Does A Bad Final Year Ruin A TV Show's Memory?

[Mr Light]

We all have favorite TV shows that ended with horrible final seasons (sometimes more than just the last one!). Does it spoil your memory of what came before, and drag down your memory of the entire show?

I think for me it does.

The X-Files was my all time favorite show in high school. But everything from S7 to the end just systemically killed my love for the show. I actually didn't watch the final season, something that would have been inconceivable to me a few years before that.

Buffy was great... to the end of Season Three. Four was such a disappointment, and while Five was good, Six was just the worst ever. Seven was a slight improvement. But when I think of the show now, I don't think of the glory years, I think of Buffy being an angry bitch in a miserable series with no action.

Stargate SG-1 is another one of my all time favorites. But Season Seven on... it just slowly fell down. Now I don't remember the amazing S3-6 years... I think of the Ori. And no O'Neill.

Deep Space Nine was another all time favorite in high school. But the show peaked with "Sacrifice of Angels". The rest of Six was such a disappointment. And while Seven ended slightly well I hated the finale.

Babylon 5 is my all time favorite series... but it will always be clouded by Season Five.

And now, we come to LOST. My favorite series of the last decade. I was a die hard apologist for this show all through the end of Five. I loved it. I had faith in it. But the flash-sideways... ugh. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't the show I grew to love so much. And now I wonder how well I'll remember it in the years to come.

Dammit. I should have added a poll. Moderators, do you have the power to add a poll to my thread?

 

[Starbreaker]

Not really... not many shows get to go out on top, so I'm used to it. I had to see Scrubs butchered, and that was hard to take, though.

 

[RoJoHen]

Honestly, I liked the final seasons of every show you mentioned. I didn't like them as much as previous seasons, but I still managed to enjoy them. It could be because I watched most of those shows on DVD, so I didn't really have to struggle through weeks of mediocrity.

 

[MyCylon]

I think I've actually been pretty lucky in that regard. I loved the final seasons of my two favorite shows, nuBSG and DS9, so no problem there at all.

Having said that, I don't think I'm the type to let a final season or episode taint the rest for me. I tend to enjoy what I like and pretty much ignore and/or re-interpret what I don't. It's simply a happier place to be, basically.

 

[Dac]

Heh, I loved the last seasons of most shows, even LOST, the last Season was overall great, it was just the last episode that soured everything.

As for Stargate and Scrubs...I tend to think of their latter series as spinoffs, to be fair, SG-1 Season 9 onwards was going to be called Stargate Command until they decided it was too expensive to change the name. At least Scrubs had the "med school" but in the credits and a completely different setting to distance itself from the original, and although season 8 as a whole was a little sub par, My Finale was a fantastic ending.

Battlestar Galactica is my favourate show of all time, and although the back end of Season 4 was mostly shots of Adama getting drunk and staring at bulkheads, I still love it because the finale was (in MY opinion) abso-bloody-fantastic.

 

[Mr Light]

Oh yeah, Scrubs is another great example.

BSG was similar to DS9. The second to last season opened with an amazing occupation storyline that was the pinnacle of the series, then meandered for the rest of the season. And the last season was an improvement but still not amazing. I did actually enjoy the BSG Finale though!

 

[Joe Washington]

A bad final season leaves a bitter taste in my mouth and though the show may have had some good seasons before, it having a bad final season would make me want to rewatch the show rarely in the future.

 

[scnj]

A bad final season leaves a bitter taste in my mouth and though the show may have had some good seasons before, it having a bad final season would make me want to rewatch the show rarely in the future.

Agreed. A final season/episode should make me want to go back and rewatch the show with a fresh perspective on events.

 

[D Man]

Lost's last season was maybe a bit weaker than many of its predecessors, but being my favorite show, I still loved nearly all of it (other than "Across the Sea," which I hated.)

Seinfeld went out with a lame whimper during its last few years, but its peak in the middle 2-6 years remain absolute classics.

I see TNG's S7 and Babylon 5's S5 in a similar light...they're not really up to par with what we've seen before, but they're still (mostly) fun adventures with some of my favorite characters, so I can give them a pass. Plus both those series had terrific finales, which certainly helps.

