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The worst last season of great shows
- Thread starter Reizzz
- Start date
Yeah, it made no sense for the show to keep going after Eric left and it showed
Luckily you can skip that whole season and just watch the last episode where he comes back
Things like HIMYM had been shit for a while, though. The show had shit the bed before the last season hit.
I'm tempted to give Scrubs a pass since it was kind of a spin off. It was still terrible though, especially after the main series finale was very well done.
GoT is in a realm of its own based on shows I've seen.
HIMYM perfectly proved that extending a show due to popularity kills the quality so that gets my second place vote.
GoT is in a realm of its own based on shows I've seen.
HIMYM perfectly proved that extending a show due to popularity kills the quality so that gets my second place vote.
And it destroys the entire show, all the character development and the journey in 22 minutes.
The last season of DS9 is pretty bad compared to much of what preceded it. Not a legendary train wreck like GoT or Dexter, but not great.
Lol, yeah, Dexter was terrible for a while. Season 6 was unwatchable. What's even worse is that Season 7, while not good, had some promising material and it was like, 'okay, maybe they are coming back to form a bit for the finale.' Nope, season 8 battles 6 for some of the worst shit ever.
My god, that show did the biggest nosedive of a show I think I have ever seen
I'll add to the Game of Thrones pile.
I so wanted to watch the whole series with my SO but I can't knowing how bad it gets.
Maybe we'll just pretend it ends after season 3.
I so wanted to watch the whole series with my SO but I can't knowing how bad it gets.
Maybe we'll just pretend it ends after season 3.
I know it's the obvious answer. I know it's the boring answer. I know there's a million other shows that deserve to be talked about in this context. But there really is only one clear, superlative answer. And that's Game of Thrones. No ending has so thoroughly destroyed a show's legacy as that one. No one talks about anything else, now, but how big of a failure it was. It has (hopefully) ended some careers. It is an eternal punchline. Nothing else comes close.
Obvious answer would be GOT
While not awful the final season of Silicon Valley is not great and really didn't like the finale.m and without spoilng anything but a main character from the first few seasons didn't even make an appearance in the last season. Would have preferred the show ended in S5, such a prefect send off.
While not awful the final season of Silicon Valley is not great and really didn't like the finale.m and without spoilng anything but a main character from the first few seasons didn't even make an appearance in the last season. Would have preferred the show ended in S5, such a prefect send off.
Older seasons of Dexter hold up.
Older seasons of Thrones definitely hold up.
The finale of HIMYM somehow just destroyed the magic for me and I can't watch it at all anymore.
Older seasons of Thrones definitely hold up.
The finale of HIMYM somehow just destroyed the magic for me and I can't watch it at all anymore.
Tough thread. It's hard to pick one that I've seen/liked that wasn't already declining.
- Arrested Development S4 was awful so S5 being the same quality was not surprising.
- Dexter was already bad far before its final season.
- Game of Thrones also wasn't great for a minute even if that last season took it to depths unimagined.
- The Office was bad but I just rewatched S9 for the first time since it aired the other day and it wasn't as bad as I remembered, and was already on track to getting bad.
I feel like I'm forgetting something, but if Altered Carbon ends at S2 it'll be that for me. The quality of writing just plummeted. Couldn't stomach it.
edit: OMG Fringe! I forgot about THAT one! I mean I didn't love S4 but S5 was a whole new level of bad.
- Arrested Development S4 was awful so S5 being the same quality was not surprising.
- Dexter was already bad far before its final season.
- Game of Thrones also wasn't great for a minute even if that last season took it to depths unimagined.
- The Office was bad but I just rewatched S9 for the first time since it aired the other day and it wasn't as bad as I remembered, and was already on track to getting bad.
I feel like I'm forgetting something, but if Altered Carbon ends at S2 it'll be that for me. The quality of writing just plummeted. Couldn't stomach it.
edit: OMG Fringe! I forgot about THAT one! I mean I didn't love S4 but S5 was a whole new level of bad.
I can't agree with the Seinfeld mentions. There is definitely a drop in quality at the end but it's still a very good show, just not an all-time classic like earlier seasons. There are a few throwaway episodes but also several very solid ones.
