Sticking the Landing

When I first wrote about The Bear four years ago, I had just finished season one and almost couldn't believe how well it worked despite it's almost comically short length. But really as the season went on, it felt like that's why it worked: each episode was exactly as long as it needed to be and not a minute more.¹ All killer no filler.²

I'm happy to report that having just finished the fifth (and final) season,³ it ends just as it began – right up to the point of having a penultimate intense episode followed by a more meditative coda for the finale. After some up-and-down middle seasons,⁴ it's nice to know they once again stuck the landing.⁵

And it's also nice to know that I wasn't alone in thinking this. I've written before about the site TVCharts, which uses IMDb's star review system to give you a sense of how each episode (and season) of a show was received. Yes, yes, the IMDb ratings are sometimes gamed at first and have at times been a hotbed of weird and/or problematic behavior. But over time, I found them to be a fairly accurate representation of how "good" or "bad" movies or shows are, at least directionally. Perhaps that means my taste are to vanilla or mainstream, but I've long found such aggregated opinions to guide me fairly well.

But actually, more recently, I've been using a site called Series Graph to track such things. The idea is the same – IMDb scores aggregated – but their data is far more up-to-date. I'll often now consult these sites before diving into a new series to see if it's likely worth my time. But I started The Bear before I found such sites, so I didn't want to "spoil" the ending – meaning, knowing if they stuck that landing or not.

Anyway, it was nice to see The Bear close out those final two episodes with a 9.7 and 9.1 (out of 10) rating, respectively. Truly great scores to wrap up a series.

And this took me down a rabbit hole of looking at just how many series stuck the landing versus "shit the landing" as it were.

Game of Thrones is the most obvious and famous example, and it's showcased well by Series Graph. Over the first seven seasons, the series had eleven episodes that are currently rated 9.7 or above – three that are 9.9! Then came season 8...

Boy did they shit the bed.

Per these ratings, the season starts out troublesome – episodes that would be considered fine for any other show, but are way below the average for Game of Thrones. But the final three episodes are well... we've been over this. It's so clear that they ran out of runway or steam or ideas – or all three. It's honestly a travesty given how good and iconic the overall series was and is. I still wish they would re-do them, because at some point soon, you know someone is going to use AI to do just that.

Okay, focus. Some other fun ones:

• The Office was clearly dwindling before ending strong.
• Breaking Bad may indeed be the GOAT (and Better Call Saul is close!).
• My decision to push out watching the end of Halt & Catch Fire (because I never want it to end) seems like it will reward me in the end, one day!
• Dexter also shit the landing, but was somehow resurrected!
• Succession started fairly slow then was truly all bangers, all the time.
• The ending of each season of The Wire is truly something to behold.
• Mad Men nearly matched it in this regard.
• As did Cobra Kai!
• And The Leftovers!
• Why is there not more Sherlock?
• I recalled liking Mr. Robot, but never finished it, but people really love the last season?
• Peaky Blinders is insanely consistent(ly) great.
• As was Downton Abbey over more episodes.
• Slow Horses has been thus far...
• As was 24 with an even longer time horizon and despite being forced to have 24 episodes each season (for obvious reasons)!
• The end of Lost was divisive in real time, but looked kindly upon now (also, wow TV shows had a lot of episodes back in the actual TV days!).
• The Crown started to lose steam but stuck the actual landing.
• Ted Lasso seemed to wrap up well (though I felt differently, which is how I knew it would be back).
• People generally don't like how Stranger Things ended (though it looks great next to Game of Thrones).
• Bring back Firefly, you cowards (more than just an animated version).
• Bring back True Detective (well, season one – the rest we can do without, especially Night Country).
• Six Feet Under had the perfect ending?
• Boy, The Boys did not.
• People seem to think more kindly upon the last few seasons of The West Wing (the post-Sorkin ones) than I remember.
• People really seem to look more kindly upon The Newsroom than I recall (as I recall thinking it was self-indulgently and self-importantly bad?!).
• The first season of The Morning Show was good! Since then, just okay.
• House of Cards was... just that!
• Andor went out swinging.
• Westworld did in season one! Then... did not.
• Bring back Mindhunter, you cowards.
• Likewise, Rome could have run a lot longer...
• Severance is more all over the place than the buzz would have you believe.
• Ditto with Pluribus.
• Though not as much as The Last of Us!
• You can see why they're bringing back Shogun even if continuing with the cast makes no sense given the books.
• Friday Night Lights played its way into shape.
• While House of the Dragon has had highs and lows, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is the real deal.
• All time great road to the ending for The Americans.
• X-Men '97 has had a few misses but some big hits thus far.
• The Simpsons chart is truly something to behold – in ways good and (ever increasingly) bad!

I could go on and on. It's such a deep rabbit hole. And now I have a half dozen old series I feel like I need to watch. At least with The Bear wrapped, there's a slot.

¹ As opposed to Ted Lasso, which always felt far too short in that first season. We'll see what format/lenght they go with when it returns this week! ↩

² Honestly, my main nit would be the release strategy here. I continue to think it's dumb that once a show is established, as The Bear clearly is, to just dump all the episodes at once rather than let them build over several weeks/months, with conversations around each episode. And it's not even Netflix that made and streamed The Bear, but FX/Hulu/Disney! ↩

³ Yes, they managed to do five seasons in four years. That's basically unheard of in our era of streaming, though, see below... ↩

⁴ Perhaps in part because they broke up season 3 into season 3 and 4 rather than just trimming the fat to make one season. Interestingly, almost the opposite problem that House of the Dragon ran into in season two (as the scores confirm!). ↩

⁵ One thing I found curious and notably absent versus the first couple of seasons: there was far less (popular) music used. Maybe I just didn't notice it as much because there was no Pearl Jam. And I love Pearl Jam. But obviously season 1 ends with that great use of "Let Down" by Radiohead, and I was surprised they didn't do something similar with the finale given how the structure mimicks the end of that first season. Were the rights too expensive given the success of the show?! ↩