Although every QaF thread I’ve started has sunk like a stone with only 1 or 2 replies, I’ll try again.
I was pleased with the finale but surprised by the lack of a real nail-biting cliffhanger, like when Justin was bashed. Another surprise was the lack of a pregnancy scare with Melanie. I really expected her to miscarry in the finale leading to marital problems. I’m glad they didn’t do that though.
Justin has become my favorite character even though he’s getting less screen time lately. And Brian keeps maturing and growing into a likeable person. He showed real kindness to Emmett and I thought their scene on the dance floor was touching.
I thought he was going to tell Justin “I love you” there at the end. I think he did non-verbally; but I wanted him to finally say it. I also expected Brian to start his own agency and steal some of his former clients in this episode as a set-up for next season.
Scott continues to protray Ted’s decline convincingly. And the return of a cleaned-up Blake surprised me. That could be interesting. I never really bought Ted and Emmett together. Ted has always been a little too self-loathing, I thought, for Emmett to put up with.
Michael on the run with The Kid, I guess, is the main cliffhanger; but I just don’t care about those two. I hope they disappear for a few episodes (or entirely) next season. Hal Sparks should not have left Talk Soup.
Perhaps the reason your threads sink is because you so perfectly summarize what’s going on. I agree with just about everything in the OP.
The Kid bugs me to no end. I want him gone, too. But Hal Sparks can come back after he sinks a few more dollars into some acting classes.
Ted is absolutely breaking my heart, and I heartily concur that Scott Lowell is doing an incredible job playing his addiction. You can feel the desperation coming off him. I’m also glad Blake’s back. I thought they had a real connection despite the drugs.
I missed an episode before this one, I think. Did Melanie, Ted, and Emmett ever make up?
Getting tired of the Ted story. What an annoying, spineless wimp. Anybody but Em would have thrown that sorry ass out as soon as he was moping about his porn business being shut down.
Michael running off with Hunter…hmm…hope the opening scene next season isn’t a crashed Corvette wrapped around a tree.
Wonder if they are going to keep Stockwell in as a nemisis for Brian. Am I the only one who thinks Stockwell might be a closet case? He seemed to enjoy the view of Brian getting into the hot tub.
Also wonder how Brian will get his finances back, but knowing this show, he will be fabulously rich again by epsiode three of next season. (Still pissed off they had Em’s character lose ALL the inherited money from Mr. Pickle).
Love Debbie. She can do no wrong.
I also thought they were going to play the old, “Is Mel miscarriaging?” bit as a cliffhanger. Was very happy to see they skipped that cliche.
So, do we now have to wait until January for the next season?
Dang.
P.S. I have digital cable and have been taping the show for a friend in Germany. However, recently the shows are longer (by 5-8 minutes) than the listing on the cable program. When programming, it cuts off the show exactly at 10:45 even though the episode wasn’t finished. That sucked. So now I have to manually turn on and turn off the VCR. Just wondering if this is a COX cable screw up, or is this happening elsewhere.
Ok, I hate to bitch about the show since I’ve watched every episode since the beginning…BUT…it’s like a trainwreck and I can’t turn away. The plot with the kid is irritating. Very unrealistic. He’s taking the HIV annoyingly well. I think I would have had a nervous breakdown. He also is in desperate need of a haircut.
This show has become more ingratiating than your average daytime soap. The plot lines are thin and are resolved much too quickly for me to give a shit about the outcome. Everyone has paired off and settled into domesticity. The predictibility is out of control, even the dialogue is predictible. What the hell happened to this show??? The dancing in the streets after the mayoral election results was over the top. Give me a break. That wouldn’t even happen in L.A. or New York. I wanted to puke. Brian, Justin, & Michael all do something noble, sacrificing everything for a cause. Again, pass the barf bag. Where’s the grit? The cutting edge story lines from the first season?
Ok. had to get it off my chest.
Wait…one more thing.
Is anyone else out there bothered by the disclaimer at the end of the show every week? That the show “depicts the lives of a particular group of gay men and lesbian friends and does not represent the lives of ALL gays” or something to that effect. WTF???
I don’t see a discaimer for The Sopranos that it does not reflect the lives of ALL Italians, ALL mafioso, or ALL citizens of New Jersey! The show ER ought to let me know that it does not represent the happenings in ALL hospitals, the lives of ALL doctors, or ALL nurses. FRIENDS should make it known to all that it is not meant to reflect the lives of ALL heterosexual friends.
As much as I enjoy bashing the show, I have to say that last night’s season ender was downright decent. I loved the role reversal of Ted being the mess and Blake being the guy in charge. Ted is an incredibly annoying character;when he was the Internet pron tycoon, he was puffed up with his own superiority, but as soon as he lost his business he immediately crashed and burned. One would think that he would be more centered.
The Kid stpryline is acutally the most compelling forme because I like the way that giving the kid love and support has made Mikey less of a self-centered, spiteful asshole.
And yes, I think Stockwell is a total closet case.
I didn’t see this thread before I started min so I’ll transfer mine here and ask for mine to be closed.
I’ve really enjoyed this season, more than the previous two. CowLip has said all along that the theme of the series is “boys becoming men” and that growth has been reflected in all the major male characters. More than any other I’d say it’s been shown in Brian and Justin’s relationship. Brian has always been my least favorite of the four guys. But the way he was shown dealing with Justin’s departure, while still honoring the commitments he had made to Justin, showed a depth to Brian’s character that had been lacking in earlier seasons. Justin’s growth in understanding that what he had and what he got from Brian was love even without the words being said was very well done. Ted and Emmet’s relationship and the snags it hit were very well done and showed the bumpiness of growing up. And of course Michael, the most childish of the group, has pretty much had adulthood thrust upon him with having Ben’s issues and now Hunter’s.
I liked that Vic is getting some. I liked that Debbie is getting some. I appreciated the increased length of some of the storylines, like the Stockwell campaign and Ted’s legal issues/job woes/addiction. A big complaint from previous seasons was the tendency to wrap up potentially interesting storylines in two or at most three episodes and more often than not never revisit the story. Also the storylines felt less “issue-driven” than in previous years. Before it was like “OK, let’s have the GSA story, then the gay-bashing story, then the HIV scare story then the ‘ex-gay’ story.” This season the stories seemed more character-driven.
I did not like that the best they could come up with for the lesbians was another baby. There must be something non-child related going on in the lesbian world that we could get a story about!
I really hope that Stockwell doesn’t turn out to be a closet case although I am getting that vibe off him as well. Talk about predictable!
Hunter is growing on me as a character although I will want to see what happens to him next season. He struck me at the start of his arc as “QAF: The Next Generation” and I was annoyed at the thought of going down that road.
I’ve been in Ted’s place to the point of being deeply depressed about not having a job so I can’t fault that storyline. Why didn’t Em throw him out when he started “moping”? Um, maybe because Em loves him and isn’t a shallow asshole?
That said, the Ted/Blake role reversal couldn’t have been more obvious. I’d been waiting for Blake Clean and Sober to show up from Ted’s first hit on the pipe. IRL though I don’t think Blake would ever be Ted’s counselor because of their prior relationship.
But this isn’t real life, this is the magical land of Pittsburgh, where seasons change from week to week, time flows backward and forward and the laws of God and man don’t apply. Which is why I was not upset in the least for there to be dancing in the street.