FINALES, THE FLASH: LEAVE THEM WITH A GIFT

There's one last "fix" in the finale of THE FLASH. Season 8 saw both Killer Frost and Caitlin killed. And season 9 gave actress Danielle Panabaker a whole new persona Khione who, while charming, never totally made sense relative to everything that had come before.

A lot of her new identity turns out to be a deus ex machina (quite literally) to deal with the corner into which the show paints itself. But then in the end, having done that, we unexpectedly get Caitlin back. 

And I have to say, as mystifying as Khione was, that twist still lands. Which I think goes to show just how special and important a character Caitlin was for the show. 

In a lot of great finales, you try to leave the story with something new to play with, a gift for the future. It seems counter-intuitive; the show is over. But actually that's part of what makes many finales so satistfying. It tells us this world goes on, and not only that, it's got very cool things ahead. 

THE FLASH gave us three new speedsters, which was it's biggest act of gift giving. 

But I think bringing back Caitlin works a bit like this as well. Because sometimes the greatest gift a show can give is a fresh insight, either into our lives or that of the characters. And bringing Caitlin back does just that. She's always been central, but in such a quiet way I think some of the power of her character was easy to miss. By keeping her away for a whole year, the show gives us the chance to realize just how much we've missed her. And that awareness is itself an unexpected gift. 

NEXT: THE MARVELOUS MARVELOUS MARVELOUS MRS. MAISEL

FINALES, THE FLASH: THE FIX

While the finale of TED LASSO doesn't drop for a couple days yet, I think it's safe to say that the way of May 24-31, 2023 will go down as one of the all time greatest weeks of finales ever. We've had THE FLASH, MARVELOUS MRS. MAISEL and SUCCESSION already, and each of them wonderful in different ways. 

I love love love finales. And one of the things I find fascinating about this current set is that in a sense they all approach the idea of the finale differently, with different goals and techniques So this week (and probably next) I'm going to dive into them, one by one. 

We start with THE FLASH, which finished a 9-season run on May 24th with the end of a four-parter entitled "A New World" which brings back season one regular Eddie Thawne. Returning to the beginning in some way is a classic finale move. But THE FLASH takes that idea to a whole other level.

Eddie began the series as Iris' boyfriend and Joe's partner. But he's also pretty much screwed from the beginning. Barry and Iris are absolutely the couple of destiny for the series, and it doesn't take very long for Barry, who has only just woken from a coma, to screw things up for Eddie. 

And on top of that, he discovers that his distant descendant Eobard Thawne is the series' evil supervillain the Reverse Flash. Seriously, this guy is just screwed. This kind of character who normally would be a pretty good guy except he's only there to get in the way of the main characters and therefore is actually cast as an antagonist is a major TV trope; it's the patsy, really. Or, if you will, The Eddie.

In the end, the writers try to redeem what they've done to him by giving him the final heroic turn of the season. Seeing Eobard about to kill Barry, Eddie kills himself, stopping him from ever existing, which is a pretty damn heroic thing to do.

Except even in this regard he ends up being a failure and a writers' patsy. Because Eobard comes back. Like, a lot. The Reverse-Flash is the main antagonist of the entire show. 

This isn't a question that lingers over the characters or the series. We barely hear about Eddie, actually.  But it is a pretty shitty way to have left the character. And so in the final four episodes, they bring Eddie back. And honestly, he's pretty messed up after he learns what's gone on, and tempted to go full evil. 

But then in the finale, he once again sacrifices his pain to be the better person. But this time it doesn't result in his death. I'm not exactly sure what life in the Negative Speed Force universe looks like but it is a life. And he has finally confronted and let go of what he's lost. 

So the finale becomes a way of righting a wrong, fixing an injustice. 

There's another sort of "fix" here, too. Unlike its predecessor ARROW, which was a series about a very dark character slowly coming to trust and come to the light, THE FLASH presents from the start as a hopeful show, a guy who not only gets the power to do the impossible but who believes in the impossible, namely that he can prove that his father did not kill his mother. It's such a beautiful storyline.

But the thing is, his mother is still a murder victim. And the killer turns out to be the man he believes to be his friend and mentor (who then terrorizes others that he loves). And now he has powers that enable him to potentially change all that. Each of these details make the show much, much more complicated and sad. And intriguingly, in some ways the show became more about a guy who struggled against the darkness of what he had experienced. Which has a tremendous real world resonance, and personal dramatic stakes for Barry for sure, but threatened at times to overwhelm the show's foundations. 

In the finale, we get this incredible moment where Barry says all this as he's trying to figure out what to do about Eddie and concluding his only real solution is to murder him. And while he's said versions of this before, there's a sense of him being overwhelmed by it all that really hits hard. It's perfect for the finale. 

And his mission, as given to him by Caitlin's new identity Khione, is to believe in the impossible once again. So again, we're returning to the beginning, but this time for inspiration. And out of it we get not only the resolution of the Eddie story line, but something radically new: Barry sharing his power with three brand new speedsters. It's a bit of fan service for those who know the Flash comics, but it's also a great "fix" on what has been Barry's fundamental character problem, a belief that it's all up to him. 

The series actually ends with us watching Barry run. And it's the first time in a very long time that we see Barry smiling as he does it. He's happy. It's a great end.  

SUCCESSION ON MAKING US CARE FOR EVERYONE

For me the real magic trick of SUCCESSION 406 is, as I mentioned yesterday, that you end up feeling strongly for all three kids, even as they're actually fucking each other over. 

