2K5 Finale Roundup

As I wrote yesterday, last night essentially denotes the end of my television viewing for a few months. There may be some new Summer shows that I'll check out, and as I write this it occurs to me that Family Guy only recently began it's fourth season, and The Batman went directly in to its second season a week after its first season finale aired. Still, the bulk of my favorite shows are done, some forever, and here's how they size up on a scale of one to five stars(with Spoilers):

The Simpsons: 3.5 Stars
After 16 seasons, the show is still going strong, and they're signed on to do 18 seasons. This episode, controversial given its approach to faith, delved further into specific religious beliefs than most, and even seemed to confirm that the church the majority of the townspeople belong to is Protestant.

Everybody Loves Raymond: 5 Stars
After nine seasons, my favorite small-screen (Italian) family said goodbye not with a bang, but with life and family continuing as it always had and always will. See here for my more detailed review.

24: 4.5 Stars
Wow. Nobody should have days like this guy does. I'm exhausted after sitting in a cubicle for 8 hours, working out for an hour, and watching television or DVDs for three. I couldn't imagine spending a day saving lives, killing people, alienating my girlfriend, getting people close to me killed, never technically catching the bad guy, and dying myself for a bit. After one of the show's best seasons, which only lost momentum slightly in the last few episodes, they really topped themselves with this one. I can't believe I have to wait until January to see what happens on the next day.

Scrubs: 4 Stars
This is such a great show and it rarely seems promoted. The finale also snuck up on me since this season started in late August and there were few repeats. When it ended with several major changes in the status quo, and the usual lack of coming attractions, I definitely checked on line, and sure enough, the season had ended. Even worse, it's not on the schedule for next Fall, which means another show I'll have to wait until next year to see.

Smallville: 3.5 Stars
Spoiled by “Overinformative Promo Syndrome”, I still found myself left with several major questions to ponder over the Summer. It wasn't as good a cliffhanger as the previous season's, but it had a lot of cool developments that, if not resolved in the first two hours next season, could promise progress long-lacking in this series. It's a great premise with some talented actors, but suffers often from holding back since there is an established mythos to follow. Now that everyone has graduated high school, perhaps some of those restraints will be lifted. This season had a LOT of tangents though, and while the finale was a great payoff for things I was anticipating for a while, I wondered if some of those tangents, like one character being possessed at times by her witch ancestor, were REALLY necessary. Crossing my fingers for next season...

Lost: 5 Stars
A lot of people may be upset by the ending, expecting more to be inside that hatch. I was expecting the final shot to be almost exactly what it was, a view up at those looking in, leaving us all Summer to wonder. But the camera pulls back to a broken ladder, and then even deeper in to the island. What some consider nothing, I consider to be something in abundance. There were other clues in the episode implying something mechanical underneath the island, and this confirmed that there's some kind of larger area underneath the island of an undetermined size. What's under there, and how they'll get down there(assuming they want to/should), will keep me theorizing for months. But the most important thing on this show is the characters, and it has the BEST characters on television right now. It's not just the interesting back stories, but the blend of diverse personalities and types that interact each week.

Alias: 4.5 Stars
Here's the major spoiler/bombshell I alluded to yesterday: “For starters, my name isn't ‘Michael Vaughn'” The episode itself had its ups and downs as it brought four years worth of plot threads to a climax, but the final line followed by a frightening car crash left me stunned for several minutes.

Joey: 3 Stars
It was a fun and inferior spin-off that I didn't expect to last past the first season, but stuck with it out of loyalty to the character. I wonder if the ending was as telegraphed as I thought it was, or if ten years of Friends have left me with an intuition for how these writers work. Next year it continues to compete with some Thursday night juggernauts and gains some competition as both Alias and Smallville move to that 8PM timeslot. Three shows, one VCR. It doesn't seem like that hard of a decision....

Tru Calling: 4.5 Stars
I'm not sure why I'm including this. It wasn't the last episode. The last episode filmed went unaired, and even that wasn't a series finale. It was a good show with a lot of potential and the developments at the end of the last episode to air were ones I'm sorry I'll never see play out. Read this for more on this discarded show.

Enterprise: 2 Stars
I'm not even going to elaborate on why this was so bad. I stopped watching two years ago, and tuned in for this reminder. Good riddance.

TMNT: 4 Stars
I've only read a few of the comics, but I've really enjoyed how true this show apparently is to its source material, and how much more mature it is than the one I grew up with(with James Avery as Shredder). The finale had genuine drama, and a point where all the heroes seemingly were ready to sacrifice themselves. The intervention of a deus ex machina of an alien race slowing down time to remove them from a deadly explosion is forgivable, especially given that a few scenes later they'll try and sentence their greatest enemy, removing him from the playing field and changing the show's status quo. That's rare in adult programming let alone Saturday morning cartoons.

The Batman: 5 Stars
I loved the previous animated incarnation of Clayface, and he remains one of my favorite tragic villains. But this version comes close not so much in his aesthetic as his connection to our hero. A friend turned enemy, and something that I not only never expected, but once again shakes up the status quo of a television series.

That's all, folks! Less television and more movie reviews, personal anecdotes, and trips down memory lane coming soon...