Game of Thrones, on the other hand, becomes an absolute dumpster fire. The second half of the show is generally pretty troubled but it reached new lows in season 8.
Game of Thrones, on the other hand, becomes an absolute dumpster fire. The second half of the show is generally pretty troubled but it reached new lows in season 8.
- Fringe. Don't watch Season 5, because it had a nice happy ending at the end of Season 4 and S5 was tacked on.
- Stargate. I don't think Seasons 8,9,and 10 were necessary. They're not bad, but a soft reboot.
- X-Files. Christ, everything after S5? Maybe S6. Both the last season of the old run and the last season of the new run are awful.
- Sliders. So bad. Half the cast had left.
- Babylon 5. Again, a tacked on Season. It was supposed to be a 5 year show, but the last season was unlikely to happen. So everything was compressed into Season 4. But then the show got renewed, so S5 goes no-where.
The Wire dips, but I still enjoyed the finale.
Babylon 5 has major issues with the end of S4 and first half of S5. It's why I put it below DS9. Both had rocky starts, but that's completely common and forgivable. I thought once DS9 hit its stride it was pretty much smooth sailing, with a super satisfying payoff. Conversely, a late dip in quality is far less forgivable.
IIRC, the ending of S4 of B5 was rushed because Straczynski didn't know if it would be renewed for a fifth season.
Babylon 5 has major issues with the end of S4 and first half of S5. It's why I put it below DS9. Both had rocky starts, but that's completely common and forgivable. I thought once DS9 hit its stride it was pretty much smooth sailing, with a super satisfying payoff. Conversely, a late dip in quality is far less forgivable.
IIRC, the ending of S4 of B5 was rushed because Straczynski didn't know if it would be renewed for a fifth season.
Indeed, sadly.
House of Cards
While not the greatest show ever, I still liked it quite a bit, but that final season is the worst last season of a show I've EVER seen.
I understand that everything that happened with Kevin Spacey forced them to make huge changes to the show, but even ignoring his sudden absence the final season was absolutely awful.
Honestly it would have been better for all involved if they'd just not done the last season.
LOST
I really did not like the last season of LOST, more specifically as it aired week by week. Each episode felt like it took an eternity to come out each week, and then a large chunk of the episodes were taken up by the alternate reality "flashbacks" that were a big waste of time.
It was a torturous lead up to an ultimately unsatisfying conclusion.
It's like every mystery that could have been left a mystery was very deliberately answered (like Richard, Jacob, and the smoke monster's origin stories), and stuff that should have been explained more was just not (like more information about the Island itself, or why exactly the smoke monster leaving would be bad, or why the island had a giant, earthquake causing butt plug).
Even when I rewatched it years later (and didn't have to wait weeks for each episode) I still found it to be a really bad season.
Killing off Locke and having him be replaced by the smoke monster was a cool reveal in the previous season, but it meant one of the best characters in the show was just gone and replaced with a completely different personality. Locke and Jack's conflict was pretty central to the show for a LONG time and it basically never got a real satisfying conclusion.
And to go back to the alternate timeline/reality scenes, they were a BIG reason the season sucked. Because whenever someone died in the real world they'd get their memories back in the alternate world (purgatory orn pre-afterlife basically), it made every death in the final season pretty meaningless.
What does it matter if Jin and Sun have a horrible death or any other character? They'll be fine in the other world in the next scene.
It just sucks any drama out of a show when you know the characters are going to be fine in the next scene.
The very end worked on an emotional level since it was basically giving all the character's you've grown to love their happy ending in the afterlife, but from the perspective of caring about the overall story of the island and what was happening in the real world, it just boiled down to a stupid fistfight between Jack and not-Locke,and then Hurley and Michael go off to keep doing whatever the hell it was the Island was doing in the first place.
While not the greatest show ever, I still liked it quite a bit, but that final season is the worst last season of a show I've EVER seen.
I understand that everything that happened with Kevin Spacey forced them to make huge changes to the show, but even ignoring his sudden absence the final season was absolutely awful.
Honestly it would have been better for all involved if they'd just not done the last season.
LOST
I really did not like the last season of LOST, more specifically as it aired week by week. Each episode felt like it took an eternity to come out each week, and then a large chunk of the episodes were taken up by the alternate reality "flashbacks" that were a big waste of time.
