Series finale
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A series finale is a promotional/advertising term used to describe the final episode of a television series, usually a sitcom or a drama. The term came into use in American Television in the early 1990s, as a variation of the term season finale, which indicated the end of a television season. Prior to that, ending episodes were referred to simply as the final episode or last episode. As a common use term, the term "series finale" does serve to distinguish between a planned final episode (one which includes resolution) and the last episode of a show which was cancelled after the last show was filmed. The majority of television programs are cancelled with little advance warning, so the occurrence of a series finale is relatively rare in comparison.
Usually, a series finale is a dramatic conclusion to the basic premise of the series. Final episodes frequently feature fundamental changes in the central plot line, such as the union of a couple, the resolution of a central mystery or problem, or the separation of the major characters. Final episodes often include looks into the future or detailed looks into the series' past.
Series finales for shows that are cancelled suddenly are sometimes seen as making relatively haphazard or rushed conclusions, or sometimes having merely reflective feeling rather than tying up loose ends.
Some feature film series have had the equivalent of series finales in which the producers claim would be the final film. However, often times if that supposedly final film is particularly successful, the series will continue regardless.
Since the 1980s, series finales for especially popular programs are often much longer than a regular series episode.
Famous Series finales
- The Fugitive (1967) - Dr. Kimble finally confronts the one-armed man.
- Mary Tyler Moore Show (1977) - The staff of the TV station find themselves bought out and fired except for Ted Baxter.
- Blake's 7 (1981) - After being absent for two years, Blake returns and has apparently turned traitor (though this is in fact a ruse). In a misunderstanding, Avon shoots Blake dead, then the rest of the crew are gunned down by Federation troopers. The final shots show Avon surrounded by troopers and raising his gun, then gun shots are heard...
- Family Ties (1989) - Alex moves to New York, having been offered a financing job there.
- Newhart (1990) - Bob Newhart awakes in bed. It turns out the entire series was just a dream of the character that he portrayed on The Bob Newhart Show.
- M*A*S*H (1983) - As the Korean War draws to a close, the 4077th ponder their respective futures.
- Twin Peaks (1991) - Agent Cooper pursues his former-partner-turned-killer Windom Earle into the Black Lodge, leading to a final confrontation with the evil entity BOB. In the end, Cooper is unable to prevail against BOB, and his soul is trapped in the Black Lodge while his evil BOB-controlled doppelganger takes his place in the real world. Cooper nonetheless manages to score a small victory, in that his sacrifice allows Annie's soul to be set free.
- The Cosby Show (1992) - Theo graduates and Denise reveals she is pregnant.
- Cheers (1993) - Diane receives an award for a screenplay she has written. Sam and Diane lie to each other about having spouses and families, until, in a moment of weakness, Sam invites her back to Boston. Before long the passion between Sam and Diane is back on and they are on a plane headed for California. At the last minute, however, Sam realizes that he is happy working at the bar and gets off the plane.
- Mama's Family (1993) - Naomi finally gives birth to her baby, a beautiful girl. They name her Tiffany Thelma Harper so that both Naomi and Thelma will be happy about the name. Iola gives up her long-standing passion for felt handicrafts and begins making masterpieces out of dryer lint.
- The Wonder Years (1993)
- Star Trek: The Next Generation (1994) - Captain Picard finds himself shift around 3 different time periods as part of a challenge presented by the Q Continuum to justify the existence of Humanity.
- Picket Fences (1996) - Carter & Sue and Kenny & Max get married. Waumbaugh and his ex-wife end up getting re-married. The triple wedding creates a bond between Jimmy and Jill Brock, and reverses the breakdown of their disintegrating marriage. All the surviving townspeople who managed to avoid dying a bizarre death over the course of the series get together for one last group photo.
- Forever Knight (1996) - Tracy dies in the line of duty. Faced with her own mortality, Natalie asks Nick to turn her into a vampire by making love to her. Nick does so, but changes his mind later and stakes Natalie before she can rise so she won't have to live the cursed life of the undead. Nick then has LaCroix stake him, finally bringing Nick's suffering to an end, and leaving LaCroix as the last (and only) man standing.
- Married... with Children (1997) - After a prolonged hostage stand-off against Bud's prison pen-pal, Kelly ends up getting engaged to one of the hostage takers. Al ruins the wedding, leaving the Bundy family with a $10,000 wedding debt.
- Roseanne (1997) - Roseanne's monologue reveals that Dan had died from the heart attack at the end of season 8, and season 9 was mostly her imagination. In fact, none of the people we've known for all these years are actually real, but rather characters in Roseanne's book meant to help her deal with the events of her life.
- Seinfeld (1998) - After a mid-air brush with death, the cast ends up in a small town and mocks a man who is being robbed on the street, rather than help him. They are arrested, and a lengthy trial follows in which all the people who they've ruined over the years testify as to what lousy human beings they are. In the end, they are sentenced to one year in prison... for doing nothing.
- Due South (1998) - With the help of the Canadian mounties, Fraser and Kowalski save the world from Cyrus Bolt's militia and Muldoon's nuclear submarine. The ghost of Fraser's father is finally put to rest after father and son team up to arrest Muldoon, the man who betrayed the mounties and killed Fraser's mother.
- Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1999) - The final battles of the war with the Dominion are fought, and many dangling storylines are resolved. Captain Sisko has his final confrontation with Gul Dukat. Many of the remaining characters move on to new things, continuing arcs that began over the course of the series.
- Home Improvement (1999) - Tim records his final Tool Time. Morgan offers Tim more money and an executive producer credit to stay with the show, but Tim rejects the offer. Jill decides to take the job in Indiana. Wilson and Tim take down their fence to make room for Al and Trudy's wedding. (This was actually the final story of the series; the true series finale was a retrospective look at 8 years of the show, complete with cast interviews, never-before-seen bloopers and ultimately the revealing of Wilson's face.)
