Some plotlines had been settled long ago.
Will was dead, so there was no lingering will-they-or-wont-they with Alicia.
The rest of the shows overarching questions were left unanswered.
Credit: CBS
Was the episodes title End meant to be ironic?
What we got wasnt an ending at all.
What happened to the finality of the finale?
Closure used to count for something.
How about Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer in jail?
This wasnt just the finale of an all-time great show.
It felt like a finale for life itself.
We dont often get great swan songs like that anymore, and you might blameThe Sopranos.
Today, an ambiguous finale is viewed as the only smart way to end a series.
If you demand answers, people assume youre dumb.
But is that really true?
Isnt that just as unambitious as a lazy coda that wraps things up too neatly?
Its deceptively hard to write a finale that, in hindsight, seems inevitable.
Just look at the wayBreaking Badpainstakingly plotted Walts fate from the beginning.
With plotting that precise, youre not focused on what happened after the credits rolled.
Youre free to deconstruct the richness of the work.
We invested seven years in Alicia Florricks life.
Dont we deserve some closure?
Im not talking about rewarding fans with a pat ending at the expense of a more complex character arc.
And Im definitely not suggesting a rom-com send-off for Alicia and a man.
Im talking about offering some insight beyond the obvious idea that the victim became the victimizer.
PostBreaking Bad, too many other, better series have ended that way.
We have to get rid of the ideas that darkness equals quality and that all happy endings are basic.
End felt more like the conclusion of an episode, not a series.
Maybe Wills right that nothings ever really over.
But TV would be a whole lot more interesting if he were wrong.
A version of this story appears in the new issue of Entertainment Weekly.
