It's a sad truth of TV : an otherwise great TV show can still have a terrible ending.
Sometimes, it's so bad that it ruins the entire series. With that in mind, let's take a look
at the sci-fi shows with finales so awful that they cast a pall on everything that came
before.
The NBC superhero series Heroes has gone down in TV history as a truly legendary squandering
of potential. For those of you who missed the hype when it debuted back in 2006, the
show follows several different characters who discover that they have superpowers. They
each proceed to use those powers in various ways to affect the world around them, for
good or bad. That's a perfectly solid premise. But the execution didn't always live up to
what could've been. Problems include an endless struggle with tonal inconsistency, weak romance
writing, and a slapdash approach to character deaths. While the first season is a whole
lot of fun, seasons two and three are overwhelmingly messy.
Heroes' fourth and final season marks something of a creative rebound, as it focuses on the
characters themselves as opposed to soapy, world-ending drama. The finale even ends with
a cool cliffhanger of Hayden Panettiere's character Claire showing the world that she
can heal herself. It finally appears that everyone is going to know about super powered
individuals and everything the show has promised is actually going to be explored. But of course,
it isn't, as this is an ending and there isn't any time left to do all that. Heroes' original
finale sucks the joy from the rest of the series because it's such a potent reminder
of the show's squandered potential. And it's hard to live with the realization of just
how little of that potential was actually fulfilled… even with the brief revival series
that attempted to fix things in 2015.
The 2000s revival of Battlestar Galactica is one of the most critically-acclaimed and
popular sci-fi series of the 21st century. Fans adored the story of a distant civilization
of human beings living life in the Twelve Colonies as they fight off attacks from the
Cylons. The series ends with a three-part finale entitled "Daybreak," and viewers ended
up seriously divided following this episode's revelations.
"Daybreak" reveals that the hallucinations that Gaius Baltar and Six had throughout the
series were actually angels. The phrase "deus ex machina" has never been more appropriate
to describe such a twist, as God literally shows up at the last second to change the
fundamental nature of the series. Questions abound to this day. Was God just messing with
the characters by sending them angels? Why does God give the crew such a roundabout way
of returning to Earth that necessitates so many brutal assaults? "Daybreak" attempted
something daring, but it insead stirred up plenty of controversy.
"All of this has happened before."
"But the question remains: does all of this have to happen again?"
The Sarah Connor Chronicles portrays the adventures of John and Sarah Connor in the aftermath
of T2: Judgment Day. It uses the Terminator franchise as a storytelling springboard, and
the results are a bit of a mixed bag. There are plenty of bright spots, but there are
also a whole lot of frustrating moments.
The series finale actually manages to be a decent hour of television in some ways. While
the previous episodes focus on the lead-up to the apocalypse, the finale makes it clear
that we're finally about to get into the endgame in regards to the Terminators' final plans.
It perfectly teases fans with what's to come. If the show had been renewed for the third
season that the finale foretells, it probably would've been great, but it never came to
be, as the show was canceled. The finale has become a frustrating reminder of what The
Sarah Connor Chronicles could've been and what it should've focused on from the start.
There was a period of time when all anyone could talk about was Lost. Even if you've
never watched it, you probably know that it involves a group of plane crash survivors
who end up stranded on a mysterious island. Flashbacks and flashforwards reveal more information
about the characters, while their time on the island is marked by strange happenings
involving polar bears and smoke monsters. It had the whole world in its grip, and then
it fumbled in the end zone.
The Lost finale fails primarily because it didn't let audiences know exactly what was
going on with the island. The show had earned a reputation for constant ambiguity, which
became a double-edged sword. Establishing mysteries is one thing, but failing to reward
fans for dedication and patience is another. The finale leaves fans hanging on this central
question. It takes place in the afterlife, but it's also sort of not the afterlife. It's
muddled, and thus disappointing. The entire run of Lost is cheapened by its ending. Why
would people go through the trouble of rewatching the series when there's no reward at the end
of the tunnel? It's a slog, and that's one word that should never be used to describe
entertainment.
ALF is an iconic 80s sitcom. It stars a wisecracking alien who crash-lands in an American suburb
and ends up living with the Tanners, a nice middle-class family. It's a light, breezy
show, provided you could get past ALF's predilection for eating cats, which makes its dark ending
all the more strange.
The series finale, entitled "Consider Me Gone," sees ALF receiving a broadcast over a shortwave
radio. The transmission comes from his fellow aliens Rhonda and Skip and informs him that
they've acquired a planet and want to create a new home, so ALF leaves the Tanners' house
to reunite with them. Alas, the plan soon goes awry when he's captured by the Alien
Task Force, which has intercepted the transmission. ALF is now a prisoner, and the episode ends
right on that downer note. Granted, the series did get a happier finale in the form of Project:
ALF, a TV movie that aired six years later. But for quite a while, all fans were left
with was the bleak finale. Who knows what the authorities had planned for ALF? For such
a chipper series, it's one seriously sour note.
"Wait! Wait! Don't leave me!"
