Community - 6.13 Emotional Consequences of Broadcast Television
Kyle XY - 3.10 Bringing Down the House
Northern Exposure - 6.22 Let's Dance
Ozark - 4.14 A Hard Way to Go
Soul Eater - 1.51 The Word Is Bravery!
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - 7.25 What You Leave Behind
Voting ended onNov 26, 2023
The top 5 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
Brooklyn Nine-Nine - 8.09 / 8.10 The Last Day
It just... season 8 had been so bad as a whole, it attempted to touch on the blm movement and did it in an okay at best way and in the wake of it all, i think a lot of people just weren't here for cop shows. The finale tried to bring the magic back with one last heist and it did pull out all the stops but I don't know, it just left me feeling really cold. And the ending being that even though the main character wasn't a cop anymore, that he would return to the station every year for the heist... it just never escapes the cop narrative even after he's left.
Chén Qíng Lìng/The Untamed - Episode 50
I nominate this final on grounds of CCP information control, censorship and homophobia. They were so scared of the power of wangxian that they ended up banning ao3 in china and in the show they have to inexplicably have them part ways just to hammer home the no-homo. Plus the show is just kind of objectively bad.... but it rewires your brain all the same
Community - 6.13 Emotional Consequences of Broadcast Television
ok i haven’t watched it in a while but it wasn’t the episode’s fault this show had been going downhill for a while. The finale put it out of its misery mostly.
Kyle XY - 3.10 Bringing Down the House
The writers knew they were getting canceled and chose to raise more questions than answers and set up cliffhangers, rather than have a satisfying end. I'm sure it was a last ditch effort to save the show, but it didn't work and now it's just a bad finale.
Northern Exposure - 6.22 Let's Dance / 6.23 Tranquility Base
No propaganda submitted
Ozark - 4.14 A Hard Way to Go
No propaganda submitted
Soul Eater - 1.51 The Word Is Bravery!
ugh god it just gave up on any attempt at character development or the ending of the story in any meaningful way. instead of a complex universe journey exploring her bond with soul, and death the kid becoming the new god of death, maka just...wins the day by 'being brave', extremely underwhelming and borderline nonsensical
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - 7.25 / 7.26 What You Leave Behind
Man so okay like it’s not the worst worst one out there but man they really just fuckikg did that. Found family all went and spread themselves across the quadrant with the head of the show the leader, Captain Benjamin Sisko who really just wanted to live on Bajor, got turned into an incorporeal being who could no longer live a linear life while his wife and unborn child had to go on without him. They didn’t even have him saying goodbye to his actual son. His literal son did not get a goodbye, they only gave that to Kasidy, and no hate to Kasidy, she’s my girl, but she’s only been there for three year while his actual son Jake sisko was still basically a kid. He was like 19, 20 and no goodbye fork his dad he’s lost time and time again. Some characters got a satisfying ending but then Julian Bashir is left to stay on deep space nine supposedly still in love with Ezri Dax and together (but let’s be honest, it was a terrible forced decision. They made no sense, and had no chemistry) and still stuck without moving forward or changing. Like what a cop out. Not to mention the terrible cgi fire caves where literally gods got thrown into a fire pit and that was the big climax
Tales of Arcadia - Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans
Ted Lasso - 3.12 So Long, Farewell
Torchwood - 3.05 Day Five
Voting ended onNov 26, 2023
The top 4 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
Agent Carter - 2.10 Hollywood Ending
Just as Peggysous became canon, just as Jack is about to start his redemption arc, they cancelled the show and left all of us on a massive cliffhanger for, let's see, almost 8 years at this point. We need ANSWERS.
It was written as a cliffhanger for a second season that would never come, but it just felt flat. The one objective that our leading lad (Josh) had been chasing (saving Sam) was rendered pointless, because the moment the big bad was defeated she effectively declared herself the new big bad and everyone who wasn't a major character went 'hmmm, okay!' And accepted it!
They didn't even address this all that well, just ended with a shot of the MCs looking shocked.
