Quite simply, the Crane family, as extended as it gets in later episodes, is one of the best ensembles in sitcom history. At the pivot you have Frasier, all pomposity and loneliness, but around him circle a family of people that are as funny, and yet as realistic, as you could hope to see. In Martin Crane you have a father figure with a rich background as you find out not only about his life as a cop but also the complicated relationship he had with his wife but who finds love again with Ronee. From there, there is obviously Niles, who marries Daphne. Also, it's hard not to include Roz, who arguably becomes Frasier's best friend, and her daughter Alice. Just like in Cheers, written because the creators didn't have a bar to hang out in so they made one of their own, and Friends, about a group of twenty-somethings, an age-group otherwise ignored on TV at the time, Frasier is a grown-up world and shows that, even after the stupidity of youth, we'll carry on making the same mistakes again and again. In these characters, we spend eleven seasons. Yes, there are bumps in the road occasionally but what sitcom doesn't have that? In these characters though we watch them have their hearts broken and then build themselves back up again. It is in the brilliant writing, the acute directing and utterly brilliant performances that this comes across though. Frasier feels like a full journey for the characters. We laugh with them and we cry with them. As Frasier finishes his final radio show though, he looks to the words on Alfred Lord Tennyson to give inspiration to both himself and to us as he says. If nothing else, although they're not quite the last words of the programme, they are the last words of his show, and we might as well let Frasier have the final say.
"It may be that the gulfs will wash us down; It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And though we are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will; To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." I've been thinking about that poem a lot lately. And I think what it says is that, while it's tempting to play it safe, the more we're willing to risk, the more alive we are. In the end, what we regret most are the chances we never took. And I hope that explains, at least a little, this journey on which I am about to embark. I have loved every minute with my KACL family, and all of you. For eleven years you've heard me say, "I'm listening." Well, you were listening, too. And for that I am eternally grateful. Goodnight, Seattle."
