10 TV Show Endings That Get Worse The More You Think About Them

10. Seinfeld - The Finale

Undeniably one of the most influential and hilarious sitcoms ever made, Seinfeld made an artform out of the mundane, and brought its laughs to life with a variety of deeply flawed characters whose misadventures never talked down to their audience.

The joy of Seinfeld came from how it made the audience know they were watching terrible people get away with terrible things, which is why putting the New York Four on trial and sending them to jail for all the awful deeds they'd committed was a major tone-shattering misfire.

In doing so, the controversial episode brings back a whole host of characters, including several ex-girlfriends and employers who only appeared in one previous episode. Their return retroactively makes Jerry and co's past misadventures feel much less effective, especially since these re-appearances aren't played for laughs.

The episode's sense of finality betrayed the entire spirit of the show and its hysterical lack of stakes, and because it ends in such a clear-cut way, it makes earlier episodes hard to revisit.

Knowing these gags will be used to add unnecessary poignancy to the show's ingenious low-risk concept is one of the strangest final notes in TV history.