Television Collision: Finales, Finally!
Written by: Phoebe Raven, CC2K Staff Writer
A few weeks ago I shockingly confessed that I, TV junkie extraordinaire, was bored with television and needed Finale Week to roll around already and raise the stakes. And it did. While a few shows still have to follow foot, a lot of shows made their final appearance before the summer break (or forever) and gave fans and critics lots to talk about.
It is impossible to run down all the finales of all the shows and I will keep my mouth shut on one of the most hype-infused ones – Lost – but I will at least talk about some of the finales of shows I called out in my earlier article.
Warning: Spoilers ahead, if you aren’t up to date on your TV shows!
Let us start off with House:
This show needed a shake-up, according to my own assessment, and this it got. While the final episode of Season Six was in no way stellar, because it was too on the nose regarding House’s leg issues (and the resulting drug issues and personality issues), it did give me a lot of the things I asked for.
Firstly, Thirteen is taking a leave of absence. This is delightful to me. Though I have a lot of respect for Olivia Wilde and many people came around on her character Thirteen, I never really did. I still miss Cameron and I could never relate to Thirteen’s distanced, hardened, “bad girl with issues” act. I liked her best when coupled with Foreman, who went critically underused in the last half of the season. So I won’t be biting my nails for Thirteen’s return next season.
The other thing the Season Six finale delivered on was the House-Cuddy relationship: looks like Huddy will finally get a chance and it has been a long time coming. I never believed Cuddy was serious about Lucas anyway, so when the “for real” Huddy kiss finally happened, it didn’t take me by surprise at all. Maybe it should have, but my level of caring about House’s characters has been considerably reduced during this lackluster season, so I just nodded in approval.
A decent season finale was not enough to redeem the entire season, but there is hope for House’s future.
I also mentioned the underlying, boiling issues of Grey’s Anatomy that needed a good finale and boy, did Shonda Rhimes pull out all the stops! The two-hour Season Six finale was emotionally charged to the limit, although it did have some logical loopholes.
Let’s not get into the specifics of how a SWAT team actually handles a shooter in a hospital (or school or any other public building) and just suspend our disbelief for the sake of being entertained, heartbroken and riveted by the Grey’s finale.
I complained about the plethora of characters on the show lately, which made it impossible for any character to receive a decent amount of screen time. Well, the finale thinned out the crowd by two people at least, even though neither of them we really cared about. Two Mercy Westers are dead. The way Reed was killed was shocking in its cold-bloodedness, but (Charles) Percy’s death was just overly sappy. We only cared because it was Bailey holding his hand in death.
I wanted more from this finale. You set a shooter loose in the hospital, I wanted Shonda Rhimes to pull a Joss Whedon and kill a major character to break our hearts. Because it is not about what the audience WANTS, it’s about what the audience NEEDS and sometimes, we just need to have our hearts broken.
But killing a major character takes guts and in the end, Rhimes didn’t even have the guts to shoot Bailey (not killing Bailey, just shooting her, like Alex was shot). That’s a bit of a cop-out to me.
I am happy, however, about the pay-offs on two fronts: MerDer and Cristina and Owen. Those two couples had defining moments during the finale and I am excited to watch their relationships grow, change and maybe even crumble a bit.
All in all, it was one of the best finales of all shows.
One show that pleasantly surprised me in its finale was Bones. Too often, when faced with a choice, this show takes the obvious route and abandons good ideas from the past to construct new, implausible scenarios. But this time around they went with the quiet tones and softer notes.
The last image of Booth and Bones holding hands instead of kissing was very powerful. Both characters are aware that they have to go through their individual trials first (her in Indonesia, digging up bones and getting ready to open her heart; he training soldiers in Afghanistan and getting rid of his hero complex) for them to even have a chance at being together. The fact that Angela and Hodgins also decide to leave the Jeffersonian for a year makes me think Bones will yet again choose an obvious plot device: when the show returns in the fall, how much will you bet me it will jump ahead in time approximately eight to ten months, so that the “return home” of our characters will come in Episode 3 at the latest?
(In the show’s defense, Brothers & Sisters is also contemplating a time jump and such a thing has worked well for Desperate Housewives and Lost, so it may not be the worst move in TV history.)
Castle’s finale – you know, the other crime show with a bantering couple totally right for each other and yet not in a relationship at its center – had a way less satisfying finale than Bones. The two central characters here have never really talked about their attraction to each other and their “relationship” (a step Bones and Booth finally took and it was a great relief), so it’s no wonder they didn’t end up together and won’t for the next few seasons (because why would we continue watching, right?). Beckett finally decided that she just might have to give Castle a shot, but Castle’s ex-wife is back and she means blondie business. Ignoring the overworked crime scenarios that make little sense, the best two things about this show are Nathan Fillion – gold in anything he does – and the fact that Stana Katic finally decided to grow her hair out and it is starting to look decent. Castle needs to step it up to stay alive.
I have to say, while I enjoyed some of the finales a lot, I am not as devastated that the “fall shows” shows are going off the air for a few months as I have been in previous years. A lot of shows took missteps this season and need to get back on track. The new fall season also promises a lot of new shows and I am excited about it, because the old shows need some serious competition to remember what’s good for them.
The fact that a few of my favorite shows are returning this summer also helps me not miss the fall shows so much. True Blood is back in June, also returning is Mad Men (July 25th). Burn Notice kicks off its fourth season next week (EEEK!!!) and an all new round of brilliant dancing is about to hit us on Fox’s So You Think You Can Dance. I am ready for Summer TV, sweaty palms and heat waves included!
Recommended Collisions with your Television
(combine at will, all times EST, only new programming listed)
| Tuesday, May 25th |
|
| 8 p.m. | NCIS (CBS) |
| 9 p.m. | Glee (Fox) |
| NCIS: Los Angeles (CBS) | |
| 10 p.m. | Parenthood (NBC) |
| The Good Wife (CBS) | |
| Justified (FX) | |
| Wednesday, May 26th | |
| 9 p.m. | Criminal Minds (CBS) |
| 10 p.m. | CSI:NY (CBS) |
| Thursday, May 27th | |
| 8 p.m. |
FlashForward (ABC) |
| So You Think You Can Dance (Fox) | |
| Friday, May 28th |
|
| 8 p.m. | Friday Night Lights (NBC) |
| Past Life (Fox) | |
| 10 p.m. | Party Down (Starz) |
| 10:30 p.m. | Gravity (Starz) |
| Saturday, May 29th |
|
| Sunday, May 30th |
|
| Monday, May 31st |
|
| 10 p.m. | Nurse Jackie (Showtime) |
| 10:30 p.m. | United States of Tara (Showtime) |