The Cheat's Season Finale Reviews
Okay, I had to get this up before I left for Russia. This week was filled with the season finales of all of my favorite shows, and there was a great bit of disparity between them. It really made me think about what makes a 'good' season finale. Basically I think it comes down to a couple of key elements:
1. A 'bigger' episode than a normal week's episode. This is the week where you pull out all the stops for writing, production, special effects, guest stars, budget, pretty much everything. Your whole season has been leading up to this episode, and so the show better feel like it. Most season finales are two hours to accommodate all the extras, and I'm totally in favor of that, as long as the two hours don't feel drawn out.
2. A dramatic ending, that leaves you in suspense until next season. The best endings leave the resolution of the story in jeopardy - you don't get to find out what happens until the season resumes. A good ending can give your show legs well into next season, a bad one can kill off interest immediately. This is probably the toughest thing a television writer has to come up with.
Now, with those two things in mind, let's take a quick look at four shows that had their season finales this week.
24 - 24's season finales are always interesting, because the writers have to finish off the story. The nature of the show (one season takes place in one twenty-four hour day) means everything has to be pretty much resolved by the end of the 'day'. For this reason, 24's cliffhangers have never been the greatest. The first season's was probably the best, when we were left with Nina's betrayal of Jack and the death of his wife. Season three didn't really even have a cliffhanger. This year's left us with Jack as a presumed-dead fugitive, forced into hiding from his own government. While it doesn't create a ton of suspense, it definitely makes us curious to see how he'll return to the fold next year.
The 'story' part of this two-hour finale was split between two major plot elements, and one of them (the nuclear missile) seemed fairly anti-climatic at its end. This finale scored bonus points in my book with its closing shot: Jack Bauer walks into the sunset (and exile), but not before the money shot of him whipping out his aviator shades. The Cheat's Finale Grade: A-
House - I'm not really sure what I expected for a season finale for this show. It doesn't have many continuing plot lines, and so most of the episodes are fairly self-contained. The story ended up being a little better than average by introducing House's ex-lover and her new husband, and presenting House with the challenge of saving her husband while dealing with the fact that he still has feelings for her. The only real cliffhanger to speak of was that the woman gets bought on staff at the hospital, setting up a showdown between her and House's new quasi-love, Dr. Cameron. The Cheat's Finale Grade: C+
Lost – When I began watching this tonight, I knew I was going to hate the ending. Not because it was bad, but because I knew it wouldn’t really give away anything, and would just create more suspense around a plot that already had plenty. WHAT THE HECK IS IN THAT FREAKING HATCH?! I’ve been dying to know for weeks, and while I was really hoping to find out tonight, I really should have known better. Add to that the amazement of the guys on the raft actually running into other human beings, and then the shock of seeing what those so-called humans were after, and you’ve got a situation where I’d be happy to find the writers and kill them for teasing me so badly…except that then they wouldn’t be able to pick it all back up next season. I think the phrase "hurts so good" fits in here somewhere.
Aside from a little too much flashing back (do we really need to know that Hurley almost missed getting on the plane? Seriously, I mean, are we supposed to infer something from that?) this episode was filled with plenty of action and suspense on its own. Bonus points for the scene where Sayid cauterizes Charlie’s deep gouge by pouring gun powder on it and lighting it on fire. That Sayid is one bad-mother-shut-your-mouth! The Cheat’s Finale Grade: A
Alias – Alias fans have been waiting for a long time to see exactly how the Rambaldi prophesies were going to play out. I think all of us were a little disappointed. The episodes leading up to tonight’s finale were pretty good. In fact, I think they could have had last week’s two hour episode serve as the finale, with a little tweaking. Instead, we got an hour-long bomb…literally. The whole thing came down to the clichéd “which wire to cut” scenario found in so many mad-bomber movies. Oh, and that was after the clichéd “attack of the zombies” scenes. Also, what the heck was the motive behind this doomsday scenario anyway? What exactly are you supposed to do after the world gets turned into zombies? You can’t really go outside anymore, that’s for sure.
Alias has been famous for it’s cliffhangers over the years, with the “Sydney, you’ve been missing for years” ending going down as possibly the best cliffhanger ever (okay, Star Trek’s “Best of Both Worlds” still holds the top slot for me…). This year we discover that Vaughn isn’t really even Vaughn, and then before he can explain further, bam, a car crash. My question is: who the heck has that kind of conversation while they’re driving?! While there are some interesting directions this plot-twist could go next year, I really wish they had left us with an ending that was tied to the Rambaldi situation somehow. I think that would have been much more convincing. The Cheat’s Finale Grade: D
1. A 'bigger' episode than a normal week's episode. This is the week where you pull out all the stops for writing, production, special effects, guest stars, budget, pretty much everything. Your whole season has been leading up to this episode, and so the show better feel like it. Most season finales are two hours to accommodate all the extras, and I'm totally in favor of that, as long as the two hours don't feel drawn out.