Doctor Who - 12.10 The Timeless Children
this finale is shit!! absolute ass! nothing happens in it for it to justify having such a cool name. the master captures the doctor, shows her a slideshow that amounts to ‘‘you’re adopted!! :)" doctor breaks out of her matrix prison thing by overloading it with memories when the matrix is The Supercomputer and it’s used to hold all memories of all time lords ever? you know, the species whove been doing their thing for a billion years and live up to 10,000 years? the doctors new memories should either already be there or make nary a dent in it. the doctor’s like ‘‘why would they do that! why would they lie?’’ girl they have been lying to you since forever. they killed you once. theyve tried to kill you so many times. they turned you into a fucked up anti time monster that one time. one of the doctors past past selves even told her it doesnt really matter!! what was even the point
Loki - 1.06 For All Time. Always.
The series was going downhill past Episode 3 tbh, but it really just was a load of crap only interested in setting up the multiverse
Tales of Arcadia - Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans
This finale undoes everything the show worked for. In order to give itself stakes it kills off a few characters, but in a way that only indirectly impacts the MCs (such as Jim's Mom's fiancé getting killed).
Then, at the end of the special, the main character uses time travel to go back to the start of S1E01 and changed history so he never becomes the trollhunter. Instead he makes his next friend the trollhunter instead.
In terms of anticipation it was not at all what anyone was anticipating. (I had assumed he'd go to the start of the special and defeat the titans without any casualties).
Having undone time only he remembers the previous timestream and he makes no effort to engage with it outside of accepting his changeling principal far sooner.
Ted Lasso - 3.12 So Long, Farewell
This trash ass finale undid three seasons of character development for every single person involved (except Nate!). A long-distance parent returned "home" despite having no attachments besides his child and leaving behind his entire found family, an abused and neglected woman was left behind by the person who taught her she didn't deserve abuse and neglect, and two characters who spent the whole show learning to cooperate and care for each other got into a fistfight over the girl they both dated.
The top 4 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
Friends - 10.17 The Last One
It's specifically part 2 I think qualifies here because that has the Rachel got off the plane thing and I think in 2023 we can all admit that was a mistake. she should've just lived her best life in Paris
Gilmore Girls - 7.22 Bon Voyage
No propaganda submitted
Gossip Girl - 6.10 New York I Love You XOXO
Chuck murders his uncle so the plot is that Chuck and Blair had to get married in a day and like flee the country. Whether you loved them or hated them, no one wanted them to get married in ten minutes on the street. Dan is revealed as Gossip Girl which makes ZERO sense because he sends tips to Gossip Girl and learns stuff from it ALL THE TIME. It’s literally impossible that he was Gossip Girl the whole time. There’s a timeskip and Dan and Serena are getting married, OH cause no one even cares that he’s Gossip Girl and has ruined their lives over and over, so Dan and Serena get married even though they haven’t been together since they were sixteen!! They don’t even like eachother at all by season six. Everyone else’s ending is just tragic. Nate’s whole storyline in season one was hating that his life was planned and he’s going to end up like his dad, and he ends up exactly like his dad and he’s in politics despite showing zero interest in it before. Every character didn’t want to end up like their parents and DID by the end
ReBoot - 4.08 Crouching Binome, Hidden Virus
It concluded with a cliffanger and a massive reveal (the nice BoB, Dot was about to marry was the bad guy all along) that left the viewer shocked as Megabyte (said bad guy) seized the center of Power and everything was about to be infected.
Shameless - 11.12 Father Frank, Full of Grace
Imagine a show going on for 11 seasons just for not a single one of the characters to get a genuinely happy ending. All the endings were open ended, but for every single one of them it was implied that bad things were coming (other than the character who died, obviously, because that was a true end). We spent 11 years getting attached to characters only for none of them to be truly happy and so many questions still unanswered.
Star Trek: Voyager - 7.25 / 7.26 Endgame
Throwing together Chakotay and Seven out of nowhere at the last minute; Janeway cavalierly rewriting decades of history to save them; everything relying on deus ex machina future tech; all these are bad. But the worst part is, "Endgame" ends before they get home! We don't see any reunions between the crew and their families back home, or how their homecoming is celebrated. After seven years, they get back to Earth, and it just...ends, without any real resolution.
