The Key to Reaching Television Nirvana

I know this may be hard for you to believe, but I, a writer, have a problem finishing things.

It has plagued my life from an early age. When I first started writing stories I would conjure these huge, fantastical worlds, spread over page upon page of scrawl, displaying imagination far beyond my single figure age…until the ending. Looking back, I don’t know how much I was affected by 80’s popular culture, but every story I wrote, no matter how complex or involved, ended in the same variation of ‘Then they woke up and it was all a dream.’

This wormed its way into the choice of books I would read. I learned that the chances are a big thick book would have many other volumes, and be essentially unending. I think it was Discworld which finally brought me some true comfort, with a world that, despite Sir Terry’s death, lives on in my head. I know that Sam Vimes is stalking Ankh Morpork with his cardboard-soled boots, while Granny Weatherwax is busy scaring children and keeping the hordes of darkness at bay. A world was created that lives on far beyond their creator’s life, and far beyond the limits of the individual stories.

Stephen King is also a master of this. Many of his novels, while existing in a single stand alone story, do not end typically. Something is often left over, some ends left untied, meaning that you, the reader, know that the characters continue to exist beyond the story in the pages and have the pleasure of completing these strands in your imagination, or knowing that at some point the author themselves may scratch that itch.

This has been collectively scratched for us by the great man himself, with the writing of Doctor Sleep to follow on from the Shining, or the development of the tv show Castle Rock - Castle Rock, Maine being a fictional town that ties together many of his works.

If you are like me, and you don’t want a series to end, here is my guide to which series’ you should be looking at. I am judging this on story and world building, on longevity beyond the series itself, both in imagination and potential for resurrection. I will also, for some series, be suggesting at what point you STOP watching, because, sometimes, great shows can become average shows fairly swiftly.

Why build a world when you can build a multi-dimensional universe with time travel?

We all have a favourite Star Trek. Probably many of you have two or three. Recently, ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ took the broader ideas from the recent films about how worlds can not only be built, but also reset at will, and well-and-truly ran with it. We have Spock’s sister - previously unknown - Michael Burnham becoming the most important person in the history of their universe. Why have we never heard of her? Why, time travel of course.

They do a wonderful job of picking their way through this minefield, and manage the Star Trek trick of including intimate, micro storytelling amidst much grander and complex story telling. Their treatment of non-binary gender relationships I found particularly subtle, and, alongside the more adult action sequences, this is a series I can heartily recommend in a world that is ever growing. No need to stop or pause watching this for fear of an end: there will always be more Star Trek. For example…

Old man drinks wine, struggles with his legacy.

Any reason to watch Patrick Stewart as Jean Luc Picard is to be grasped firmly. I suspect this series is building to a conclusion which will end with his death, giving me severe anxiety about breaking my rule of loose ends, but ‘Picard’ is a wonderful exploration of how even great heroes will have those intrusive thoughts and fascinations with poor past decisions that we all have. However, yours may not lead to the collapse of a seemingly perfect society, and this merlot of collapse pairs perfectly with the rare steak of instability permeating ‘Discovery’, giving you a real insight in to how the Federation could easily collapse on itself.

If you love perfect societies collapsing you may wish to check out…

Genius family makes pretty poor choices

Given the level of brains shared between the Robinson family in the ‘Lost in Space’ reboot, you’d think they’d make much better choices, especially when they are repeatedly betrayed by the same person - Parker Posey’s excellently unhinged Dr Smith. But if Lost in Space just ejected her into space, well, who else would collapse society?

Actually, the other humans are doing a pretty good job of this, in the face of a potentially helpful/murderous alien species, and ‘Lost in Space’ continues the theme of an ideal, functioning society collapsing despite, or often due to, the well intentioned efforts of those in charge. The world being built here only just extends beyond Earth when we meet the family, so we are actively discovering the universe with the rest of humanity.

However, my metrics for good meet their first problem: the series has been renewed for a third, but FINAL season. This concerns me, because if it wraps up in a nice pretty bow, with humanity settling on a couple of planets, living in peace and harmony with aliens who aren’t murderous, then it’ll be ruining the potential of a complex and evolving universe. I’m unsure whether I will spoil my experience of the first two seasons and watch the final, but I guess we shall see. History has taught me, though, that sometimes two seasons is enough…

From hero to zero

‘Heroes’ was a revelation. A brand new concept, at the time, about how ordinary people would deal with superpowers, and how ordinary people would deal with fellow ordinary people no longer ordinary. It introduced us to Zachary Quinto and his quite amazing villain Sylar. To this day I am convinced half of the reason Skylar in Breaking Bad received the hate she did was because of the similarity in names (the other half was because she was a woman; yay patriarchy).

If you love takes on superheroes not being wonderful people, or wonder how you might react having superpowers thrust upon you, then ‘Heroes’ is more than worth your time. The writing is spectacular, the story lines complex and intertwined, there is humour, sadness, violence, and all are expertly handled. For two series.

