That’s a wrap! Our favorite TV goodbyes
There’s nothing like the anticipation, expectation and dread that surrounds the finale of a beloved TV series. This year, three long-running shows — New Girl, The Middle and The Americans
— said goodbye with three satisfying finales. That’s not always the case. Sometimes, no matter how much you love what came before, a series can miss on its last swing, leaving a bitter taste for years to come. But not with these all-time 10 best, from golden classics ( M*A*S*H) to recent favorites ( Breaking Bad).
1. Six Feet Under (HBO)
Six Feet Under was always about facing our own mortality (it was, after all, about a family-run funeral home), and the near-perfect finale faced the great beyond head-on in its excruciatingly beautiful last sequence, which flashed forward to the deaths of all the main characters — predictable, tragic or absurd. Every series finale that has used the flash-forward technique owes a great debt to Six Feet.
2. Newhart (CBS)
As twisty and self-referential as modern TV has gotten, no show could possibly pull off a twist as shocking and meta as the finale of Newhart, which is perhaps better remembered than the show itself. After Dick Loudon (Bob Newhart) is hit in the head with a golf ball, the show cuts to Dr. Robert Hartley, Newhart’s character from his previous series, The Bob Newhart Show, waking up from a dream in bed with his wife. All eight seasons of Newhart, set in a Vermont inn, were Hartley’s dream. Not even Westworld could do better.
3. M*A*S*H (CBS)
In a poignant, emotional and still top-rated finale, the 11-year run of M*A*S*H (eight years longer than the KoreanWar it depicted) came to an end as Hawkeye Pierce (Alan Alda) and (most of ) the rest finally went home. The sometimes dark final episode, which manages one last “war is hell” moment, perfectly captured the spirit of the series.
4. The Mary Tyler Moore Show (CBS)
Just thinking about that loving final hug is enough to make any MTM fan tear up. The finale ended in the sad, inescapable way many jobs in the real world do. The new owner of WJM fired the entire TV newsroom (well, except Ted), and the former co-workers came together to say goodbye. It felt realistic and emotional, just like most of MTM’s run.
5. Battlestar Galactica (Syfy)
The finale to the space epic succeeded where Lost failed, finding a way to use the spiritual and divine to answer its mysteries while making a profound statement about the nature of humanity. Sure, some are still angered by the deus ex machina convenience of the messy, benevolent god guiding the humans and cylons alike, but the relationship between creators and their creations was always the central tenet of the series. And even though the humans and the cylons gave up technology to start a simpler life on Earth, the flash-forward to modern robotics also emphasized the show’s themes: All this has happened before, and will again. So say we all.
6. The Sopranos (HBO)
The only bad thing you can say about The Sopranos finale is that it pushed the saturation of Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ to the breaking point in the years that followed. Some fans didn’t take to the open-ended, cut-to-black finale of the mobster drama, which didn’t reveal whether Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) lived or died, but his life was too nebulous to be resolved so cleanly.
7. The Shield (FX)
Not every series about an anti-hero is interested in comeuppance at the end, but even if it did, no punishment would be as perfect as the one served to Vic Mackey (Michael Chiklis) in the final episode of the police drama. Mackey ends up in his own version of prison, wasting away at an office job, far from the action and adrenaline he craves.
8. Cheers (NBC)
Sam’s (Ted Danson) true love was always his bar. The Cheers finale isn’t nearly as happy or funny as many sitcoms’ exits, but its wistful tone worked for the bittersweet episode. The gang couldn’t stay at the bar forever.
9. Breaking Bad (AMC)
Like any figure so tragic and Shakespearean, Walter White (Bryan Cranston) couldn’t survive the end of his story. The cancer-ridden chemistry teacher turned drug kingpin had finally admitted his malicious acts were purely for pleasure, but he was able to at least partially redeem himself by helping Jesse (Aaron Paul), one of the people he hurt the most.
10. The Americans (FX)
Spoiler alert: The Soviet spy series just concluded its six-year run Wednesday, and the emotions are still running high. Maybe in a few years it wouldn’t make this list. But the episode, in which Philip (Matthew Rhys) and Elizabeth (Keri Russell) return to the Soviet Union after the FBI finally figured out they’re undocumented, was perfectly suited to the series. They left behind their unwitting son, Henry (Keidrich Sellati), and their comrade daughter, Paige (Holly Taylor), leaves them. This is as close to a happy ending as the series could offer, at once surprising and deeply satisfying.