May
24
Lost’s finale aired this morning, with many of us here in the UK braving the early start on a Monday to tune in. I wasn’t very impressed with what happened – the Smoke Monster was taken out far too early and I didn’t think everything should have ended on quite such a happy note at the end, but maybe that’s just me.
At any rate, here are five shows that finished poorly, and earned the ire of fans as a result, or split them down the middle.
Quantum Leap
This is always on any list like this, so let’s get it out of the way now. After so many adventures through time, a small epitaph telling us that Sam Beckett never made it home is all we get? Thanks a lot, guys. This surely has to rank as one of the biggest screw-ups in the history of ending television, except for Dallas, maybe.
Battlestar Galactica
This divided fans clean in half, it seems. Some thought it was a wonderful conclusion; others thought it was hackneyed and overly saccharine at the end. Not to mention the unfathomable logic of Lee Adama. I’m in the latter camp – a true disappointment for an otherwise amazing series.
Supernatural
More specifically, the last ten minutes or so. How incredible would it have been to have just pulled the camera out as Dean knelt where Sam had been pulled into Hell, battered and broken while the bodies of Cas and Bobby lay beside him? A bit morbid, perhaps, but better than making Chuck God and having Samifer back at the end. It was a perfect episode up until then.
Star Trek: Voyager
Again, we spent seven long years watching Voyager try time and time again to get home, and we didn’t even get to see them actually get home in the end? What a jip. Of course, the extended universe went some way toward mollifying us in the form of books, comics, Star Trek Elite Force II and a small scene in Nemesis, but it’s not the same.
Stargate SG-1
What show runs for ten years and doesn’t bother at least trying to wrap the story up in the finale? ‘Unending’ was a good episode, but a poor finisher for the series as a whole. Yes, they were saving it for The Ark Of Truth, but really, that was little more than a filler episode, and not the finale the show deserved.
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The Stargate SG-1 series is not yet finished. They are planning on making additional movies, it did not get a proper finale because it isn’t finished.
Unending was the finale for the televised series, which is what I was referring to. Whether or not there will be more past Continuum is debatable.
And from the 80s there’s the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon which never had a conclusion either.
I thought Unending was a great finale. If Ark of Truth was the tying up of the plot arc, Unending was a more of an emotional farewell to the characters. Better that then trying to tie everything up in too short a time.
Star Trek: Voyager did end up with the crew getting to Earth – you see the ship heading towards Earth in the final episode!
The Sarah Connor Chronicles deserves a proper ending as does Pushing Daisies and Reaper – these great shows were cancelled too early, so a mini movie to tie up loose ends would be awesome! :)
What I mean is there was no conclusion to it. You see the ship heading towards Earth, but you don’t see anything like the scenes at the beginning of Endgame. It felt like a cop out, or an artistic decision gone wrong.
Actually there was a proper ending to SG1, it was called Moebius. Anything that came afterward was a badly written tacked on mess that shouldn’t have happened. Moebius was grand and they just had to go ahead and ruined it. They were originally going to make it a spin off called Stargate Command but they copped out and kept the SG1 name. Now the show has a permanent stain on its record. Even SGU can’t escape seasons 9-10 with this Lucian Alliance crap they’re writing into the show now. To quote Mr plinkett: “It will be around forever, it will never go away, it can never be undone.”
I personally really loved Lost’s ending. While certain mysteries were left at the end, I think that was probably for the best. What ‘The End’ was really about was providing resolution to the story and characters we’ve spent six years watching and caring about, something which I think it pulled off perfectly. The twist ending was weird and unexpected, but not exactly unwelcome either.
As for disappointing series finales, I’m surprised Star Trek: Enterprise wasn’t mentioned. That wouldn’t even have been very good as a stand-alone episode, but as an end to the entire series it was a downright insult. That the principle players were downgraded to bit-part characters in their own series just made it even worse.
As someone who loves Television, final episodes are a bit of a bugbear to me. Great final episodes (Mash, St. Elsewhere, Bilko, Magnum etc ) are few and far between. It seems to be a rule of thumb, TV wise, that the more you love a series the more likely it is that the final episode will leave you feeling down either because while you enjoyed the episode you are sad the series is ending and don’t want it to end (Mash, St. Elsewhere) or because if you knew how it was going to end you probably wouldn’t have loved or watched it in the first place (Dallas being the prime example ). It sees especially true of Sci-fi fantasy shows ( The Prisoner – original, ST :TNG, Quantum Leap, BSG, Babylon 5 and now sadly Lost. The only one I can think of that had anthing approaching a good final episode was probably DS9…………..
Ok, I wasn’t so sure about the Supernatural ending either, especially Samifer (like that!) coming back. All the crap about getting the guy in and then – he’sd just standing on the damn street again! And yes, Dean is great, when he’s broken – so I would have liked your ending, but I loved him gettin back to Lisa and come on: you GOTTA LOVE Cas as an Arcangel! :)
To all those like myself who were disappointed and critical of Lost’s final episode, i’m beginning to think we may have been a bit harsh. Why do i say this ? I’ve just seen the final episode of The Prisoner remake, the one we were told would be a much more explanatory ending than the original series……..
It is probably the worst ending ( and remake ) of any series i have ever seen . ….
Simple reason: American audiences need a voice over and it explained. For Lost, at least it wasn’t altogether explained. You missed SG Alantis, that ending was terrible!
Some better endings were with Charlie Jade.
If sci-fi mag looked at MPD Psycho, maybe it’d give a lot of trash coming out of the States as not as inventive as it’s asian counterparts! Lost is deffo LIGHT as compared to that series!
American audiences need a voice over and it explained. For Lost, at least it wasn’t altogether explained. You missed SG Alantis, that ending was terrible!
Some better endings were with Charlie Jade.
If sci-fi mag looked at MPD Psycho, maybe it’d give a lot of trash coming out of the States as not as inventive as it’s asian counterparts! Lost is deffo LIGHT as compared to that series!
Actually, I would like to point out that the Supernatural finale was a season finale, not a series finale, so the last ten minutes were basically a build up to hook us into season 6.