There’s that moment of extreme tension in every viewer when you’ve spent years watching a great TV show, and it gets down to that final episode, where everything should presumably be wrapped up, and viewers are left with a nice, usually emotional send-off to their beloved show. While we need only look as far as the likes of Six Feet Under and The Shield to see how to deliver a finale that’s both satisfying and also dripping with integrity, the 10 shows we’re about to document did not manage that; instead, we got a finale that left us shaking with anger, either because it was distressingly open-ended, didn’t follow the tone of the show prior, was down-right weird, or openly showed contempt for the audience that ensured it kept going for so long.
Here are the 10 most infuriating TV series finales of all time…
10. The Sopranos
The end of The Sopranos features crime boss Tony (James Gandolfini) sitting in a restaurant with his family, when he picks Journey’s classic “Don’t Stop Believin’” to play on the Jukebox, a tune that will as a result of this episode forever be associated with one of the most WTF moments in the history of television. The song plays out as the family talk about their lives and chew on onion rings. We see Tony’s daughter Meadow (poorly) try to parallel park her car, and she eventually runs over to the restaurant. We hear the door open, Tony looks up, and then…nothing.
The screen cuts to black, causing many viewers to assume that their cable box had gone kaput, but after 30 seconds or so, the end credits roll, and The Sopranos is over. It’s a crucial moment to cut things off, given how shrewdly the scene was staged; several possible antagonists of Tony’s are spotted around the restaurant, and one man even goes to the bathroom not long before the cut-to-black, causing some to suggest it was a reference to the scene in The Godfather in which Michael Corleone runs to the bathroom to fetch a gun. Thus, some believe the cut to black was, in fact, the end of Tony’s and perhaps his entire family’s lives, reflecting a conversation earlier in the season between himself and brother-in-law Bobby, where they wondered whether you hear anything when getting shot to death.
The other explanation is that the song ending on the lyrics, “Don’t stop…” suggests that life continues for Tony, but he has to spend the rest of it looking over his shoulder for someone who might try to pop him. Though it is a clever ending either way, its ambiguity is extremely frustrating.
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11 Comments
To have left off M*A*S*H, whose finale I personally think was the absolute worst ever, seems indicative of something I’ve noticed here as well as on other entertainment sites. Specifically, most entertainment writers seem to have forgotten there was an industry prior to 1980 or, worse, they feel there is no need to clutter up their prose with something approaching historical data or context. These days most top ten lists are clearly geared to the under 40 crowd which might be great for advertising demographics but seriously undercuts credibility. If you want to be ‘culture lite’ as a business model, that’s certainly your right. But how does that differentiate you from the broader marketplace?
Shows before 1980 often didn’t have recurring plot lines or a specific linear structure. They were often episodes that stood alone and never ended the arc of character development solidly. Shows like The Brady Bunch and All in the Family and I Love Lucy and Happy Days were shows built on stand-alone episodes.
The shows on this list have arcs, thusly, they are infuriating when they aren’t superior to the rest of the show.
Again someone that didn’t understand the lost finale… The finale isn’t the afterlive scene. It’s the final shot of Jack closing his eyes while the plane pass. The afterlive scene is just what it is. Afterlive. It’s like a season 7 of Lost, where after they are all dead ( and we ALL are going to die eventually) meet again and go to the next stage.
Twin Peaks :(
Enterprise.
The whole finale was just a holodeck simulation that took place during a TNG episode. A much loved character dies, the Federation is finally kick-started & all this is seen thru the eyes of 2 TNG characters who had a VERY tenuous link to even being there in the 1st place….
Not a nice way to say goodbye to a faithful cast, the ONLY trek cast that remained unchanged throughout the complete series run! How`s THAT for a golden handshake!
Married with Children, cause it got cancelled and thus never got a 12th series, it never had a proper ending
Though, I know I completely understand that I shouldn’t have had my expectations so high or above sea level at all, Smallville’s finale was terrible.
Yet another person who doesn’t understand the end of Lost. Do a bit of research or watch the show again before you criticize it!
Research what? The way the show meandered, piling on “mystery” after “mystery,” while the creators promised they had a plan before admitting they were making it up as they went along? The way the main bad guy’s motivation turned out to be mommy issues? The way the creators promised the Island was not purgatory…before effectively ending the show in purgatory in a “flash sideways” or -forward, or some other technical dodge?
Re: Lost
They were, in fact, NOT dead the whole time. I don’t recall where they said there would be no afterlife whatsoever, they just said that they were not dead the entire time in response to fans who thought everyone died on the initial crash in the Pilot episode.
If you have a link or a quote where they said there’d be no afterlife, I’d like to see it.
Stargate SG-1, sadly.