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shapinglightI have a few days to myself, during which I should try to do something productive, I know, but which I already suspect I'll squander and end up achieving nothing. :( I can't even think of any prompts for the final week of March at ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
sb_fag_ends, and though I've read some of your posts this morning, I can't think of a single intelligent thing to say.
Oh anyway, endings.
They're hard, aren't they? So often TV shows get them wrong. There was Battlestar Galactica, for instance.....
More behind cut with spoilers for BSG, The Hour, Being Human, AtS, The Wire.
Personally, I didn't mind the finale of BSG too much the first time I saw it, (quite liked the 'angelic' versions of Baltar and Six melting into the modern day, but maybe that was because of the soundtrack. I've always loved Hendrix's version of All Along the Watchtower), but on thinking about it a bit, I'm in the same boat as everyone else. I don't like it. Not because Starbuck was an 'angel' too, not because Roslin died, but because the final set-up, with the cast wandering around a suspiciously manicured 'primitive' earth was just too Erich Von Daniken for me. It was our own ancestors who sweated and toiled and built civilisations, not a bunch of (mostly white) aliens. So there.
So how would I have liked it to end? Not sure really. I think maybe the end of the first run of season 4 eps, where they end up on a ruined earth, might have been a good place. Yes, it was horrifically downbeat, but this is BSG. It was all horrifically downbeat. Plus, I could have really, really done without Dee Dualla's suicide, which was the low point of the whole series for me.
Then, most recently, there was The Hour, which ended with Freddie (played by Ben Whishaw) being beaten almost to death by gangsters in a scene that I found almost unwatchable. That in itself was horrible enough, but then the show got cancelled, so we're left to decide for ourselves whether he survived or not (it being 1950-whatever, I'm going to go with not). I really hated that. It didn't feel to me like a show that should have ended that way. Well, I suppose it wasn't. Thanks for nothing, BBC.
Being Human has just ended too. Unlike The Hour, though, the final episode was written as the end of the series. It was okay - nothing that special (and the BBC's lack of money really showed in the Being Human version of the Apocalypse, which consisted of an abandoned car and a couple of bodies lying on the pavement). I also think that season 4 was a terrific reinvention of the show and that Tom, Hal and Alex still had plenty of mileage as characters, so it's shame that potential was never realised. But the end was okay. I liked the little frisson of doubt caused by the origami wolf (very Bladerunner), that made you wonder whether the housemates had succumbed to temptation after all.
So, that's two bad finales, and one okay one. I'd put Chosen in the 'okay' group too. I understand what Joss was trying to do, but I don't think he succeeded that well on screen. Plus, it was Spike's big moment, and for me it was a little tired and lacklustre. I don't know what I would have done to make it better, though.
But it was okay.
And then we have what I think are two great finales - AtS and The Wire. The Wire would end every season with a sort of montage of all the characters important in that season and what they were up to now. The finale did the same only writ larger. The best bit, of course, was Bubbles sitting down to eat with his sister and niece. That was just such a great moment. But it was all good.
Then there's NFA, which IMO is a terrific end to AtS. Okay, it had to be scrabbled together quickly due to the show being cancelled so late in the season but I think it perfectly captures what the show had become over the years. A very, very dark ending that managed to give every character still standing their moment (okay, some of their 'moments', like Lorne's and Lindsey's, were uber- dark, but even so).
So anyway, what show endings did you like/not like? How would you have changed them?
I like the end of Friends too, btw. That bit about Rachel's plane having no falangies makes me howl with laughter every time I see it - which was often until quite recently, as C4/E4 were showing Friends on an endless loop.
sb_fag_ends, and though I've read some of your posts this morning, I can't think of a single intelligent thing to say.Oh anyway, endings.
They're hard, aren't they? So often TV shows get them wrong. There was Battlestar Galactica, for instance.....
More behind cut with spoilers for BSG, The Hour, Being Human, AtS, The Wire.
Personally, I didn't mind the finale of BSG too much the first time I saw it, (quite liked the 'angelic' versions of Baltar and Six melting into the modern day, but maybe that was because of the soundtrack. I've always loved Hendrix's version of All Along the Watchtower), but on thinking about it a bit, I'm in the same boat as everyone else. I don't like it. Not because Starbuck was an 'angel' too, not because Roslin died, but because the final set-up, with the cast wandering around a suspiciously manicured 'primitive' earth was just too Erich Von Daniken for me. It was our own ancestors who sweated and toiled and built civilisations, not a bunch of (mostly white) aliens. So there.
So how would I have liked it to end? Not sure really. I think maybe the end of the first run of season 4 eps, where they end up on a ruined earth, might have been a good place. Yes, it was horrifically downbeat, but this is BSG. It was all horrifically downbeat. Plus, I could have really, really done without Dee Dualla's suicide, which was the low point of the whole series for me.
Then, most recently, there was The Hour, which ended with Freddie (played by Ben Whishaw) being beaten almost to death by gangsters in a scene that I found almost unwatchable. That in itself was horrible enough, but then the show got cancelled, so we're left to decide for ourselves whether he survived or not (it being 1950-whatever, I'm going to go with not). I really hated that. It didn't feel to me like a show that should have ended that way. Well, I suppose it wasn't. Thanks for nothing, BBC.
Being Human has just ended too. Unlike The Hour, though, the final episode was written as the end of the series. It was okay - nothing that special (and the BBC's lack of money really showed in the Being Human version of the Apocalypse, which consisted of an abandoned car and a couple of bodies lying on the pavement). I also think that season 4 was a terrific reinvention of the show and that Tom, Hal and Alex still had plenty of mileage as characters, so it's shame that potential was never realised. But the end was okay. I liked the little frisson of doubt caused by the origami wolf (very Bladerunner), that made you wonder whether the housemates had succumbed to temptation after all.
So, that's two bad finales, and one okay one. I'd put Chosen in the 'okay' group too. I understand what Joss was trying to do, but I don't think he succeeded that well on screen. Plus, it was Spike's big moment, and for me it was a little tired and lacklustre. I don't know what I would have done to make it better, though.
But it was okay.
And then we have what I think are two great finales - AtS and The Wire. The Wire would end every season with a sort of montage of all the characters important in that season and what they were up to now. The finale did the same only writ larger. The best bit, of course, was Bubbles sitting down to eat with his sister and niece. That was just such a great moment. But it was all good.
Then there's NFA, which IMO is a terrific end to AtS. Okay, it had to be scrabbled together quickly due to the show being cancelled so late in the season but I think it perfectly captures what the show had become over the years. A very, very dark ending that managed to give every character still standing their moment (okay, some of their 'moments', like Lorne's and Lindsey's, were uber- dark, but even so).
So anyway, what show endings did you like/not like? How would you have changed them?
I like the end of Friends too, btw. That bit about Rachel's plane having no falangies makes me howl with laughter every time I see it - which was often until quite recently, as C4/E4 were showing Friends on an endless loop.