Finale, Finale

This week seems to be the time many shows are wrapping up. With the exception of The Sopranos, which will end in the Mother of All Finales in two weeks, a lot of the shows I watch have wrapped up this week, and that continues tonight with one I'm particularly looking forward to in Lost.

The 24 finale was a perfect finish to a boring and disappointing season, in that the finale was both boring and disappointing. There were no huge twists, no sudden realizations that someone was a sleeper agent, that someone we thought was dead actually isn't, or that … well, anything. The idiotic plot that essentially came down to Russia's entire defense system being vulnerable by "the component" was resolved, presumably – though in a vague enough way (why didn't Jack just take it from his father?) that it's possible, if improbable, that it's not a dead issue yet. (Please, please let it be done.) Almost everything that came up during the year felt either unresolved, or left a question of…why? Why did we see Milo's brother come back, in the middle of the night, to take his stuff? Why is Chloe pregnant? (The answer, of course, not being a birds-and-bee lesson, but why it's important to the show.) Why did no one in Los Angeles seem particularly freaked out that a NUCLEAR BOMB had gone off that day? Why was Nadia such a weak leader? Why were we supposed to care about Jack's nephew Josh so much? What's Jack's real history with Josh's mother? (I'll never complain about Rena Sofer, though. Truly striking, and a decent actress to boot.) In any event, I'm hoping the entire staff of 24 takes a long look at the season and figures out how it went so off-track. The reality is it wasn't horrible (the first four episodes were historically tense), but it's a pale imitation of what 24 is like when it's on.

On the flip side, while the Heroes finale wasn't perfect, it did answer some good questions, even if the final confrontation was anti-climatic. The show avoided some of the pitfalls other serial dramas have had, and gave answers week after week. It's not fair what some folks have been doing (comparing the first season of Heroes to other shows farther along, like Lost) but there's no denying that this was the single best new show of the year along with Friday Night Lights.

I'm hooked.

Veronica Mars finished not just the season, but the entire show last night, and while that's sort of criminal, the final episode was a primer on why the show was so good when it hit. With clever banter that rarely went overboard (see: Gilmore Girls, Studio 60), and jokes meant for the true fans but not so insidery that they didn't work for others, Veronica Mars was on a rampage. The final episode started with her trying to find out who had leaked a sex video of her and Piz, and ended up bringing back characters from Season 1 (which I only saw some of). While the show didn't know whether it would be renewed or not when they made the show, they did try and finish enough threads to not disappoint. Personally, I loved it – when Veronica decides to mess with the guys who leaked the video, it was just great. Cancelling his credit cards, having Weevil steal the tires off his car, capped off with her dismantling the electricity in his dorm room – then revealing herself and singing/mocking "Bad Day" – while protecting herself with a stun gun. I mean, that's right out of the playbook. And while it's been published elsewhere, this exchange alone made the whole show:

Mac: Hey, did you guys hear that there's going to be a Matchbook 20 reunion?

Piz: Who cares? Rob Thomas is a whore.

Now, that's funny all on its own – but even moreso since the creator of Veronica Mars is also named Rob Thomas. It makes no sense to me that the CW would cancel this show, but it appears the deed has been done. So, goodbye CW. It's been fun while it lasted. Off to see Lost.