Top Chef - 11.17 Finale
It's the end of a long season full of frustrating man children and delicious food in Louisiana. With our final two we have Nina, an award winning chef and fan favorite of the season who has been in the top ten challenges and the bottom only twice. She could be the first (and to this day would still be the only) black woman to win Top Chef. In the other corner we have Nicholas, who was in the top four times and the bottom six times and always blames other people for his problems. He yells at his staff and coworkers whenever things get tough throughout the season as well.
They each get three sou chefs and Nina picks the two other strongest women of the season who both were screwed over by Nick earlier in the season, alongside her friend Travis. Nick picks three bros and there's a joke that it's Guys vs Girls because Travis on Nina's team is gay.
Service is stressful for each team but they handle it in different ways. Nina readjusts her plans quickly and Nick yells at his waitstaff in front of everyone again. The judges eat at both places and we get an emotional interview with each contestant of what winning would mean for them.
Judging time! Three of the judges think Nina should win because her food was the best of the night. Two judges think Nick should win because his food was better. One of the Team Nick judges is head Judge Tom Colichio and he speaks to the other judges like they're stupid. The judges start debating and the two Team Nick judges say, wait, actually both teams were equally good that night but Nina has always been that good meanwhile this is the best Nick has ever done so he should win. The judges argue more and at one point Tom Colichio says Nick yelling at his staff proves he's a passionate chef so he should win. They keep disagreeing with three for Nina and two for Nick. We don't see the end of the argument.
Two Cheftestants stand before the judges with their families and all the former contestants of the season standing off to the side. The winner of Top Chef New Orleans is... Nick. Some of his fellow Cheftestants from the season are visibly annoyed and Nick gives his mom a sloppy kiss on the lips before giving a tearful confessional. The end.
My Next Life as a Villainess - 2.12 My Graduation Ceremony Happened...
True Blood - 7.10 Thank You
The Who Was? Show - 1.13 Julius Caesar & Bruce Lee
Voting ended onNov 26, 2023
The top 4 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
CSI: NY - 9.17 Today is Life
CSI was always copaganda and admittedly NY got cancelled midseason but jesus fucking christ. Weird semi-bottle episode of cops trapped inside their station because people are protesting the shooting of a Black man as the others desperately scrabble to prove he was armed as if that automatically makes it okay. No closure for any characters other than making previously sympathetic characters look like racist dicks.
Faking it - 3.10 Up in Flames
This series finale was so underwhelming that I didn't even realize it was the finale and not just another episode. Yes, the show was cancelled early but it didn't even read as a season finale...
Imposters - 2.10 See You Soon‚ Macaroon
Ok listen so no I wasn’t expecting much from this show like I knew what I was getting into. But oh my GOD the way you could FEEL how rushed this finale was. Early cancellation‚ I believe there was meant to be one more season. (Also personally did not enjoy it bc I did not find myself compelled by Ezra’s storylines this season but he is the main character so the last scene of the entire show was something I thought was SO stupid). Also broke up the found family. Unsurprising but I’m dying out here and they couldn’t have thrown me one line?
The actual structure of the majority of the episode was pretty tight‚ like if it were a normal episode it would be fine. But then they had to go and try to wrap everything up before it was meant to be wrapped up and nothing has ever been less satisfying
Jane the Virgin - 4.17 Chapter Eighty-One
context: back in season 3 the protagonist jane was married to michael. he died in a heartbreaking and brilliantly done episode, and then the series jumped forwards 3 years in time. michael, his relationship with jane and his death was always treated with respect, even as jane slowly began to fall for her old flame and friend rafael.
in the season 4 finale, it seemed like rafael was going to propose to jane, which was lovely. but then the very annoying drawn out villain told rafael ""something"" that made him withdraw and lash out at jane for reasons she and the audience didn't understand. they still had sex which was disturbing considering his anger and drunkenness, and then at the end of the episode it was revealed that the information he found out was that michael was alive. he'd been alive this whole time. the last moments of the episode are jane and michael seeing each other again. this made NO SENSE considering he died in a public place from an aortic dissection (a sudden blood pressure spike from a pre-existing injury) and they had a casket at his funeral - but apparently the villain has been keeping him alive all this time!! for some reason!!! this finale not only ruined the main romantic relationship between jane and rafael for pointless drama, it also spat upon the memory and fans of michael, and michael and jane's romantic relationship. not even to mention the ridiculous drama that another fan favourite petra was put through this episode. the entire thing was full of cheap shock value moments and cliffhangers to try and get audiences to watch for the final season.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! - 2.12 My Graduation Ceremony Happened...
