tom and shiv holding hands in car in succession finale
The history of television is practically littered with shows that started great but faltered before the finish line. Even generally acclaimed shows like Lost and Game of Thrones have suffered the pain of a last-minute defeat due to a divisive finale that ruined an otherwise stellar record.
But every once in a while, a series comes along that manages to deliver a truly spectacular experience from beginning to end... and we do mean the very end. Some of the greatest TV episodes of all time have been series finales, often the conclusions of beloved, long-running shows. For these shows, whether they’re dramas, comedies, or something in between, the final episode is the cherry on top of a delectable, carefully constructed masterpiece, delivering emotional and thematic closure to a perfect story. So, without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the greatest series finales of all time that deserve to be called masterpieces. 1 ‘The Leftovers’ Based on Tom Perrotta’s 2011 novel, The Leftovers is a supernatural drama series created by Perrotta and Damon Lindelof that explores the aftermath of the “Sudden Departure," a mysterious global event that resulted in 2% of the world’s population inexplicably disappearing. The show follows a varied group of characters, all affected by the event in one way or another, as they struggle to adjust to their strange new lives. The series stars an ensemble cast led by Justin Theroux, Carrie Coon, and Christopher Eccleston, with Amy Brenneman, Liv Tyler, Chris Zylka, Margaret Qualley, Ann Dowd, Regina King, and more in lead roles. Often hailed as one of the greatest TV shows of all time, The Leftovers boasts some truly amazing performances, music, direction, and writing, along with a thematically rich plot and engaging characters. Its finale,"The Book of Nora," is where it all comes together, an emotionally devastating and utterly beautiful final chapter focused on Carrie Coon’s Nora Durst. Exploring the aftermath of Nora’s decision to take part in an experiment that could reunite her with her lost family. It’s the perfect ending to one of the most perfect shows ever made, and it has been widely hailed by critics as one of the greatest series finales of all time. 2 ‘Better Call Saul’ Created by Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould, Better Call Saul is a prequel to their hit crime drama show Breaking Bad. The prequel stars Bob Odenkirk as small-time attorney Jimmy McGill, charting his journey to becoming the morally challenged criminal lawyer Saul Goodman. Besides Odenkirk, the series also stars Jonathan Banks, Rhea Seehorn, Patrick Fabian, Michael Mando, Michael McKean, Giancarlo Esposito, and Tony Dalton in lead roles. Breaking Bad is almost universally hailed as one of the greatest shows ever released on TV, but Better Call Saul is just as good . A thrilling, darkly funny, and thematically rich drama, the show earned several accolades during its original run, and we’re not exaggerating when we say it doesn’t have a single bad episode. The series finale, “Saul Gone,” shows Jimmy facing the consequences for all his sins and attempting one last gambit, leading to his first meeting with his former wife Kim in six years. It's a powerful ending that delivers a final piece of poetic justice and beautifully closes the book on the massively successful franchise. And as a bonus, the finale also includes a guest appearance by Bryan Cranston as Walter White, the franchise’s central character and the catalyst for the whole story. 3 ‘Fleabag’ A semi-autobiographical tragicomedy, Fleabag was created and written by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, who also stars as the central character. Based on Waller-Bridge’s eponymous one-woman show, the series follows the title character’s life as a young woman living in London, running a café, sleeping around, fighting with her sister, and trying to ignore the overwhelming grief caused by the death of a close friend. Sian Clifford, Bill Paterson, Olivia Colman, and more star in key supporting roles, with Andrew Scott joining the main cast in the second season. A raunchy, dry-witted, and playful comedy that explores some genuinely traumatic emotions, Fleabag is easily one of the most acclaimed shows of the 21st century so far. The fourth-wall-breaking comedy’s second and final season became a cultural phenomenon, with audiences around the world falling in love with the doomed romance between Fleabag and Andrew Scott’s Hot Priest. And it all comes together in the final episode, a bittersweet ending that sees Fleabag find some measure of growth and closure, just as the Hot Priest makes the final choice between his feelings for her and his dedication to God.Show Do You Belong In? Yellowstone · Landman · Tulsa King · Mayor of Kingstown Four worlds. All of them brutal, complicated, and built on power, loyalty, and the price of survival. Taylor Sheridan doesn't write heroes — he writes people who do what they have to do and live with the cost. Ten questions will reveal which one of his worlds you were made for. 🤠Yellowstone 🛢️Landman 👑Tulsa King ⚖️Mayor of Kingstown FIND YOUR WORLD → QUESTION 1 / 10POWER 01 Where does your power come from? In Sheridan's world, everyone has leverage. The question is what kind. ALand, legacy, and a name that's been feared and respected for generations. BKnowing the deal better than anyone else in the room — and being willing to walk away first. CReputation. I've earned it the hard way, and everyone in the room knows it. DBeing the only person both sides will talk to. That makes me indispensable — and dangerous. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 2 / 10LOYALTY 02 Who do you put first, no matter what? Loyalty in Sheridan's universe is always absolute — and always costly. AFamily — blood or chosen. The ranch, the name, the people who carry it with me. BThe company — or whoever's signing the cheques. Loyalty follows the contract. CMy crew. The men who stood with me when it counted — I don't abandon them for anything. DMy community — even when my community is a powder keg and I'm the only thing stopping it from blowing. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 3 / 10CONFLICT 03 Someone crosses a line. How do you respond? Every Sheridan protagonist has a line. What matters is what happens after it's crossed. AQuietly, decisively, and in a way that sends a message to everyone watching. BI outmanoeuvre them legally, financially, and politically before they even know I've moved. CDirectly. Old school. You cross me, you hear about it to your face — and then you deal with the consequences. DI absorb it, calculate the fallout, and find the move that keeps the whole system from collapsing. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 4 / 10SETTING 04 Where do you feel most in your element? Sheridan's worlds are as much about place as they are about people. AWide open land — mountains, sky, silence. Somewhere you can see trouble coming from a mile away. BThe oil fields of West Texas — brutal, lucrative, and indifferent to whoever happens to be standing on top of them. CA mid-size city where the rules haven't quite caught up yet — fertile ground for someone with vision and nerve. DA rust-belt town built around a prison — where everyone's life is shaped by what's inside those walls. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 5 / 10MORALITY 05 How do you feel about operating in the grey? Nobody in a Sheridan show has clean hands. The question is how they carry the dirt. AI do what has to be done to protect what's mine. I'll answer for it eventually — but not today. BGrey is just business. The line moves depending on what's at stake, and I move with it. CI have a code — it's not the law's code, but it's mine, and I don't break it. DI've made peace with it. Keeping the peace requires compromises most people don't have the stomach for. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 6 / 10AMBITION 06 What are you actually fighting to hold onto? Every Sheridan character is fighting a war. The real question is what they're defending. AA way of life that the modern world is doing everything it can to erase. BMy position — and the leverage that comes with being the person everyone needs to close a deal. CRelevance. I've been away, I've been written off — and I'm proving that was a mistake. DWhatever fragile order I've managed to build — because without it, everything burns. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 7 / 10LEADERSHIP 07 How do you lead? Authority in Sheridan's world is never given — it's established, maintained, and constantly tested. ABy example and force of will. People follow me because they believe in what I'm protecting — and because they know what happens if they don't. BThrough negotiation and leverage. I don't need people to like me — I need them to need me. CBy being the smartest, most experienced person in the room and making sure everyone quietly knows it. DBy being the calm centre of a situation that would spiral without me — and accepting that nobody thanks you for it. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 8 / 10OUTSIDERS 08 Someone new arrives and tries to change how things work. Your reaction? Every Sheridan show has an outsider disrupting an established order. Sometimes that outsider is you. AThey'll learn. Or they won't. Either way, the land was here before them and it'll be here after. BI figure out what they want, what they're worth, and whether they're an asset or a problem — fast. CI was the outsider once. I give them a chance — one — to show they understand respect. DNew players destabilise everything I've built. I assess the threat and manage it before it manages me. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 9 / 10COST 09 What has your position cost you? Nobody gets to where these characters are without paying for it. The bill is always personal. AMy family's peace — maybe their innocence. The ranch demands everything, and I've let it take too much. BRelationships, time, any version of a normal life. The job eats everything that isn't nailed down. CYears. Decades in some cases. Time I can't get back — but I'm not done yet. DMy conscience, mostly. And the ability to ever fully trust anyone on either side of the wall. NEXT QUESTION → QUESTION 10 / 10LEGACY 10 When it's over, what do you want people to say? Sheridan's characters all know the ending is coming. The question is what they leave behind. AThat I held the line. That the land is still ours and everything I did was worth it. BThat I was the best at what I did and that no deal ever got closed without me at the table. CThat I built something real, somewhere nobody expected it, and I did it on my own terms. DThat I kept the peace when nobody else could — and that the town is still standing because of it. REVEAL MY SHOW → Sheridan Has Spoken You Belong In… The show that claimed the most of your answers is the world you were built for. If two tied, both are shown — you're complicated enough to straddle two Sheridan universes. 🤠 Yellowstone 🛢️ Landman 👑 Tulsa King ⚖️ Mayor of Kingstown YELLOWSTONE You are a Dutton — or you might as well be. You understand that some things are worth protecting at any cost, and that the modern world's indifference to history, to land, to legacy, is not something you're willing to accept quietly. You lead from the front, you carry your family's weight without complaint, and when someone threatens what's yours, you don't escalate — you finish it. You're not cruel. But you are absolute. In Yellowstone's world, that combination of ferocity and loyalty doesn't make you a villain. It makes you the only thing standing between everything that matters and everyone who wants to take it. LANDMAN You thrive in the chaos of high-stakes negotiation, where the money is enormous, the margins are thin, and the wrong word in the wrong room can cost everyone everything. You're a fixer — the person called when a situation is already on fire and needs someone with the nerve to walk into it. West