2. A dramatic ending, that leaves you in suspense until next season. The best endings leave the resolution of the story in jeopardy - you don't get to find out what happens until the season resumes. A good ending can give your show legs well into next season, a bad one can kill off interest immediately. This is probably the toughest thing a television writer has to come up with.
Now, with those two things in mind, let's take a quick look at four shows that had their season finales this week.
24 - 24's season finales are always interesting, because the writers have to finish off the story. The nature of the show (one season takes place in one twenty-four hour day) means everything has to be pretty much resolved by the end of the 'day'. For this reason, 24's cliffhangers have never been the greatest. The first season's was probably the best, when we were left with Nina's betrayal of Jack and the death of his wife. Season three didn't really even have a cliffhanger. This year's left us with Jack as a presumed-dead fugitive, forced into hiding from his own government. While it doesn't create a ton of suspense, it definitely makes us curious to see how he'll return to the fold next year.
The 'story' part of this two-hour finale was split between two major plot elements, and one of them (the nuclear missile) seemed fairly anti-climatic at its end. This finale scored bonus points in my book with its closing shot: Jack Bauer walks into the sunset (and exile), but not before the money shot of him whipping out his aviator shades. The Cheat's Finale Grade: A-
House - I'm not really sure what I expected for a season finale for this show. It doesn't have many continuing plot lines, and so most of the episodes are fairly self-contained. The story ended up being a little better than average by introducing House's ex-lover and her new husband, and presenting House with the challenge of saving her husband while dealing with the fact that he still has feelings for her. The only real cliffhanger to speak of was that the woman gets bought on staff at the hospital, setting up a showdown between her and House's new quasi-love, Dr. Cameron. The Cheat's Finale Grade: C+
Lost – When I began watching this tonight, I knew I was going to hate the ending. Not because it was bad, but because I knew it wouldn’t really give away anything, and would just create more suspense around a plot that already had plenty. WHAT THE HECK IS IN THAT FREAKING HATCH?! I’ve been dying to know for weeks, and while I was really hoping to find out tonight, I really should have known better. Add to that the amazement of the guys on the raft actually running into other human beings, and then the shock of seeing what those so-called humans were after, and you’ve got a situation where I’d be happy to find the writers and kill them for teasing me so badly…except that then they wouldn’t be able to pick it all back up next season. I think the phrase "hurts so good" fits in here somewhere.
Aside from a little too much flashing back (do we really need to know that Hurley almost missed getting on the plane? Seriously, I mean, are we supposed to infer something from that?) this episode was filled with plenty of action and suspense on its own. Bonus points for the scene where Sayid cauterizes Charlie’s deep gouge by pouring gun powder on it and lighting it on fire. That Sayid is one bad-mother-shut-your-mouth! The Cheat’s Finale Grade: A
Alias – Alias fans have been waiting for a long time to see exactly how the Rambaldi prophesies were going to play out. I think all of us were a little disappointed. The episodes leading up to tonight’s finale were pretty good. In fact, I think they could have had last week’s two hour episode serve as the finale, with a little tweaking. Instead, we got an hour-long bomb…literally. The whole thing came down to the clichéd “which wire to cut” scenario found in so many mad-bomber movies. Oh, and that was after the clichéd “attack of the zombies” scenes. Also, what the heck was the motive behind this doomsday scenario anyway? What exactly are you supposed to do after the world gets turned into zombies? You can’t really go outside anymore, that’s for sure.
Alias has been famous for it’s cliffhangers over the years, with the “Sydney, you’ve been missing for years” ending going down as possibly the best cliffhanger ever (okay, Star Trek’s “Best of Both Worlds” still holds the top slot for me…). This year we discover that Vaughn isn’t really even Vaughn, and then before he can explain further, bam, a car crash. My question is: who the heck has that kind of conversation while they’re driving?! While there are some interesting directions this plot-twist could go next year, I really wish they had left us with an ending that was tied to the Rambaldi situation somehow. I think that would have been much more convincing. The Cheat’s Finale Grade: D
Season finales really just come down to one thing: Will I keep watching the show next season? For 24 and Lost, the answer is obvious - the fall season can't get here fast enough. House is still relatively new, so I'll give it the benefit of the doubt for now. Alias is the real question here. It's suffered through a fairly rocky season plot-wise. I'll definitely be tuning in for the season premiere, but it J.J. Abrams had better convince me in the first couple of weeks that he's not messing around anymore. Otherwise, I may find myself kissing Sydney, Vaughn, and the rest of the gang goodbye…actually, I think Sydney’s the only one I’d kiss…
posted by Kyle at 11:56 PM
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