You sort of got it. Sam decided there was one thing he had to fix: convincing Al’s wife to not give up on her husband. We viewers couldn’t really know what he had in mind until we saw Mrs. Calavicci, which is why I think they should have ended the show with him just leaping.
And his subconscious was telling him at what points to jump into various peoples lives that in turn helped other people in some kind of happy web of lives touching lives? It’s obvious they were saying god was jumping him around they just whimped out. So no there was no payoff because they didn’t do the reveal.
Now admittedly I saw it last a 1,000 years ago but as I remember it the ghost came in helped people then jumped out which is exactly Sam’s M.O. even using the same graphic effect. If it wasn’t leaping and time traveling what was it doing?
Oh and did they ever let him know he had a wife and restore his memory in total before he made his big decision to never go home? I forgot if they did or not but I know if they didn’t it would have been another reason I was pissed when I saw it.
It’s a bit of both. His subconsious was telling him where to go but it was God keeping him from going anywhere else until did what he was supposed to.
IIRC, the ghost was there the whole time, helped people, then disappeared. Sam remarked that the disappearance must be what he looks like when he jumps. Whether or not the ghost was actually jumping somwhere (sometime?) else is unknown.
That they did. Sam did jump home for one episode, the opener for Season 4. Sam & Al switch places due to a lightning strike.
Oh yeah, and the only ones who could see the ghost were Sam and the bartender.
I remember not only loving that final episode, but being sort-of freaked out by Earl’s boss essentially going mad towards the end. (If I remember correctly, as the dinosaurs were dying, he was locked up in his trailer, cackling insanely. Creepy.)
My vote is wishy-washy and unfunny.
See, this is my biggest problem with the ending–to have such an obvious “moral focus” is completely unnecessary, particularly if you paid attention throughout the course of the series.
The point of the show was that these people could be hopelessly self-centered and blithely callous to the concerns of others, but most of the time, this would bite them in the ass! They didn’t need a finale that gave them their comeuppance, because every other episode had their various schemes and deceptions and manipulations cruelly unravel (with Kramer getting off the lightest and George often getting it the worst) before their eyes. Sure, sometimes they got away scott-free, but usually, all four were in a perpetual state of damage control because of their clueless, inconsiderate, or selfish actions. Why bother having a finale that simply stated this in the most heavy-handed obvious way possible, when the series had accomplished it seamlessly dozens of times much much better already? The whole contrivance of the finale’s scenario to fashion such a “moral” ending would’ve been ridiculously stupid if it weren’t so apparent they were going for just that type of “irony.” If you really thought that this was the chickens finally coming home to roost after all these years of them “getting away” with things, my only question is: Were you actually awake during the run of the show? 
I got the “inside joke”, but that’s all it was. An “inside joke”. And not even a particularly clever one.
A longer, more joke-filled episode would have been more true to the spirit of the series in that it would have been entertaining, instead of this largely laugh-free “object lesson”. Yuck.
And if I’m remembering the last ST:TNG episode, was that with Q and the multiple-crews and some space-time gobbledy-gook? Double Yuck.
Hmmm it’s been years since I saw the ending, so when its released on DVD later this year I might be able to see the problems more readily, however my recollection of the ending was that:
Al the Bartender (God) told Sam that he(God) wasn’t the one leaping him around to set right what once went wrong, that it was Sams decision to do this, but whilst he was choosing to help, he was being guided into the right people.
In an earlier episode they had established that the Leapees personalities stayed with Sam, so it was my understanding that the bar was actually Sams subconscious, and the “Ghost leaper” was actually God helping him get rid of some of the excess personalities (or maybe the most personally motivating to Sam?), to make way for a new batch.
Sam made the decision to help Al (for a second time) whilst he had a choice and then decided to continue helping people so never returned home.
I dont think that it was because he helped Al that he didnt return home, because if that was the case when he helped his own family in an earlier season it would’ve been a bigger problem IMO.
**
Could the problem also be the way it was advertised in the US? over here they basically didnt advertise the show (and near the end IIRC were jumping it all over the place), so we didnt have this build up as to getting answers to all the loose ends just a “Stay tuned next week for the final Quantum Leap”.
I have to disagree with many of the posters here. I thought the ending to QL was excellent. Added a little depth a meaning to both the show and the two main characters. Sam never went home because he didn’t want to. He wanted to stay and help which suited his character to a tee.
Another vote for Blake’s Seven. Damn was that a good show. I was 9 when I saw the last episode and it blew me away. Paul Darrow cackling as the credits role. Brilliant end to a brilliant series. I remember telling my Dad that I thought Avon could shoot his way out. He didn’t argue with me so I knew I was wrong 
I disliked the finale of QL – or rather, I disliked the title card at the end – becase it seemed inconsistent. The final episode to me seemed like Sam had reached epiphany about his leaping – he was doing it on purpose to himself in order to help people. Once he understood that consciously for the first time, it meant he should have been able to take some time off and visit his wife once in a while, and then go back to work. That was my thinking as the episode ended, and it was a very happy ending; even while Sam continues his work, he’s no longer trapped and, more importantly, he understands that it was never a trap in the first place. But instead, the title card seemed to erase all that and suggest that it was just more and more of the same, forever.