Other than Firefly, this is perhaps the most terrible act of TV vandalism we have seen - even more so than Game of Thrones. Some of you may remember the Hollywood writers strike, and the effect this had on ‘Heroes’ was almost tantamount to destroying a work of art. You can fully blame NBC for this, as instead of settling the writers’ strike, they ploughed on. Who needs writers, eh?

Watch ‘Heroes’, but DO NOT watch past series two; finish it in your head, or allow the world to live on unresolved as the original writers envisioned. And mourn the lost opportunity. If you wonder what could’ve been…

It only took 10 years to undo the ‘Heroes’ damage

Go straight to ‘The Boys’ after ‘Heroes’, because this is currently showing us what could have been. From the opening few minutes of the first episode, the black humour, the pathos, and the extreme violence will probably have you hooked. Far more realistic than the Avengers’ films, in its depiction of humanity (it’s got people who fly; I understand ‘realism’ is entirely a ridiculous concept, but it’s my head so sh...), it feels like it goes where ‘Captain America: Civil War’ wanted to go but was too scared. It also helps us resolve the question of what to do when those we think are the best of us are, in fact, worse.

It is only two seasons in, however, and that makes me nervous. Thanks a bunch, ‘Heroes’...but, by God (or maybe Homelander), these first two series are awesome and more than worth your time.

Magnificent, boundary pushing worldbuilding, full of shocks, surprises, gore, and without a care for protecting it’s audience from the scheming of man doing it for you? Well, clearly there is but one option from here…

Game of Moans

Look, the chances are that you have already watched this, or have been so thoroughly put off by the hype that you never will. I have quite a lot to say about this, because this should have been the perfect show. It had no reason to fail, but half of it did, and it failed spectacularly.

Firstly, and I realise you may feel you don’t need to hear this, read the books. If you think the series is complex and full of shenanigans and chicanery, the books are a league apart. Secondly, when you do watch, DO NOT watch past season 5.

George RR Martin is notoriously un-hurried when it comes to writing his books. Like Patrick Rothfuss, if the result is perfect, it doesn’t matter how long it takes (he writes, screaming internally that book three of the Kingkiller Chronicle is put back yet another year; if you like GoT go read these). However, that of gives the executives a headache when a TV series based on a series of books catches up to the books it is based on. A broadcasting organisation is left to make, as with ‘Heroes’, two choices: wait until the source material/writing is done to the right standards, or plough on regardless ‘cos advertisers need those eyes.

‘Game of Thrones’ was faced with this choice in season 4. That was where, more or less, it caught up with Martin’s books, and Martin left the writing team. Apocryphally, he left the general story arc for the remaining writers to work with, but removed himself from the credits, stating he would probably write something different anyway.

For season 5 this was fine, because the leisurely pace of Martin’s story forced the remaining writers to finish the complex parts, but the pace of writing increased, while the complex plot strands decreased. Eventually this resulted in the story becoming pretty straightforward, with minor character plots removed completely, and even some major ones rushed to an end.

Laying this at the door of the writers is a little harsh; reportedly the main actors had said they wanted to move on with their careers. As, barring five or six - most of whom had already been murdered brutally -, the main actors owed the show their promotion from ‘extra-with-a-few-lines’ in British daytime TV dramas to global superstar, that strikes me as a little unappreciative. It also tells me that issues with the finale (or whole final season) are unfairly laid purely at the show runners Benioff and Weiss’ feet.

So, stop at series 5, and pray to the gods of books that George RR Martin finishes the series for us. Or not, as we know that what exists in our imagination will have to be better than the dross HBO served up at the end.

So, how does one end a long running series? If you’re interested in that, then this:

Fuggedabowdid

It only feels right that I end on a pristine gem of a series that finishes, for me, in the perfect way. It wraps up the major storylines and no more episodes have been made, but you know that in this world things still continue: trucks are being hijacked, plots foiled, rats whacked, and toxic masculinity exposed. Yes, of course, if you want to watch the perfect TV series with the perfect ending, it has to be ‘The Sopranos’.

I will put a brief spoiler alert here because, as my article is about endings, I need to discuss the ending. Shut your eyes, scroll to the bottom and drop me a heart if you want this show to be unspoilt.

Still here? Ok. What happens at the end of ‘The Sopranos’ is:

Nothing.

It’s brilliant. Oh gosh, was it frustrating at the time: the constant theories, the desperation to know if Tony survived, the debates about why on earth anyone would end a series this way, but, for me, it is perfect.

This world continues to this day in my imagination, and, were it not for the terribly sad and untimely death of James Gandofini (Tony Soprano), that bubble would never have been popped. Life went on in Tony’s world, threats whacked were replaced with new problems; molls went, molls would come again, but Carmela would still be by his side, his son and daughter safe and protected. Or maybe not, but for sure his world continues, and I am not left with a gaping hole where ‘The Sopranos’ was.

Alongside the Discworld, for me, it rolls on, on the back of four stoolies standing on concrete boots.

If you, too, agree that never-ending worlds are essential to the perfect work of fiction, drop me a heart. If you’d like to encourage me to create my own unending and self-perpetuating world in which you too can live, leave me a tip! If neither, well, fuggedabowdid.