In my experience, that is not generally how SUCCESSION has worked. Other than when they're unified against Logan, we've usually been given reasons to root for or against one or another of the siblings. If I step back and think about that, it's usually their flaws that are used to guide us against them. Kendall has crazy ideas and is often a public embarrassment; Shiv has a hard time standing up for herself; Roman is such a daddy's boy. The show offers us these moments and in doing so guides us to side with the other siblings. 

(I realize there are people who would say, I have been Team Shiv from day one, and her "flaws" are much more indicative of her father's horrendous manipulative treatment of her than a judgment on her in herself, and so on for all the characters. Another way of putting it might be, the show has loved to expose characters as "weak" in some way to turn us against them.)

As we start 406, we find ourselves headed into familiar Roy sibling territory. Kendall and Roman have a plan, they are not letting Shiv in on it, even though that's what they promised they would do just a few days ago. And so of course I'm rooting for her. 

But then slowly she comes around to undermining them, which on the surface, hell yeah. Fuck them. But then in that moment before Kendall is going to go on stage, after Shiv has convinced Roman to not go up there on the stage with him,  we watch Kendall sitting in a chair, just reeling, as we've seen him do before. 

But rather than satisfying it's painful. In some ways that's precisely because we've seen him in this place before. Here again, we're revisiting an icon of the show. But where the water imagery is used to create contrast, here the repetition is like a doorway back into the sympathy we've had for Kendall at other times, the vulnerability that we know is who this guy is beneath the surface. 

And so instead of feeling vindicated, because he has been a complete shit to Shiv and also he's so incredibly self-destructive, we're suddenly protective of him. Sad Vulnerable Kendall is itself part of the language of the show, so much so that when played it generates sympathy. 

(While I'm trying to look at this strictly from a writing point of view, it's important to note, this scene works like it does because Jeremy Strong just fucking kills it. He's so damn good in this episode.)

And writers Georgia Pritchett & Will Arbery are not content with leaving him stripped away like this. They make him go lower, first by having Carl, who is by far the wishy washiest character on the show, the most milquetoast, go absolutely toe to toe with Kendall, ruin the plan he's spent the last few days dreaming up, and leave him speechless.

Pritchett & Arbery set this moment up so well; earlier in the episode we get Gerri and Roman going head to head as well. And she is in many ways more confrontational than Carl, and a stronger character by far, and Roman absolutely steps up and shuts her down. Meanwhile Kendall, facing a far weaker foe, can barely get a word out.

And even that is not the bottom for Kendall. We watch him go out onstage, and his opening moments are just a trainwreck—he's repeating the same thing over and over; he's talking to the teleprompter; he has a simulated conversation with his dad—so painful. It's just one long spiral of agony, with cutaways to his family and employees watching in horror. 

There's just no way not to care about this guy in the face of all that.  

And yet again, he is being terrible to Shiv, lying to her face and seems completely at ease with it. And he's tanking a deal that he absolutely shouldn't. All of which is classic Kendall. 

Which for me makes where the show leaves us with him just an incredible feat. And I can look at structurally how they did that—repeat an iconic Kendall trope; have him roll over and play dead against a weak foe; and publicly humiliate himself—and say yep, that's how they did that. And now we can too!

But honestly I think I'm still barely scraping the surface. Because there's something else going on in the episode with all three characters, beats of them being really exposed and vulnerable—always in private—that seems to grant each of them that same sympathy, even as they are each being, again, so horrible to each other.  

Could it be that the good will and sympathy that the Logan's death episode generated in us is still a work? Is that what this is? 

I may continue to babble about this tomorrow. It's just such great writing. 

SUCCESSION ON THE ART OF REVISITATION

Another great episode of SUCCESSION this week. Maybe my biggest takeaway, and one that I'm going to write about, is the way the episode creates conflict amongst the three kids, and you see them each fucking over the others—especially Kendall and Roman screwing Shiv—yet somehow you end up feeling for each of them. Like, start of that ep I am 100% Team Shiv, and in a way that doesn't change. But then once Kendall's all alone I am so rooting for him, too. 

There's a lot to unpack there. 

But today I just want to note the way the episode ends. Kendall, on his own, floating on his back in the Pacific. It's clearly a baptismal moment; he's come through something, his own self-destructive tendencies, and come out the other side. 

And what's brilliant about that end image of him floating is the way that it calls back to him in the pool at the end of 308. There he's really at his lowest point: having killed someone at the end of season one, he's now got his father—who of course got him out of it—holding it over him, telling him he'll never be free of that. He's basically trapped. And at the end he's floating on a raft, drunk. But the episode ends with him passed on, his face in the water, his beer floating away like an image of his soul. It was a huge question mark whether we hadn't just seen him die. 

How brilliant to take that image and flip it on its head—or on its back, as it were—to represent what is really his resurrection. Where he was face down and drowning in despair in 308, now he's face up, floating without even needing a raft to hold him. 

One of the things I adore about the final season of great series is the way that they revisit its key visual metaphors, events and lines of dialogue. Together those moments are the imaginative landscape of the show, that is, the landmarks of the show as it exists in our minds. To offer any kind of callback is great fan service. But to do what Georgia Pritchett & Will Arbery do here, to take such a moment and use it in a whole new way, is both deeply emotionally satisfying for the audience and carries the water for so much story. Kendall floating on the ocean tells us everything that we need to know about him without a single word having to be said, and it does so 1000 times better. 

We should all be so lucky as to write on the finale of a great show. But the same principle applies to the end of a season, or even the end of a pilot. What can I revisit at the end of my piece that casts that moment in a whole new light?