An Emotional Goodbye: The Good Place "The Final Chapter: Whenever You're Ready" Series Finale

Note: I apologize for not writing this up and posting it. It's been almost four months since this aired. And well, let me say that after watching it the first time, it was tough to protect it during the second time because it was so emotionally powerful.

The series finale of The Good Place might be one of the best finale endings in quite a long time, and saying goodbye to these characters is overwhelming emotions. The episode picks up as everyone enjoys their time in A Good Place, from learning ethics to seeing everyone doing their own thing and being happy. The new system looks to work for the best as the Judge learns from Michael and Chidi.

But things took a turn quickly when Justin won the Super Bowl in the video game with his dad, and he felt it was time for him to leave. After throwing a party, Justin walks with Janet to the doors to the universe. Tahani reunited with her sister and learned that their parents had passed the system, but what they had expected wasn't the case with their parents as they showed love and affection. After many moments, she decides she's ready, but instead of leaving, she wants to be like Michael and work as an intern.

Later, Eleanor learns that Chidi is on the verge of wanting to leave and tries to keep him here by taking him to all the places he loves. But Eleanor knows that to be happy, she can't ruin someone's happiness, too. After an emotional and memorable scene of the two at sunset, Chidi leaves Eleanor while sleeping. But a surprise comes when, just as Chidi walks into the door to the universe, Justin pops out to give Janet the necklace he had made for her, and after another moment, he walks with Chidi.

Soon, Eleanor felt it was time; she brought Mindy St.Clare to The Good Place to agree to take the test. She gets the Judge to grant one last favor for Michael; he becomes a real-life boy who goes to Earth and lives out his best life, from learning guitar to cooking a meal in the microwave.

Just before Eleanor leaves, she talks with Janet and has one last drink with her. Soon, she walks into the door to the universe to see her body turn into stars, where one falls to Earth to a man who almost threw out someone's mail but returned it, that happens to be Michael.

"Whenever You're Ready" was one of the best series finales since Parks and Recreation. The finale felt like a natural closure to the series, with the characters deciding to leave or stay and become something else, like Tahani wanting to do what Michael has done. Each character had a memorable moment; the one that stuck was Chidi and Eleanor with that sunset, in which Chidi described the ocean waves. This episode should get an Emmy nomination for best writing. Overall, I give this episode a 10/10, while the season gets a 9.5/10.

You can catch The Good Place on Netflix and Google Play. 

Together as a Family: Fresh Off The Boat "Family Van"/"Commencement" Series Finale

The one-hour series finale leaves the Huangs with a lovely bow to end the series. Here's a recap!

In the first half-hour, the episode "Family Van" deals with the Huangs saying goodbye to their family van after it breaks down trying to go to Disney World. While Louis tries to save his van, Jessica gives it up after learning nothing can be done to save it. Louis goes on memory lane while Jessica tries to blow it off until when they go car shopping, she steals the van that looks like theirs. Jessica tells Louis that her grieving process was to bury it, but after Louis kept pushing her and pushing her, they came to miss the van.

Meanwhile, after finding a measured map in the van, Eddie, Emery, and Evan go on a road trip to their home in D.C. to find their time capsule. While Eddie looks forward to having an adventure with his brothers, Emery and Evan aren't as seeing Eddie dealing with an upset stomach from gas station hot dogs. But as soon as Emery and Evan found their time capsule, they realized that Eddie wanted to spend enough time before leaving for college.

The second half-hour, the episode "Commencement,t" deals with when Eddie tells Jessica and Louis that he scored 1500 on his SATs, and that gets Jessica to turn a 360 as she's pleased about her accomplishments with Eddie.

Jessica was so happy that she took Eddie off of housework and even did the dishes. They spend the day buying clothes and such and soon get an interview with Harvard. However, after the interview with Andy Ritcher, they learn that Eddie might not get in because of Jessica's helicopter parenting.
But Eddie tells Jessica that he doesn't want to go to Harvard, as he wants to go to Culinary school and work at Cattlemen. Even though it took her a while to come to terms, she was on board with Eddit.

Meanwhile, Emery and Evan come to different terms with Evan's memoir and using stories from Emery and even helping the birth of Honey's first baby. Emery gets back at Evan by running for his seat on the neighborhood council. Evan sees the probable and apologies to Emery and Honey about the memoir.

Jumping to 2008, and while we see that Louis and Jessica are at Harvard for graduation, we don't quite know whose graduation it was until we learn that Evan graduated with high honors and gave his commencement speech. We see Jessica, Louis, Eddie, Emery, and Grandma celebrating Evan's graduation.

"Family Van" and "Commencement" are excellent episodes and place a nice bow to end the series. While it might not have been the most incredible series finale of all time, it was an accurate fitting to see these characters where they ended up happy and together as a family. Was this better than the Season 5 finale? Yeah, it was. The writing was so good, and the cast gave such excellent and memorable performances, like Constance Wu, who I hope gets an Emmy nomination. Overall, I provide these episodes with a 9/10. I give the season a 9.5/10.

You can catch episodes of Fresh Off The Boat on ABC.com. Hulu and Google Play. 

Always In my Television Heart: ER: 10 Years Later After Series Finale

It's one of those days I can't forget that changed my television world forever.

I remember it like yesterday, April 2, 2009, as the day it would change my life in the future television world forever. I've been through other series finales that made me cry, mad, and even laugh, but this one show meant more to me than anything else in the television universe. That specific date is the day that ER ended its 15-season run.

The morning of Thursday, April 2, 2009, was one gloomy day to start, as I had an early class downtown. It was cloudy with showers. I had stopped to pick up newspapers like the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune as I would think they would have put something in there for the series finale of ER. I've gone through each section and found several pages about the show and some with poster ads.