incest
True Blood - 7.10 Thank You
so much wrong (really) with this show (which i love) but that final fucking image just does me in! sookie, our protagonist, who's been battered back and forth between stubborn heroine and hapless waif for 7 seasons seems spends her final (on-screen) moments sitting at her table surrounded by loved ones - which would be heartwarming if tara (abused for 6 seasons and then fridged, thanks alan ball) wasn't missing, a woman wasn't sitting next to the groomer she married (they meet near the beginning of the show when she is 17 and he is almost 30, they start dating immediately), and sookie were sitting at the head of her own fucking table. it's nice that sookie gets what she wants - she's tough but pretty milquetoast (don't get mad at me! i love our twee fairy vixen!), and she really has wanted to just be cozy and settle down this whole time. it makes sense to close on her enjoying a semi-mortal evening with the people she has left. but to leave on her tropily pregnant (even if it's in character - if it were just the pregnancy it wouldn't irk me so) and centre her nameless, faceless husband in the final frames of 7 seasons that have been (for better and way worse) about nothing but sookie? despicable! it's the series finale i've hated the most, but in some ways it's almost perfect because it totally exemplifies the political identity crisis true blood has for 7 years. edge vs. wholesomeness, agency vs. damselhood, change vs. status quo. it's such a disappointing result of the struggle that not only sookie (a character so many fans hate for her simultaneous stubbornness, ditz, and naivete - and who i love btw!) but the writers struggled for (sorry) 7 seasons. it's like witnessing your dear, baby faced, precocious & clever kid relative exit an intense emo phase only to become corporate law student. it's the cold fear that can only be induced by a white teenager with a briefcase. it's the slump end to a potentially fruitful struggle. in this sense it feels inevitable...but does it HAVE to be?...at least bill died.
The Who Was? Show - 1.13 Julius Caesar & Bruce Lee
the show got cancelled before season 2 released EVEN THOUGH it was certainly meant to have a season 2 so i will never see my silly blorbos ever again, nor will we be able to see who ate those grapes. It has been 5 years and I am still not over it :'(
Akuma no Riddle - 1.12 Therefore, the World is Full of ___
Crash Landing on You - 1.16 Episode 16
Mr.Robot - 4.13 Hello, Elliot
People of Earth - 2.10 Game Night
Pretty Little Liars - 7.20 Till Death Do Us Part
Secret Invasion - 1.06 Home
Skins - 4.08 Everyone
Voting ended onNov 26, 2023
The top 4 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
Akuma no Riddle - 1.12 Therefore, the World is Full of ___
the last five minutes just ruined the entire show... it's one thing to give a happy ending and another to resurrect all the characters last minute when it males no sense. it made the whole series feel pointless. and it didnt even have the guys to be explicitly gay
Crash Landing on You - 1.16 Episode 16
I just think it makes no fucking sense that the MC have to/would be able to meet in fucking Switzerland once a year or whatever it is. Idk if the series was trying to do social commentary with that but if so I don't understand what the moral lesson is
Mr. Robot - 4.13 Hello, Elliot
The writers had a poor understanding of DID and ended up saying a lot of things that were wrong and reiterating information and mindsets that are harmful to those who struggle with DID.
People of Earth - 2.10 Game Night
Season 1 had a PERFECT ending. It set it up really well for a second season but also wrapped things up enough that if it got cancelled it would still be satisfying. THEN the season 2 finale (aka the series finale) left it on total cliffhangers. Literally every storyline was left on a cliffhanger. Horrible. The fact that it was cancelled should be illegal.