So overall, I'd have to say that No, a bad (or under par, or slightly worse than before, etc.) final year doesn't affect how I feel about a series.

P.S. I think BSG's weakest season was a combo of parts of 2.5, parts of late 3.0, and parts of 3.5. Season 4 was awesome for me, so I can't use this show as an example.

 

[Orac Zen]

Not really. I'm usually more disappointed if the finale sucks than if the last season isn't stellar.

B5's last season wasn't great (but how does anything match up to the magnificence of the two seasons that preceded it?) but it wasn't anywhere near as bad as it's usually painted, either; IMO the last 10 or so episodes are up there with almost anything else the show did. TNG's last season was wildly uneven (to put it politely) but it doesn't diminish what went before for me. As D Man mentioned, the fact both those shows had superlative finales certainly helped but the fact those last seasons weren't great didn't negate everything that went before them.

One or two episodes aside I enjoyed the final season of Lost a lot, and it too had (IMO) a superb finale. To each their own.

 

[Jax]

Scrubs season 9 wasn't awful and grew on me as it went on BUT it seemed so out of place that it does kind of ruin all that went before it. The season 8 finale of Scrubs was just perfect, an emotional/funny ride that was just the whole point of the show and what made it so good.

X Files went down hill after 7 and I've never watched all of 8/9 but I am going back through the show so will get there eventually.

I never had the same issues with SG-1 as others but with the story being so different and not ending on TV but DVD, it does feel out of place and should of been a 4 year spinoff not SG-1 s9/10.

Heroes was ruined for me from season 3 & 4, infact never watched all of 4 and probably never will.

 

[Mr Light]

We bought the complete series set of X-Files but I just feel like I'll never want to watch it even though ten years have passed. All I can think about it is those bad last few years... I can't even remember the love I used to hold for the show. Not to mention the fact that in the entire the alien mythology never went anywhere and was just completely thrown out the window. I actually ran an incredibly detailed X-Files Mythology Guide analyzing every line from those episodes, which looking back on it now just feels ridiculous

 

[Australis]

The last couple of episodes ruined all of Lost for me. I'll never watch it again.

 

[Chess Piece Face]

Battlestar Galactica's finale made me never want to watch ANY of what came before, which I used to love. I hate it now. I couldn't even bring myself to watch The Plan.

Lost's finale was very disappointing but I could see myself watching the show over in about 10 years.

On the other hand, I just finished a rewatch of ds9 and the last 10 episode arc including the finale was particularly satisfying.

 

[DevilEyes]

The last season of BSG was much weaker than the preceding ones (except maybe 3.5, where many of the problems of season 4 started). I'm not sure it utterly ruined the show for me, but I do hold it in much lower esteem now as a result.

X Files went down hill after 7 and I've never watched all of 8/9 but I am going back through the show so will get there eventually.

After 7?! Season 7 was by far the worst season of The X-Files. The next 2 seasons were an improvement, but still not nearly enough to get it fully back on track, since the mythology had been utterly screwed up (which I'd say happened halfway through season 6).

 

[RoJoHen]

We bought the complete series set of X-Files but I just feel like I'll never want to watch it even though ten years have passed. All I can think about it is those bad last few years... I can't even remember the love I used to hold for the show. Not to mention the fact that in the entire the alien mythology never went anywhere and was just completely thrown out the window. I actually ran an incredibly detailed X-Files Mythology Guide analyzing every line from those episodes, which looking back on it now just feels ridiculous

As someone who just finished rewatching The X-Files last month, I assure the mythology continues into seasons 8 and 9 and is actually quite consistent with what came before. I remembered hating Seasons 8 and 9 as well, but when I rewatched them, I actually found that they were pretty good. Season 8 was actually kind of awesome.