It was a torturous lead up to an ultimately unsatisfying conclusion.
It's like every mystery that could have been left a mystery was very deliberately answered (like Richard, Jacob, and the smoke monster's origin stories), and stuff that should have been explained more was just not (like more information about the Island itself, or why exactly the smoke monster leaving would be bad, or why the island had a giant, earthquake causing butt plug).
Even when I rewatched it years later (and didn't have to wait weeks for each episode) I still found it to be a really bad season.
Killing off Locke and having him be replaced by the smoke monster was a cool reveal in the previous season, but it meant one of the best characters in the show was just gone and replaced with a completely different personality. Locke and Jack's conflict was pretty central to the show for a LONG time and it basically never got a real satisfying conclusion.
And to go back to the alternate timeline/reality scenes, they were a BIG reason the season sucked. Because whenever someone died in the real world they'd get their memories back in the alternate world (purgatory orn pre-afterlife basically), it made every death in the final season pretty meaningless.
What does it matter if Jin and Sun have a horrible death or any other character? They'll be fine in the other world in the next scene.
It just sucks any drama out of a show when you know the characters are going to be fine in the next scene.
The very end worked on an emotional level since it was basically giving all the character's you've grown to love their happy ending in the afterlife, but from the perspective of caring about the overall story of the island and what was happening in the real world, it just boiled down to a stupid fistfight between Jack and not-Locke,and then Hurley and Michael go off to keep doing whatever the hell it was the Island was doing in the first place.
House of Cards had a terrible last season, that's the best one I can think of.
Dexter, Game of Thrones, How I met Your Mother, yes, they all had bad last seasons, but the shows were already going downhill way before that.
By the time they got to the last season, were they even great shows? Not really...
Dexter died with Trinity, GoT got severly wounded at the end of S4, and got the final blow in the Battle of the Bastards, which was ridiculous from beginning to end, that whole storyline was a mess. And How I Met Your Mother went creatively bankrupt after season 5/6.
Dexter, Game of Thrones, How I met Your Mother, yes, they all had bad last seasons, but the shows were already going downhill way before that.
By the time they got to the last season, were they even great shows? Not really...
Dexter died with Trinity, GoT got severly wounded at the end of S4, and got the final blow in the Battle of the Bastards, which was ridiculous from beginning to end, that whole storyline was a mess. And How I Met Your Mother went creatively bankrupt after season 5/6.
Penny Dreadful had two godlike seasons followed by a third that should have been the best yet (they introduced Dracula for fuck's sake) but it was pretty damn terrible and now I can't recommend the show to anyone because of how it ends.
Thankfully, that won't even be the last season come a year or two. And now that Aaron McGruder is back, the new seasons should be a hoot. The comics he made last year prove he's still got it.
Yeah, GoT, like, retroactively made the earlier seasons worse. Like it completely removed GoT from the public's consciousness. It's just gone, like Avatar.
Fringe's final season wasn't bad, it was just a massive tonal and structural change to the show.
Yes I'd probably have been fine if it'd never gotten the last season, but it was clearly a storyline that had been in the works.
I think it would have been better if it hadn't been the FINAL season, hadn't been quite as depressing (it was sooo dark), and hadnt ended with the cliche "using time travel to make it so the bad stuff never happened". I hate time travel stories that end like that, it basically makes the whole season feel pointless since it was just erased from existence (except for Walter disappearing from modern day, that bit didn't really fit in the time travel rules they'd established IMO).
Avengers Endgame was pretty goofy with its time travel rules, but I really appreciated that it found a way to still have the events matter that happened in the past, and still get a "we saved (almost) everyone" conclusion.
Sliders.
It was about a group of people travelling randomly between parallel Earth's trying to get back home, it was like Quantum Leap with every episode a new story as each Earth had its own problems. It was great.
But in S3 we lost a major cast member, in S4 another (in a horrible disservice to the character and actress), and in S5 the main star left. S4 also saw them get home but parallel Earth aliens had taken over so they left to find help on other Earths. S4 was bad with the Alien stuff becoming the focus of too many episodes instead of the new Earth of the week, the show had lost its entire point.