Pretty Little Liars - 7.20 Till Death Do Us Part
No propaganda submitted
Secret Invasion - 1.06 Home
No propaganda submitted
Skins - 4.08 Everyone
A character getting randomly brutally killed in the previous episode is the real crime, but the fact that the finale barely acknowledged it and had no emotionally satisfying conclusion or follow-up for that is a capper on it
Leverage: Redemption - 2.12 The Museum Makeover Job
Medium - 7.13 Me Without You
Nancy Drew - 4.13 The Light Between Lives
Roseanne - 9.23 Into That Good Night
Torchwood - 4.10 The Blood Line
Xena Warrior Princess - 6.21 A Friend in Needp
Voting ended onNov 26, 2023
The top 4 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
Dancing with the Stars - 31.11 Finale
The winner had been pre-decided before the season even began which rendered the entire season pointless. I also watched on the West coast so I went into the episode knowing just how rigged it actually was because the results were already posted online. I don’t expect these shows to be 100% authentic but I at least expect the finale to use actual votes instead of having the winner put it in her contract that she wins.
Leverage: Redemption - 2.12 The Museum Makeover Job / 2.13 The Crowning Achievement Job
I just Cop Daughter. What ever happened to the “good” cop just being some rando I liked those days.
Medium - 7.13 Me Without You
I'll be honest, I watched this show with my mom as a child and I don't remember too many details, but I DO remember being filled with absolute rage over the fact that they killed the main character's husband so abruptly and how they handled the fall out. This was the series finale and instead of giving a nice, wholesome ending, the creators decided to say F you to the fans and make everyone miserable for... no real reason, honestly. It wasn't even well written or well acted, from what I recall. It was just... bad. It's been almost 13 years and I am still filled with absolute rage over this stupid ending. I honestly don't care if no one else votes for this, I just want it to be known it's a Bad finale.
Nancy Drew - 4.13 The Light Between Lives
The entire final season sucked honestly. They didn’t give a proper ending to most of the plot lines simply because they didn’t give themselves enough time. And they knew it was going to be the final season so it made no sense to do that.
Roseanne - 9.23 / 9.24 Into That Good Night
Just focusing on the (at the time) series finale and not all the terrible things Roseanne decided to say and be later. This finale sucked. It was built to retcon the entire (admittedly bad) season that came before it as a bizarre fantasy of the titular character after her Husband died. They quickly and randomly undid different characters' development and swapped around couples just because.
Torchwood - 4.10 The Blood Line
Captain Jack's magical blood is necessary to heal a evil vagina running through the core of the Earth, and Bill Pullman's on hand as a cackling supervillain pedophile who dies screaming about how he's going to chase little girls in Hell. But the worst part is, somehow, all of that is boring.
Xena Warrior Princess - 6.21 A Friend in Need
They undid an entire series of redemption work with one that could only be redeemed with her death an unending torment
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina - 4.08 At The Mountains of Madness
Choukou Senshi Changerion - 1.39 Over the Times...
The Get Down - 5.11 Only from Exile Can We Come Home
Grimm - 3.22 Blond Ambition
Jane the Virgin - 5.19 Chapter One Hundred
Voting ended onNov 26, 2023
The top 4 finales will move on to be included in the main bracket
Propaganda is under the cut, may include spoilers
Blake's 7 - 4.13 Blake
Technically, the episode is a very, very good one. Hell, I wouldn't wish for a different finale, to be honest. It's perfect, in its own "What the actual hell!?" way, and it does wonders for the show's themes of doomed struggle. The problem with it is that it was intended to be just a *series* finale, not the *show's* finale, so it ends on an extremely high-stakes cliffhanger. It's fantastic, it's scary, it's heartbreaking, you want more, you want to see it resolved... and the show was cancelled after the fourth series. So all we have is an extremely bleak ending with all but one character presumed dead and that damned last smile in the face of overwhelming odds in a completely hopeless situation.
Castle Rock (2018) - 1.10 Romans
When this show was coming out I was still deep in my Stephen King hyperfixation so needless to say I was *stoked*. But man this was one of the most underwhelming things I've watched. With episodes released weekly we had two months of people going insane with theories, new revelations, Stephen King fans digging up their old books to pick for scraps of hints that could explain what's going on, every week there were new video essays and analyses of the new episode, subreddit buzzing with the wildest theories about who is this mysterious character of The Kid who's kicked the whole plot in motion and what the hell is going on with the seemingly cursed town.