The Star Trek franchise went back to the beginning in 2001 with the UPN series Enterprise. As
a prequel to the original series, it takes place before widespread space exploration
by focusing on the travels of Earth's first warp-capable galactic starship. It's led by
Captain Jonathan Archer, played by sci-fi veteran and Quantum Leap star Scott Bakula.
Enterprise never had the cultural impact of earlier Trek series, and while it was one
of UPN's higher-rated shows, its best spot in the overall yearly TV rankings was a lowly
115. The show was cancelled in 2005, and it sputtered to an end with a series finale entitled
"These Are the Voyages…" A lot happens in this episode. Commanders T'Pol and Charles
"Trip" Tucker break up. Then Trip shockingly dies as Captain Archer tries to guide the
ship to one of the earliest events in the creation of the United Federation of Planets.
That's all finale-worthy stuff, but it came with a twist and an unnecessary framing device.
Everything that transpired is witnessed in the form of a Holodeck adventure witnessed
by Riker and Troi from The Next Generation as a way to help them make a decision after
the events of the 1994 episode "The Pegasus." Even Jolene Blalock, who played T'Pol, called
the episode "appalling."
"End program."
The X-Files is generally considered one of the most popular and greatest sci-fi TV shows
of all time. But it had a hard time nailing the ending. After nine seasons in its original
run, two movies, and two revival seasons, it finally concluded in 2018, apparently for
good, with the episode "My Struggle IV." Series creator Chris Carter told TV Insider that
he wanted to tell the stories of the characters who were, quote, "central to the mythology":
Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, Cigarette Smoking Man, and Mulder and Scully's son William.
Unfortunately, the finale is overstuffed, as it tries to tie up too many loose ends
with one wacky, out-of-nowhere revelation after another. Mulder gets shot, but he's
not really Mulder, but rather William who also isn't really dead, but an immortal shapeshifter
who took on the appearance of Mulder. The Cigarette Smoking Man dies, and Scully reveals
that she's pregnant with Mulder's baby. It was all a bit much from a show that had probably
hung around for too long.
"When I gave you life, I never fathomed a moment when I would need to end it."
Quantum Leap follows the adventures of Dr. Sam Beckett over the course of five fascinating
seasons. He's an experimental physicist with six degrees who gains the ability to leap
through space and time and inhabit the bodies of various people throughout history in order
to right the wrongs of the past. This ability comes with a terrible price, though, as he
can't return home until he has put history to rights, and he won't know that he's finished
until he's leapt home.
Quantum Leap's blend of humor and social commentary garnered a fanbase, but it ultimately came
to an end after five seasons due to declining viewership. In the series finale, titled "Mirror
Image," we learn that Sam can return home if he so chooses, but he instead decides to
go back in time and save his friend Al's marriage. In doing so, Sam willingly makes it so that
he and Al never meet, thus trapping himself in a paradox and giving up the life he so
desperately wished to return to throughout the duration of the series. His fate is finally,
chillingly revealed in the show's last frame:
"Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home."
This ending changes the mood of everything that came before. Instead of being a series
of wacky misadventures, each episode is reframed as one man's fruitless quest to return home.
He will apparently just keep going through these motions forever. That's not just bleak,
it's horrifying.
The Prisoner is a British series that aired a single season of 17 episodes from 1967 to
1968. It boasts an intriguing plot about Number Six, an unnamed intelligence agent who's trapped
in a strange coastal village. It's become a cult classic for many reasons. It's a fascinating
allegory, a gripping spy story, and a psychological thriller. Its finale however remains controversial,
even among diehard fans.
The last episode had its work cut out for it, considering how many mysteries needed
to be wrapped up. Instead of giving fans straightforward answers, things take a turn for the weird.
Number Six discovers a man wearing a gorilla mask whom he then finds out is a clone who
looks exactly like him. Yes, it seems that everything on this island has been run by
a clone in a monkey mask, who then blasts off in a rocket ship. It's a decidedly odd
ending that casts a pall over an otherwise excellent series. All of the twists and turns
that The Prisoner takes throughout its run aren't as intriguing when the resolution is
so absurd.
The BBC series Life on Mars follows Sam Tyler, a cop from 2006 who ends up in a traffic accident.
He wakes up in 1973 and must discover what happened to him and how to return home. In
the final episode, we get all the answers we were looking for, but not in the way that
anyone expected.
The finale reveals that everything in the series up until that point had been the result
of Sam being in a coma. That's right, it was all a dream. Sam wakes up back in his own
time, but he now finds real life to be utterly dull. So what does he do? Why, he throws himself
off the roof of a building and back into his fantasy world, where he can be truly happy
once again. The ending is ambiguous, but implied to be an afterlife of sorts. A girl who has
symbolized death throughout the series turns off the TV at the episode's end, thus indicating
that Sam is truly beyond life's tether. Moreover, the sequel series Ashes to Ashes shows Sam's
personnel file rubber-stamped with the word "SUICIDE." It's a downer ending of the most
extreme sort and a total cop-out, which sits uncomfortably alongside the rest of this ambitious
series.
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