S5 having only one original cast member left and still the alien nonsense was just unwatchable. It was cancelled on a cliffhanger.
It was about a group of people travelling randomly between parallel Earth's trying to get back home, it was like Quantum Leap with every episode a new story as each Earth had its own problems. It was great.
But in S3 we lost a major cast member, in S4 another (in a horrible disservice to the character and actress), and in S5 the main star left. S4 also saw them get home but parallel Earth aliens had taken over so they left to find help on other Earths. S4 was bad with the Alien stuff becoming the focus of too many episodes instead of the new Earth of the week, the show had lost its entire point.
S5 having only one original cast member left and still the alien nonsense was just unwatchable. It was cancelled on a cliffhanger.
Every one repeating the same shows over and over again. I find it very rare when the last season isn't the worst but the two off the top of my head are...
Friends and King of Queens. Not terrible seasons but they both feel very different and very "final". In King of Queens particularly, it went from a loving show with arguments to where it just felt really mean.
Friends and King of Queens. Not terrible seasons but they both feel very different and very "final". In King of Queens particularly, it went from a loving show with arguments to where it just felt really mean.
I can't think of one where everything was humming along fine and then out of nowhere the last season was bad. With shows like The Office, Game of Thrones, and Lost it was clear for a while that they were on a downward slide.
The last season of Married with Children was an insult to the legacy of that show. It was awful, and the last episode was probably the worst the show had ever been.
I feel about Battlestar Galactica how others feel about GoT - it's retroactively ruined me and I don't want to rewatch. Even the second half of Season 3 with the trial was weak, but Season 4 went completely to shit. Such a disappointment.
While I agree I would just simply split a hair that the writing was on the wall during season 7. Anyone who was surprised by season 8 was being too charitable after the disaster that was 7.
Also, your avatar is perfect. That stupid starbucks cup is symbolic of everything- the attention to detail was gone.
Game of Thrones I think is the winner as the hype for it was the highest a show has had and it failed in almost every way. The Wire final season is the worst out of all of the preceding seasons but I know some will say that Season 2 was the worst.
I think Galactica is in consideration but I still think the final season is fine, it just isn't the strongest out of the others. I would also argue Sopranos as well.
I think Galactica is in consideration but I still think the final season is fine, it just isn't the strongest out of the others. I would also argue Sopranos as well.
Game of Thrones had only one thing going for it for seasons 6, 7, and 8, and that was revelation, shock, and spectacle.
With the revelation gone, the shock stupid, and the spectacle tired, we were left to wallow in what had been there for 4 seasons: D and D's shit-tacular writing.
It's like I said in my Rome comparison thread, the endgame of Game of Thrones should have been showing how this giant world they built would endure after all the wars, but they didn't bother over 73 episodes to craft a believable world. There's just schemers and battles that are over and dead. Nothing to root for, no future. The show that had an endless supply of plot threads floating around in your head left nothing in the end. No one cares.
With the revelation gone, the shock stupid, and the spectacle tired, we were left to wallow in what had been there for 4 seasons: D and D's shit-tacular writing.
It's like I said in my Rome comparison thread, the endgame of Game of Thrones should have been showing how this giant world they built would endure after all the wars, but they didn't bother over 73 episodes to craft a believable world. There's just schemers and battles that are over and dead. Nothing to root for, no future. The show that had an endless supply of plot threads floating around in your head left nothing in the end. No one cares.
Actually, the new boondocks is going to be a complete reboot, unrelated to the last show. It's not season 5, it's season 1 of the new boondocks. It's not a continuation of the old one, so all the old stuff with woodcrest and all that? Never happened.
Also, no John Witherspoon.
Yeah, I'm surprised multiple people le feel this way, some of the best Seinfeld episodes are in the last 2 seasons.
Game of Thrones is my pick but HIMYM is very close, really loved that show and last 2 seasons just fell off a fucking CLIFF and the ultimate ending was super dumb.
The issue is that the renew-or-not mechanism through which most TV is made means a strong ending isn't required, because at that point, it doesn't matter anymore.
Interesting. I hadn't heard that news. Well, I trust McGruder regardless.
This was my answer. One of the fumiest and best written comedies ever. But that last season wasn't fun at all.