And then the finale came and just. Nothing. Everything went back to square one. The Kid is locked back up in the same cage he was originally found in. Nothing was explained. Everyone moves on as if nothing happened. After two months of Castle Rock being the main focus of all of my free time this completely took the wind out of my sails and I completely lost interest in the show and honestly, soon almost forgot it even existed. When the second season came out I didn't watch even the first episode, even though the second season *might* have explained everything, I simply didn't care enough to find out anymore. And from what I've seen, others have felt the same way because since the first season ended I haven't really seen anyone talk about the show.
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina - 4.08 Chapter Thirty-Six: At The Mountains of Madness
Ok so in fairness this entire final season sucked but the real kicker is that in the final scene we learn that after the main character died, her love interest killed himself in order to be with her in the afterlife. Yeah, a teenager committed suicide and we were supposed to see that as a happy ending.
Choukou Senshi Changerion - 1.39 Over the Times...
It's the last episode, which means no new information or worlds should be introduced, right? WRONG. Inoue (the main writer) decided that, for this last episode, we should see into an alternate (maybe, perhaps) timeline alongside the regular content. The bad guys are coming, except our main guy is starting to go down and remembering all the things that have happened, as well. And then it just ends. On an explosion, of course. Roll Credits!
The Get Down - 5.11 Only from Exile Can We Come Home
rushed to complete the show and low on budget, the writers sent every character besides the protagonist (zeke) to their worst possible fate. shao, finally free and with the person he loved, was coerced to return to the sexually abusive woman who had been his boss since he was a child. dizzee is implied to have been struck by a train after breaking his boyfriend out of prison for graffiti. and boo-boo, the 14 year old, is arrested for selling drugs. in some ways its thematically appropriate, but the unrelenting viciousness of the end of each character's story is sudden, deeply tonally jarring, and leaves the audience feeling despondent and hopeless even with the main character surviving to sing it all as an adult and his love interest finding success as a singer, albeit far away in another city. tgd is an excellent show, but besides being cancelled, the big kicker for it was that the romantic lead mylene didn't hit for a lot of people, and watchers who preferred shao and zeke to get together due to having such strong chemistry and a well-developed bond probably had a very different experience than the writers had intended. mylene is a fine character and she's unfairly disliked by a lot of watchers, but her romance with zeke was simply not as well developed as shao's and zeke's relationship was
Grimm - 3.22 Blond Ambition
It forgoes the usual: 'there is a scary wesen that is causing problems and we can solve this' formula to pay off other plot points, but it kinda makes the episode feel less tethered.
The focus is a wedding between supporting characters, whilst a former finale villain is just stalking around town and also a (corrupt) FBI agent is preparing to make his move.
Both make their moves and the results are kinda lame. The agent is almost immediately beheaded rendering his active threat moot. And the other villain disguised herself as the MC's girlfriend and sleeps with him.
The only major points are the wedding, a police captain getting shot (glossed over here but become relevant next season), the FBI agent dying (it starts a dull investigation next season), and the MC losing his power right at the end (which led to one of the worst periods in the show until he regains his powers...)
Any finale that was submitted and made it through prelims is included, i.e. my personal opinions are not reflected in this blog
finales can be bad because of bad writing, rushed production, premature cancellation, or anything else.
A bad finale doesn’t necessarily mean a bad episode‚ and vice versa.
Poll posts will include:
- Screencap some were submitted but most are just the first result I could get from google
- Summary pulled from imdb. NOT meant to be propaganda, just meant to help jog your memory
- Propaganda + I'm listing a word count bc I think it's funny
- cws and extra context that I got in submissions (if there is no cw that doesn't necessarily mean they don't need one, just that none were submitted)
This is the time to be a hater, but sometimes we only hate because we love so much
I’m sorry they did that to you.
Spreadsheet listing all finales submitted (those in voting are in bold)
Link to challonge bracket (includes links to individual polls)
Also, you're always welcome to submit propaganda via my submissions box (can be for or against)‚ as well as any screencaps you feel should be used.
+ Here's the pinned post for the last tournament (Most Episode)
No set schedule this time, but I'll post links to poll groups here