After my only class for that day, I headed back home while listening to the ER soundtrack on my MP3 player. As I get home, I go through the VHS tape of the Today Show when Noah Wyle was on to promote the series finale. I kept myself busy with the usual stuff from watching ESPN until 5 p.m. of the news that the Chicago Bears had made a trade for Jay Cutler (how great that turned out to be ten years later). My grandmother and I ordered Chinese food for dinner, and as time flew by, the world learned that Guiding Light was also ending.

At 7 pm, the special retrospective of ER begins as well, as the waterworks started as the doors opened at County General. As you're going through the hospital doors and into the ER, you hear the voices of all the characters that had worked on the show, from Anthony Edwards' Dr. Greene in the pilot to Noah Wyle's stepping up during an outbreak in Season 4; to George Clooney's Dr. Ross talks about how he tries to help kids who suffer from pain to even William H. Macy's character telling Edward's character that "you set the tone."

The special was an hour-long celebration of the show's origins and how the show has changed network television in medical drama and drama. Two parts restarted the waterworks, reliving the events of Dr. Greene's last episode to even acknowledging the creator of the series, Michael Crichton, who had passed away in Nov. 2008.

The series finale was one that I believe was written for the fans but also paid tribute to the pilot. The two-hour pilot was like a documentary-style episode with bits and pieces of moments that took you back from the past 15 years of the show's history.

There were many moments of laughter, but moments that brought you to tears, from a husband losing his wife to a mother dying after giving birth to twins. Not to mention, a homosexual HIV patient learns that he's got terminal cancer and accepts it without fear as he feels he lived long enough.
I can't forget the significant moments of former cast members returning. Susan Lewis, Elizabeth Corday, Kerry Weaver, Peter Benton, and Rachael Greene, Dr. Greene's daughter, try to get in as medical students at County General, where her father worked.

As the finale ends, we get a moment when residents, doctors, nurses, and Rachael discuss their med-student experience. Sam got a call from EMTs about a mass casualty at a chemical plant explosion and was on the way. As everyone gets ready, all the doctors and nurses come out together, awaiting, and Carter gets prepared, too. As the ambulance rolls in, everyone takes each patient. Carter takes a burn victim. As he rolls them in, he turns to Rachael and asks, "Dr. Greene, are you coming?" and she comes along.

As the episode closes, the doctors and nurses check on other ambulances outside the hospital. As the camera moves back, we see for the first time the building that is County General Hospital with the theme music playing in the background.

"And In The End" was a series finale that was a remembrance of the 15 seasons of the show, with its powerful and emotional stories to the humorist side of the show too. Now, it only shows the strong character growth of the doctors and nurses, but the patients who come in and out may or may not live in the hospital. Still to this day, ten years later, I am still overwhelmed by rewatching the finale of ER.

Watching the series finale of ER was the first time I would lose a television show that I had watched since I was five years old. I'd always thought that ER could live forever, but I know that it will live forever, not only on DVD and digital but in my heart as well.  And on every April 2 since I do indeed rewatch the series finale, and not only do I still get emotional watching it. But I felt so lucky to have watched a show that ran for 15 seasons.

Circle of Life: Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt "Kimmy Says Bye!" Series Finale

Will Kimmy help save her apartment building? Will Titus pick career over love? Is this the end for Lillian? Here's a recap for the series finale of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

Trying to come up with the money to save their apartment, Kimmy tries to figure out what to do from doing live streaming cash and go pron video with her and the bunkers members but that doesn't work. She thought that website that her boss helped build seems to have not worked as it comes up as an error.

Kimmy tries to help Lillian, who isn't taken well of losing her apartment. Lillian tries to go out with her building until the blast wasn't strong enough to take the whole building down. Lillian gets another calling thanks to Kimmy.

Titus gets the role that he's been waiting for, a spot in The Lion King. He's second in line of another star, but soon gets hurt in a bike accident. Later Titus gets a call from Mikey, who wants him to sing at his wedding, but does he? He chooses career over true love, but Kimmy steps in and helps Mikey decided whether to cancel the wedding or go with it. As Titus gets a break, he realizes that he still loves Mikey and tries to go to the wedding but Mikey gets to the theater first and tells him that he loves him and the two kiss.

Jacquline deals with Eli again. As her business is falling apart, he hits on her in a way that she questions of whether to do or not. But soon, she declines until he tells her that it was an offer work as a junior assistant for him, which she agrees only after learning that he's blind. 

Kimmy tries to figure out what's her next thing, and when she sees Xanthippe, Kimmy realizes that she's been reading her book. Xanthippe tells Kimmy that her book is a hit and that the reason that her website isn't working is because of the many, many people trying to visit it. She confronts Jacquline and Eli and worked up a deal.

Four years later... Lillian is the voice of the New York Transportation, Titus and Mikey are happily married with two kids as Titus is a hit movie star. Jacquline and Eli are a hit top movie agent duos. And as for Kimmy, as big as her book become, she opens a theme park at Universal Studios.

"Kimmy says Goodbye" is really the circle of life wrapped up in a nice and lovable bow. There were many laughs, but many, many tears shedding during this episode that I lost it fully during that montage of Circle of Life. So well written finale with amazing and outstanding performances from the cast. This should be in line with some of the greatest series finales like The Office, 30 Rock and Parks and Rec. Overall, I give this episode a 10/10.

You can catch the entire series of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt available on Netflix.

Timeless Final Mission Promo

It's the mission that we've all been waiting for...the last mission for #Clockblockers. It's the all time  Christmas gift for fans of Timeless. Here's a promo for the two-hour series finale. 

You can catch the two-hour series finale of Timeless next Thursday at 8/7c on NBC.