on one hand we are disappointed because we expected Jack's death and the Jack/Rebecca love storyline has been beaten to death they are upset because neither of them accomplished what they truly wanted to. they both sacrificed to have a great family that at the end of it they feel so empty inside. Jack didnt start up an auto body shop. Rebecca never sang. But I do think this finale was built for future seasons. especially with the Kate singing/Kevin choosing to take that meeting/Randall adopting storylines put into play. We all know Jack is gonna die at some point. He is already dead. its not a William situation where there was a timeline of death. Maybe its our fault for assuming. Because you know what they say about assumptions. but that fight between Jack and Rebecca and then that Jack speech at the end were fucking great.
it's not the audiences fault. that was beating over our heads from the 2nd episode. the producers talked about it all the time. you don't explicitly address the issue in the penultimate episode and not even mention it in the finale. that was just bad storytelling and distracted from the episode. one thing i have learned from talking to people and reading reviews, is people are a lot more invested in the "how" than i am/realized. that's not a "mystery" that kept me watching this year and I hope they adjust that in the second season. but i guess maybe the point is that it worked for most of the audience and i'll just have to deal.
FYI there was never a timeline for the death kind of a fucked up society we live in that we are pissed off that someone didnt fucking die smh
i'm not talking timeline. and i'm not pissed off he didn't die. he's dead. and he's a fictional character. i'm pissed at the showrunners for screwing that all up.
how did they screw up? are you in the writers room? do you know what the big picture is? what if that wasnt the right timing for the death? you cant blow your load all in season 1 you know...
see to me it's not. i don't care "how" he dies. i do care what it does to the family and how they react. the "how" could not matter less to me and it's probably the only thing that really annoyed me about this season. the focus on "how" led to me (and many others) being distracted during this whole finale, taking away from the important story of the finale. take for example william. we knew "how" he was going to die from the get go. but they did such a good job with the story, the relationship between him and the rest of the family, that "Memphis" was one of the better hours of tv i've seen in a while. so i know they can do it. i know they can make a great hour of tv without that "surprise" or "mystery", but for whatever reason they refuse to give Jack that benefit.
Except that they've spent the entire season building and focusing on Kate and Jack's daddy/daughter relationship (when she was made fun of at the pool for being heavy, at her birthday when everyone went to Kevin's party, etc) leading to the revelation that Kate feels responsible for Jack's death. For all that we know, however he died is what sent her into a tailspin. Maybe that's what made her get fatter. Maybe that's why she spurned relationships. Maybe a million other things that could be a direct result of how her dad died. Based on the way season 1 developed, the "how" is critically important.
I'm okay with it. Instead of how Jack dies, we got how Jack and Rebecca met...which I think was kind of cool. And while we knew the relationship between Jack and his father was a "strained" one, to say the least, we hadn't seen details of why, so that was alright too. It's not actually the writer's fault you were focused on the possible death of Jack. Whether it happened or not, that's what you were going to be focusing on, and missing the rest of the episode. You're pissed because you were focused on Jack possibly dying and missed Rebecca possibly saving Jack's life before they even officially met, and at the very least, making him a better person for not having the chance to rob the bar...and then the death didn't happen. Even if it had, you'd have still missed other parts of the show as a result. It was a good episode. Not the best, but good. And who says the season finale has to be the best episode of the season? Maybe this finale falls short of others, comparatively...but how many episodes during this season were better than most of everything that's on tv right now? I'm way more sad about Kevin/Sophie. She's bae.
Wife and I binged through this and watched the finale live(ish). This is 100% not my type of show and I loved every minute of it. The pilot completely hooked me. I do agree with others' assessments that they rewrote the finale after they got renewed. My only worry is where they go moving forward without William, who to me was an integral part of this show.
Good post. Post is good, and I agree with all of it...especially the Sophie part. I love her so much. Would wife immediately, or re-wife in Kev's case.
Well, the beauty of the show - and I don't know if this will be true for William - is that no one ever really has to be dead. It feels like they can be done with his story line, but who knows what future events could call flashbacks. I haven't seen every episode, so correct me if I'm wrong, but we've never seen how black triplet came to be put up for adoption(I know we've seen how Jack and Rebecca got him, but never from his biological parent's side, I think). We could get another young version of William for that. I don't think this series is destined for a lot of seasons...and that's actually okay. It reminds me a bit of Wilfred on FX(which was a remake of a British show that only went like 3 seasons). A large part of the beauty of this show is its uniqueness. Yes, the writing is really good, but that the storytelling is done in a way that's so different than anything else on television, makes it that much better. Run the series too long, and you start to lose that. 3-4 seasons feels like the sweet spot.
Spoiler William and the mother met right after his mother had died from cancer. Randall's mom died during birth and William dropped him off at the firehouse because he knew that they would know what to do. Fireman who found him tried to take him home to fix his marriage but that failed so he took the baby to the hospital
I thought the finale was great and the overall season was amazing. I guess I didn't expect to see Jack's death at all this season and especially didn't think so after William just passed a couple episodes back. Zero complaints from me.
The obvious one would be car crash because he's drunk. My next guess would be bar fight at Rebecca's show? Though that may be a little too much.
Good season premiere. Premier was good. Loved Beth's desire to adopt older, massively overlooked demographic of orphan.
damn uh did i miss anything? Did Rebbeca drive around with his stuff? I wasnt playing close attention at the end because my friends roommate was being high as shit.
thats how i saw it but then she pulled up to the burned down house. and it looked like she was very surprised but idk.
They keep saying there are more significant clues than what we saw at the very end so...idk. I also still don't care how he dies, but that's not important since that's where the show continues to go. I really liked the premier and that talk at the door hit hard. Really looking forward to this season
Think that was more of a realization that it really happened. For all we know, that’s the first time Rebecca had seen the house.
but how would she get all those things if he died in a fire, nothing looks burned. We'll surely find out more but rn im confused. First ep was really really good though.
My guess is he got drunk, passed out and the house burned down because he was cooking a pizza or some shit.
Well Kate said it was her fault so idk. Could of course just tie back to her getting him to go see the show and punching that guy from the band, guilt in those situations come from very little sometimes.