 

[caisson2delta]

We bought the complete series set of X-Files but I just feel like I'll never want to watch it even though ten years have passed. All I can think about it is those bad last few years... I can't even remember the love I used to hold for the show. Not to mention the fact that in the entire the alien mythology never went anywhere and was just completely thrown out the window. I actually ran an incredibly detailed X-Files Mythology Guide analyzing every line from those episodes, which looking back on it now just feels ridiculous

As someone who just finished rewatching The X-Files last month, I assure the mythology continues into seasons 8 and 9 and is actually quite consistent with what came before. I remembered hating Seasons 8 and 9 as well, but when I rewatched them, I actually found that they were pretty good. Season 8 was actually kind of awesome.

Good points on both counts.I think the real issue, with many fans, was that certain aspects of the root stories were left sort of hanging. That being said, it doesn't ruin any love of the X Files for me. I think a big issue with many of these series, particularly ones that ran as long as the X files and SG1, is that they started off really strong and with unique stories. They ran their course and lost some fan favorite characters and many can't accept new faces and will dislike anything from that point, regardless of the quality.

 

[DevilEyes]

Good points on both counts.I think the real issue, with many fans, was that certain aspects of the root stories were left sort of hanging. That being said, it doesn't ruin any love of the X Files for me. I think a big issue with many of these series, particularly ones that ran as long as the X files and SG1, is that they started off really strong and with unique stories. They ran their course and lost some fan favorite characters and many can't accept new faces and will dislike anything from that point, regardless of the quality.

I was indifferent to/OK with Reyes, but Robert Patrick's Doggett was awesome and is one of the reasons why the show improved in the last 2 seasons (of course, the other reason is that the show went back to its roots and brought back the dark atmosphere and stories). The show started to go downhill in season 6, even though it still had several great episodes. The first time I felt something was 'off' was at the start of season 6 when the show was shot in LA instead of Vancouver. There was a certain 'sunny' look to the show that was just wrong. And then they started to have far too many lighthearted comedy episodes. Now, comedy episodes worked before, when they far and few in between, and when they were actually intelligently written and still had the quirky X-Files feel to them (Humbug, Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space', Post-Modern Prometheus are some of the examples). But in season 6, they had episodes like the appalling Rain King, that felt like a classic farce/romcom. And then it got worse in season 7. It was filled with lighthearted episodes (which weren't even that great); the writers didn't seem to know what to do with Mulder and Scully; David Duchovny looked bored and seemed to have started to play himself more than Mulder; and the story just didn't seem to be going anywhere. This was the absolute nadir of the show.

They tried to salvage this in the last 2 seasons, and it worked to an extent, with some of the darkness being brought back, and with the new dynamics and fresh new characters. Letting Duchovny take a leave was a good idea and allowed his character to be there after the comeback only when he had something important to do. However, I think that the show's mythology had already been fubared long before that (in second part of season 6 and with the anti-climatic 'closure' to Samantha storyline in season 7), and attempts to revive it just made everything incredibly convoluted.

 

[Warped9]

We all have favorite TV shows that ended with horrible final seasons (sometimes more than just the last one!). Does it spoil your memory of what came before, and drag down your memory of the entire show?

Not really. Particularly if the bulk of the show was good.

Also when you revisit a series through boxed sets and watch episodes uncut, without commercials and one after the other you experience it differently then when you watched it on commercial television when it was originally aired. Things are tighter and you don't have this intangible sense of events you don't see happening between episodes.

When I look at The X-Files I love most everything except the last two seasons which I feel could have been condensed into one better season. And it's really only the last season that lets me down--the show had just run out of steam creatively and the character chemistry wasn't there anymore. I don't hate Babylon 5's last season--it has its moments--but it could have been more.

I get more disappointed with series that don't fulfill their promise, get sidetracked or just don't really get off the ground. I liked the idea of Crusade, but it was just screwed from the get-go. I loved the first season of Earth Final Conflict, but then the series imploded in Season 2 and I could never go back. I liked the short lived series Now And Again with Eric close and Margaret Colin, but they just couldn't get the show going into something really interesting. And just as Journeyman began to hint at what was going on they cancelled it.

 

[Othello]

Yes it does.

I hated the finale episodes of Battlestar Galactica so much I sold my entire DVD set after tha travesty.