I thought Star Trek: Voyager’s conclusion was fine. Not as good as ST:TNG’s or DS9’s, but OK.
The X-Files ended poorly, I’d agree. But my all-time most-hated series conclusion was that of Twin Peaks:
The quirky but pure-at-heart FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper is possessed by the evil and murderous Bob, but no one else knows. It was an awful end for a wonderful character, and implies that what happens next is going to be esp. nasty. What a shame.
Eep! I couldn’t believe anyone could consider that finale to be good, so after Elendil’s Heir posted, I checked, and yeah, I was thinking of the ST: Enterprise finale. Which was a steaming pile of poo.
I’m not sure I’ve even seen Voyager’s finale.
Although I actually sort of enjoyed the decision to Abandon Colonial technology and civilization. Not because it made sense - this was a horrible call. But the entire series was, IMHO, about watching the mind-fracked survivors of nuclear holocaust endure the final, inexorable decline and fall of Colonial institutions - the erosion of the economy, courts, democracy, and so on. The story can’t end well, and it really doesn’t. I liked that.
**X-files **has the worst finale of any successful show that has ended since 2000. I think it makes Lost’s look brilliant.
Seinfeld’s final episode was also worse than Lost’s, but it is a different genre.
Yeah, but the only expectations for Seinfeld was for it to be funny. There was no mythology that people were invested in that was supposed to have been made clear.
It was a mediocre episode as compared to Seinfeld episodes. It was still a great episode compared to its competitions - like, say, Dharma and Greg.
-Joe
Oh, yes. Enterprise and Seinfeld both ended badly. Big letdowns.
Snerk.
I never understood the hate for the Seinfeld finale
explain
note that I never watched the show until after the finale in syndication
I hated that decision, both from a logical perspective and as a creative choice. Thought it was batshit insane on both counts. I’d rather the show end with the Galactica and ragtag fleet getting massacred by cylons…or both sides losing the final battle.
Soap. As a soap opera parody it had several continuing storylines, each of which ended in a life-threatening cliffhanger. And then it didn’t get renewed.
Yeah, I’d forgot about Soap… but the worst? Roseanne. No question.
I have to give Married w/ Children a little love.
As in, no ending at all. 11 seasons on the air, 263 episodes. It deserved to have a finale to put a button on what might happened to Al, Peg, Kelly, Bud, Marcy, and Jefferson.
Along with The Simpsons, it was Fox’s flagship TV Show for many years.
Just to throw something different into the mix, does anybody remember Dream On? It was quirky and inventive, if not necessarily groundbreaking. I enjoyed it.
Martin had spent the entire series pining over his ex-wife Judith, who was basically a horrible shrew who treated him like crap. By the end of the show, Martin has finally won her back, and they are planning to re-marry. The perfect ending, IMO, would have been for him to realize at that point that, now that he had gotten her back, he was finally over her, and to call off the wedding so that he can at last get on with his life. That’s what the entire run of the series seemed to have been moving toward. Instead, nope, he marries his bitch ex, presumably living miserably ever after. Ugh.
The Sopranos…game…set…match.
I prefer shows that don’t have a “finale.” Like Cheers: after the final episode, you get the feeling life goes on at the bar as it always had, and I found that comforting. Yeah, they’re all still there, and they still know your name.
That episode was “Deadlock,” which I just rewatched the other day, and it’s quite good up to that point. In fact it could have been saved even then, if they’d showed Kim having difficulty dealing with his situation, or established that Ensign Wildman was unable to bond with the alternate, still-living version of her dead baby that Kim brought with him, or something like that. The basic problem with Voyager was their refusal to commit to their premise or show consequences to anyone’s actions.
I agree that the Cheers finale was a smart one. No reason to close the bar or have any major changes happen.
Well, you have to define major change, I think. Rebecca got married, Woodie became a city councilman, and Norm got a job, after all.
I think it went:
My future self comes back in time to save us all.
I didn’t mind the BSG finale at all. And I didn’t watch Lost. But these sucked:
I also hated the endings of Sports Night and Firefly, but that’s just because I didn’t want those series to end. The episodes were fine, even if they didn’t wrap everything up.