry because there hasn't been reruns or compilation of the series, because it's simply impossible to buy the rights of the music that station programmed and stikll sell DVD or BR aat a reasonable price and make a profit.

Re Seinfeld, it seemed like the point of the finale was that they were all getting their comeuppance for years of selfish behavior.  But it wasn't needed because they generally got their just desserts at the end of each episode.  Still, the biggest problem with the finale was the general lack of humor in the witness testimonies.