The 10 Most Controversial Series Finales

WARNING: AS YOU MIGHT EXPECT, THIS FEATURE CONTAINS STONKING GREAT SPOILERS. GOT THAT?

“Endings are hard. Any chapped-ass monkey with a keyboard can poop out a beginning, but endings are impossible.”

So said Chuck Shurley (aka God… possibly) in an episode of Supernatural a while back, and he had a point. Nothing is harder than delivering a solid, satisfying finale to a show that has a loyal following salivating at the thought of seeing all their hopes for their favourite characters coming to fruition. Do you give them everything they want? Are you cruel or are you kind? Do you kill, maim or otherwise sow carnage, or do you have your cast riding off into the sunset?

Here, Jayne Nelson takes a look at ten of the most controversial finales. Feel free to add any others we’ve missed in the comments. And remember, endings are hard. Or as Chuck continues: “You try to tie up every loose end, but you never can. The fans are always gonna bitch. There’s always gonna be holes. And since it’s the ending, it’s all supposed to add up to something. I’m telling you, they’re a raging pain in the ass.”  Quite.

Smallville, “Finale”

For ten long years we followed the life and times of young (well, pretending to be young) Tom Welling as Clark Kent. Through all that time, the one thing that kept fans going was the thought that one day we would finally get to see Kent as Superman – actually wearing the red, blue and yellow costume his red, blue and yellow wardrobe had been building towards.

But what did we get instead? A final episode stuffed with fan-treats, sure, with the return of Lex Luthor, the marriage of Lois and Clark and even a faintly satisfying flash-forward at the end. But we couldn’t help feeling it was all a little rushed – particularly Lex’s scenes, which ended with him disappointingly losing his memory and forgetting that Clark was Superman. Yawn.

And what of that final moment, the culmination of all our hopes and dreams? Way back when the show began the producers said we’d never see Tom Welling in The Costume, and they were right. Instead we got a rubbish CGI Welling flitting about like something out of a computer game (and a bad one at that). Even the final scene, in which he runs towards the camera before ripping open his shirt to reveal the S leaves you going, “AND?”

An entire decade spent waiting for a superhero to suit up, and all you get is CGI? [Throws rotten tomatoes]

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