Six Feet Under, without a doubt.
Ah yes. The flashforward to end all flashforwards.
Second vote for The Shield. Absolutely brilliant.
I came to appreciate the ending of The Soprano’s.
The Shield.
“Newhart” and “The Fugitive” are the best.
I’ll give a mention for “Upstairs, Downstairs” after everyone had moved out of 165 Eaton Place, Rose walked through the empty rooms with sound clips of what happened in each room played.
I can’t say it was the most perfect series ending, but I think honorable mention should go to the short-lived I Married Dora.
The male lead boards a flight that will take him away for two years, leaving his family in emotional turmoil in the airport. Then this happens: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvVR99yafr8
Most of the examples in this thread have been endings to memorable series, but when the ending of an otherwise completely forgettable series has stuck with me for more than 20 years, I have to give it some props.
Six Feet Under for the last fifteen minutes.
The Shield for
[spoiler]Vic Mackey is the man who ALWAYS managed to out think and out hustle everyone and who used his badge to commit numerous crimes. He confesses every horrible thing he’s ever done in exchange for immunity and what he believes is a sweet job with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), hoping to continue being the one who always gets his man, by any means necessary. The only thing that he loves more than being a cop is his family and friends.
In the end, he loses his family to witness protection, his friends are all dead or in jail and that sweet job? He’s a suit wearing desk jockey, expected to produce so many reports per week, nothing else. If he quits or is fired, he loses immunity. He is trapped in bureaucracy and all alone.[/spoiler]
Had a distinctly Deus ex Machina feel to it. That’s a cop out and dirty trick to fans.
It’s only a *deus ex machina *if the gods aren’t an integral part of the play from the beginning. BSG was *always *a religious story. Remember, we had a character who for four seasons claimed over and over again that she was an angel of God - why are people so surprised to learn she had been telling the simple truth?
Everyone seems to mistake BSG for science fiction.
Thanks for helping me remember how excellent The Shield’s ending was. I had just remembered it as being dark and depressing. Only fitting!
I’m pleased that my memory of SFU is shared by so many.
Excellent summary. I just want to add
…and all of that conveyed with a daring - what was it - 5 minutes of silent close up on Vic’s face. With no musical adornment, no fancy camera work, we see Vic in a well deserved private hell. His facial expressions as he processes his new lot in life was amazing acting - and a powerful conclusion to a wonderfully crafted long-running story.
I’d have to say the ending lost points for being so obvious; it was the only way it could’ve ended . . . unless someone had thought beyond that.
I liked the ending of Harper’s Island. It knew it was going to be a one-season show (with the premise, how could it not have been?) and it wrapped things up in a satisfying way the last two episodes. Although, unlike Grey’s Anatomy’s season finale, you weren’t left with the sense of “they should have killed off more people,” so it’s not as though there were too many loose ends to deal with 
I liked how Dawson’s Creek ended too, despite not killing off you were left with a good feeling about how almost everyone turned out.
On the other hand, I didn’t like how either Buffy or Angel ended, because they left me with the same now-what feelings as any other episodes did. And that made me sad, because there were to be no more glimpses into what could have come next- at least not for people who aren’t inclined to read comics.
One that I don’t think has been mentioned: The West Wing. Have the series end with Bartlet finishing his Presidency and a new President being inaugurated.
Didn’t we do this just recently?
I’ll second the vote for Blackadder Goes Forth, and add Ashes to Ashes. Since the latter has yet to air outside the U.K., I won’t spoil it.
These are the two I was going to say.
If you like happy endings, Charmed did an excellent job of tying off all loose ends in a nice way. Oh sure, many died and came back but The Charmed Ones were always dying and coming back anyway.
Another vote for The Shield. I was very disappointed by the ending of Lost - it had some cool parts but in all in just didn’t make any goddamned sense. The Shield’s ending was perfectly logical, yet still managed to have great emotional payoffs:
Claudette took Vic in the interrogation room and quietly and calmly ripped him an asshole, and made a clear case for what a horrible person he was. Then she arrested Ronnie right in front of him forcing Vic to stand and swallow his own betrayal. Before he leaves there’s a subtle moment where Dutch is looking at him and Vic can’t really meet his gaze, showing that all of this time Dutch has indeed been the better cop and the better man.
Plus there were many great moments other than the very end, especially the final conversation (over the phone) between Vic and Shane, which was even more brutal than any physical altercation could have been. The end of the Shield was just handled perfectly.
Mmm… while I agree it wasn’t as terrible as everyone makes it out to be, calling it one of the best is pushing it for me. I guess it depends on whether you want to feel good at the end of a series or not. It was not by any stretch of the imagination a ‘‘feel-good’’ ending. It made me feel an incredible sense of loss. But then, the whole series kinda did.
Six Feet Under times a billion - I don’t think something has made me feel so much emotion in so short space of time. I watched it a few days ago and it still made me shed a few tears.