- Hercules: The Legendary Journeys ((1999)) - Hercules and his long-time nemesis Hera end up unintentionally helping each other save Olympus from the invincible titan Atlas. Zeus and Hera kiss and make up, and Hercules and the alternate-universe Iolaus walk off into the sunset, much to the chagrin of the war god Ares.
- Red Dwarf ((1999)) - The Red Dwarf is destroyed by a living blob of acid, and the main cast, with no place to escape, disappear in the chaos. Only Rimmer remains, collapsed on the floor and awaiting the inevitable end. But when the Grim Reaper arrives for him, Rimmer musters enough strength to kick Death in the groin.
- Sliders (2000) - Rembrandt goes off to his homeworld with a virus to defeat the Kromaggs. Diana, Maggie, and Mallory are stranded in a parallel earth where the Sliders are celebrities. Their only hope of finding out what happened to Rembrandt disappears when the Seer dies. The remaining Sliders have no way of knowing whether the Seer's prophecy of their next slide causing their deaths has been changed or not.
- 3rd Rock From The Sun (2001) - The mission ends and the Solomons go back home. Despite the newfound kinkiness of dating an alien, Mary ultimately can't bring herself to follow them into space, so Dick eases her pain by erasing her memory of him with a karate chop to the head.
- Star Trek: Voyager (2001) - After a decades-long journey to reach the Alpha Quadrant, Admiral Kathryn Janeway makes a bold decision to change the past in an attempt to undo the toll taken on the crew during their arduous journey home. As a result, the Voyager crew make use of the Borg's trans-warp technology to return home, while the 'future Janeway' remains to ensure the destruction of the Borg Queen.
- Xena: Warrior Princess (2001) - Xena dies in order to defeat a Japanese demon lord. She's been dead before, so that's no big. However, this time, Xena can't be brought back to life, as that would condemn to eternal torment a few thousands souls she killed back when she was still a bad guy. Long story short, Gabrielle sails off into the sunset alone to continue the work, although Xena's spirit stands beside her. Almost all of series' re-occurring characters had died already, so they couldn't make it to the finale.
- Daria (2002) - Is it College Yet? - Daria's classmates prepare for graduation while Daria decides to end her relationship with Tom and Quinn faces her own problems that demand an unexpected maturity.
- The X-Files (2002) - Mulder uses a keycard to break into Mount Weather and learns the date of the alien invasion using a misappropriated password. After escaping from the military, he and Scully go to New Mexico in search of a wise man who knows the final truth. That individual turns out to be the Cigarette Smoking Man, the individual who supplied the keycard and password. Meanwhile, Reyes and Doggett return to Washington to discover that the X-files have been closed once and for all. Black helicopters ultimately arrive and the Cigarette Smoking Man is killed, leaving Mulder and Scully to ponder the future.
- Brookside (2003) Drug dealer Jack Michaelson gets killed by a number of regular characters, who had been at the receiving end of his vile ways in previous episodes, an idea subtly suggested by Barry Grant, who makes a return to the Close along with Lindsey Corkhill. The final shots show Jimmy Corkhill adding a 'd' to the street sign, so that it read 'Brookside Closed'.
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2003) - Buffy learns that she doesn't have to be the only active Slayer, and her dream of a somewhat normal life is realized. The First Evil is defeated, but that was more or less a given. A couple of the recurring characters die, but a surprising number survive to move on to new things.
- Dawson's Creek (2003) - Jen dies, leaving her daughter to be raised by Jack and his boyfriend - Pacey's cop brother, who turned out to be gay after all. Joey takes Pacey back to New York with her, leaving Dawson back in LA producing his autobiographical series, "The Creek".
- Touched by an Angel (2003) - Monica has her final assignment which will lead to her promotion taking over tess' position.
- Farscape (2003) - After rejecting Scorpius' offer of an alliance with the Peacekeepers, the crew manage to save Earth from the planned Scarran invasion by using Crichton's Ancient knowledge of the wormholes to collapse the Earth wormhole. However as a result Earthman Crichton is forever cut off from his homeworld. On a quiet alien planet, Crichton proposes marriage to Aeryn, who joyfully accepts and reveals that she is carrying Crichton's child. Without warning, the two are unceremoniously vaporized by a miscellaneous passing cruiser, and the end credits roll by somberly without music. An uncompromising ending to an uncompromising series rescued by a two-part mini-series which wraps this plot line up but (inevitably) leaves one or two more loose ends, in case someone can be persuaded to fund more adventures.
- Friends (2004) - Erica gives birth to twins and Rachel and Ross finally get together.
- Frasier (2004) - Ronnie and Martin wed, Daphne gives birth to a son, David Crane. Roz gets promoted to station manager of KACL. Feeling increasingly distant from his family and Friends, Frasier accepts a new radio job in San Francisco. But in the end he is flying to Chicago to catch his new love. The story is somewhat open ended.
- The Practice (2004)
- Angel (2004) - Team Angel plan to anger the Senior Partners by destroying the Circle of the Black Thorn, their influence on Earth. Although they succeed, Wesley dies on his mission and the final scene is Angel, Spike, Ilyria, and a mortally wounded Gunn about to fight what appears to be a hopeless battle against a massive army of hellspawn (plus assorted giants and one flying dragon). On the plus side, Lorne the singing demon manages to get away, having left the group earlier for parts unknown.
- The Drew Carey Show (2004) - Kellie accepts Drew's marriage proposal and gives birth to a baby.