–Cliffy
Except those people were completely different characters who only looked like ones Sam had run into while leaping and at the end he didn’t leap into anyone. From Mrs. Calavicci’s point of view, this strange guy appeared out of nowhere and told her that Al was safe and will return to her.
Just remembered, the episode that week was supposed to be one that had been postponed from a previous week, at least in my area.
Ahh ok my memories of it are a bit suspect then, I hadnt remembered that they had different names to the original chars, and I had thought that Sam leaped into one of her friends.
definately need to watch it again then.
My understanding of the QL finale was that Sam was dead, like the ghost walking around, and that God himself was there telling him about it. Kind of a time-traveling Touched by an Angel.
Of course that doesn’t mesh real well with him having gone home earlier, or Al having leaped.
So you DIDN’T run out to see Fire Walk With Me when it hit the theatres?!?! 
I actually thought the last ep was a bright spot in a meandering second season. The cliffhanger was a last-ditch, too-late effort by David to get another seaon out of ABC.
It wasn’t a best last ep ever done but it wasn’t that bad.
That bad were MASH & XENA.
Best ever was, of course, NEWHART.
Pretty darn good were BUFFY & ANGEL & HERCULES.
Just finished the thread & I :smack: that I totally forgot Seinfeld as one of the worst.
It could have been one of the best if it had a different final scene-
The whole ep is exactly as shown- the Jury renders the Guilty verdict AND THEN…
Newman, having been stuffing his face with snacks, laughs so hard at the verdict, he starts choking on his mouthful of chips.
Close-up on Kramer, who’s thinking “I gotta help Newman!”, runs over to do Heimlich.
Close-up on Elaine, thinking “Newman! My love! I’m coming to save you!”, runs over to help.
Close-up on George, “Hey, maybe if I help, the Judge’ll go easy on me!”, runs over to help.
Close-up on Jerry, looking askance at all of them, thinking “Aw, let the fat bastard choke.”
“Goodbye … Newman!”
Come on, people. How about the ending for I Remember Mama?
That’s definitely correct. One thing that irritated me about the last episode (aside from all the egregious legal mistakes during the trial–but that’s just the lawyer in me), was the whole “they’re finally getting their comeuppance” tone that was really misplaced. Granted, the characters were definitely not shining examples of humanity at its finest, but they weren’t exactly J.R. Ewings either. For the most part, their offenses were so petty (the blase reaction to the death of George's fiance notwithstanding) that it wasn’t really worth getting too upset about. Now, I might’ve cut the episode some slack if the characters ended up getting unequally punished with George getting the worst of it (i.e., not only being found guilty and having to serve the full sentence but also losing his job, his money to pay his legal fees, and his family after being disowned by his parents) and Kramer, as usual, getting off lightly with nothing more serious than a small fine. As you stated, that would have been in character with the type of “punishments” that were meted out during the previous episodes of the series.
Another vote for Futurama here. The final episode had it all: romance, intrigue, and the Robot Devil. I watch it all the time on DVD.
I thought Cheers was pretty good too, although looking back makes me wonder…
Was there some deep meaning to that scene where someone knocked on the door causing lucky-son-of-a-bitch Sam to call out that the bar was closed? I mean, I get that it’s the last episode so the show is “closed,” but in the Cheers world it wasn’t going anywhere right? I think we learned as much in a few Fraiser episodes. Years later and that still scene strikes me as odd.
And I didn’t particularly like the Seinfeld conclusion either. I can see valid points that it may or may not have been brilliant/clever/subtle/whatever, but I just didn’t enjoy it mainly because George became such a raving jackass. I know he was never supposed to be the traditional likable character, but his dialogue in the last episode just irked the hell out of me.
So far Mad About You ended up in both the best and worst piles. Can anyone summarize how the show ended for those of us who didn’t watch it religiously?
The funny thing about this thread is that it’s making me realize how many shows I used to watch whose endings I have absolutely no recollection of now. Anyone remember if Wings had a decent sendoff?
Well…[spoiler]It starts off with Paul and Jamie at their daughter’s movie premier (obviously an art house hack job) they are split up and barely civil to each other. The daughter is seemingly narrating another movie about them (this I think leads many many people to believe that Paul and Jamie are watching the movie that the show is framed around which is very confusing to say the least) Then you get a series of flash backs showing how the family got to where they are and the high and low points in their lives. Like Jamie having a miscarriage. Their dog dying Paul’s dad dying etc. Then it shows them splitting up because Jamie has become bitter and hostile over the years. This is the weakest point of the show because it’s hard to figure out why she became this way. Was it the miscarriage? Was it the pressure of raising a daughter? Did she feel betrayed by Paul for not getting another vasectomy like he told her and blame the miscarriage on him? This isn’t explained very well. Then the show starts to end on a dark note implying that the daughter blames her mother for all her troubles in life and the fact that she keeps standing up men at the alter.
Of course it ends with Jamie kissing Paul at the end of the art house film and them reconciling and the daughter saying she blames her mom because now she’s not going to be happy with anything except the love like her parents share.
The other characters are visited. Ira is married to Mary-Ann (sp?) and has dozens of adopted kids. Lisa is still single (if I remember right)
In short a very ambitious episode but if they pulled it off or not depends on who is watching it I guess. [/spoiler]
Heh as for the Quatum Leap thing I think it’s better I don’t say anything more until I see it again. I just know I hated it when I saw it at the time and leave it at that.