So Much Pop Culture, So Little Time

I’ve shipped quite a few couples in the years that I’ve been a TV fanatic and I have to say: I’m really getting tired of my ‘ships getting screwed (and not the fun way) in the end. And it leaves me to think, what is so wrong with “happily ever after?” in fictional TV?

A history of my ‘ships...

My first ‘ship (dating myself here) Joel and Maggie on “Northern Exposure” saw a sad, truncated ending when the actor who played Joel left the show a year before it officially wrapped. They separated (for seemingly ever) and Maggie implausibly cozied up to the only other available male on the show, with an implied happy ending for them (a character she’d been strictly friends with for years). In this case, real-life issues influenced the ending. Did I see these two going the distance? Most likely not, since they were very Sam-and-Dianeish in their love/hate relationship. Still, the ending was rushed, odd, and broke my young shipper heart to pieces.

Did it stop me from shipping? Not in the least. Next, I adored the cool, forbidden love of Michael and Nikita from USA’s “La Femme Nikita.” After finally getting together, they were separated (rather nonsensically) in a season-ending cliffhanger (after it was revealed--ugh--that Nikita was a double agent and had been screwing over (and not in the fun way) Michael for years). And THEN the show was unceremoniously canceled. Fans clamored for & won a truncated final season where M & N got to sporadically interact (the actor who played Michael only did a few of the eps) until being separated...for seemingly ever.

Thank God for Netflix or else Luke and Lorelei’s ending would have been a quick “kiss and most likely happily ever after.” This after my beloved Amy Sherman-Palladino actually did--on a network show--the “secret kid from a previous relationship” trope favored by afternoon soaps (rumor at the time was this was done out of spite since her and her hubby’s contract demands weren’t met and they unceremoniously quit their own show). My heart broke again until it was finally stitched up haphazardly by the reboot on Netflix (oh, the L/L story was glorious and that wedding(!!) Love it!). I do say haphazardly though since Rory’s story’s end (or is it?) was again, kind of a downer. Taking the story back to its beginnings, but still, why did the daughter have to repeat the sins of the mother? Sigh. I wanted her with Jess.

The one shining star in the bunch? My beloved Emma and Hook from Once Upon a Time. Although I did have some quibbles with their storyline over the years (ahem, the ridiculous rebooted 7th season with Wish Hook), those two ended up together, married, and with a kid. And frankly their storyline was really well done. Nicely paced. Romantic. Sweet. Sexy. Adventurous. Conflicted. It had it all. I loved how both characters grew and ended up finding a good, stable life together. Finally, one of my ships had sailed!

Eric and Sookie from True Blood. I just...ugh. I can’t even bring myself to talk about the ridiculous ending to their story...both in the books and the TV show. Again, not sure they would have gone the distance but goodness, they couldn’t even have let it end on an open-ended note? 

And now to Klaus and Caroline from The Vampire Diaries and The Originals. Spoilers are out about their ending and, sigh. Of course. Rumors have it, no endgame and in addition to that, the death of Klaus. The immortal big-bad hybrid who was supposed to be finding redemption due to his unexpected daughter is going to commit suicide? I know I should be happy that we even got continued interactions between Klaus and Caroline. After their last interaction in season 5 of TVD and with the writers literally saying their story was over for good...I guess anything after that is icing on the cake, right? Still the way they were written in season five of The Originals and Klaus’ contention that he would be Caroline’s last love, I thought we might at least be left with the open-ended idea that that might meet up later...yet that doesn’t seem like it’s meant to be. 

I guess I don’t get it, from a writing/show runner perspective. Isn’t entertainment the goal of your shows? Is it so wrong to give your fans what they want? Why is fan service so bad? Why finally have the Ted character on “How I Met Your Mother” meet the mother, have her be awesome, and then kill her off? In my shipping experience, only the show that was literally about “finding happily-ever-afters” Once Upon a Time, actually respected its audience’s feelings and gave them a happy, joyful uplifting ending. Why all the death? Destruction? Why the “gotcha” endings that strain the credibility of the storylines, character motivations, and character relationships you’ve spent years building? Surprising your audience is a completely different thing than surprising them with something that goes against character and established narrative just to upset them or leave them without a sense of resolution.

Writers and show runners can certainly do what they want, but death is no longer shocking. And frankly, at this point, it seems over done and like a cop-out to me and certainly a way to purposely hurt your audience and diminish their sometimes years-long investment in your work. My fave finales: The Wonder Years, The Office, Parks and Rec, ER, Friends, The West Wing... these honored what came before but also paid off viewers love of the characters and how they had grown throughout the series. Some death may have occurred, but nothing that ruined the shows for me (ER expertly rebuilt its character base over the years so when beloved characters died, there were ones still living that you could still root for).