Texas oil country rewards exactly what you are: sharp, adaptable, unsentimental, and absolutely clear-eyed about what people want and what they'll do to get it. You're not naive enough to think this world is fair. You're smart enough to be the one deciding who it's fair to. TULSA KING You are a Dwight Manfredi — someone who has served their time, paid their dues, and arrived somewhere unexpected with nothing but their reputation and their wits. You adapt without losing yourself. You build loyalty through respect rather than fear, though you're not above reminding people that the two aren't mutually exclusive. Tulsa King is for people who are still standing when everyone assumed they'd be finished — who find, in an unfamiliar place, that they're more capable than the world gave them credit for. You don't need a throne. You build one, wherever you happen to land. MAYOR OF KINGSTOWN You carry the weight of a system that is broken by design, and you do it anyway — because someone has to, and because you're the only one positioned to do it without the whole thing collapsing. Mike McLusky's world is for people who are comfortable operating where there are no good options, only less catastrophic ones. You speak every language: law enforcement, criminal, political, human. That fluency makes you invaluable and it makes you a target. You've made your peace with both. Mayor of Kingstown belongs to people who understand that keeping the peace is not the same as being at peace — and who do the job regardless. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 4 ‘The Sopranos’ Created by David Chase, The Sopranos is an epic gangster drama series starring James Gandolfini as New Jersey Mafia boss Tony Soprano. After unexpectedly suffering panic attacks, Tony is forced to see a psychiatrist , who encourages him to open up about his life, especially his struggle to balance family and crime. Edie Falco, Michael Imperioli, Dominic Chianese, Steven Van Zandt, Tony Sirico, Robert Iler, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, and more star in key roles. Easily one of the most legendary TV shows ever made, The Sopranos is an acclaimed evergreen favorite that enjoyed consistently high ratings throughout its six-season run and is still beloved by fans. Striking a balance between gangster drama and family drama, the series presents a thoroughly engrossing and thematically rich story that has had a profound impact on the crime drama genre. The show’s final episode, “Made in America,” was quite controversial when it was first released because even though it does provide satisfying conclusions to all the show’s last plotlines, its final moment leaves Tony Soprano’s ultimate fate unrevealed. Though this vague and abrupt end infuriated some fans at the time, the show’s ending has since been re-evaluated as a masterpiece in keeping with the series' themes, and the finale is regularly ranked among the greatest of all time. 5 ‘Veep’ A political satire series created by Armando Iannucci, Veep stars Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Selina Meyer, the fictional Vice President of the United States of America . Loosely adapted from the 2005 British sitcom The Thick of It, the show follows the ups and downs of Selina’s life and career, as well as those of her dysfunctional team. Anna Chlumsky, Tony Hale, Reid Scott, Timothy Simons, Matt Walsh, Kevin Dunn, Sufe Bradshaw, and Gary Cole star as her core staff members. A celebrated satirical show that aired for seven seasons and earned 60 awards, Veep is a stellar piece of political comedy that explores contemporary topics in politics, media, and public service with a biting sense of humor. The final episode, also titled"Veep," brings all of Selina’s destructive, narcissistic tendencies to a crescendo with a final scheme to become President, sacrificing every last bit of her principles for power. The story then jumps to her funeral 24 years later, which ties up all the remaining plotlines and concludes her staff’s stories before delivering a final twist that underscores the fleeting nature of political importance. 6 ‘Succession’ A satirical black comedy-drama series created by Jesse Armstrong, Succession follows a destructive succession struggle within the uber-wealthy Roy family, owners of the global media corporation Waystar RoyCo. The story kicks off when the family patriarch, Logan Roy , announces his plan to retire, which sets off four seasons of no-holds-barred war between his children as they vie for control of the company. The show also features Matthew Macfadyen, Nicholas Braun, Hiam Abbass, Peter Friedman, and more in key roles. One of the biggest TV hits of recent years, Succession has been widely hailed as one of the best TV shows of the 21st century so far, earning praise and accolades for its sharp writing, dark humor, compelling performances, and high production values. The series finale, “With Open Eyes,” brings the show’s hilarious and epic struggle to a close, with an acquisition plan on the table that could make or break the Roy siblings’ plans. The episode has been universally acclaimed as one of the most well-written, masterfully performed, and thematically resonant series finales of the 2020s, and possibly of all time. 7 ‘Friends’ Created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman, Friends is an iconic TV sitcom that follows the various misadventures of six longtime friends in their 20s and 30s who all live in Manhattan. The series explores their attempts to navigate love, life, and work in the big city, meeting all sorts of eccentric characters and getting into hilarious situations, with their friends providing both help and harm in equal measure. The show stars Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry, and David Schwimmer as the lead characters. Subscribe for deeper TV finale analysis and picks Join the newsletter for thoughtful breakdowns, ranking lists, and behind-the-scenes context on the greatest series finales and TV moments, plus curated recommendations for shows worth rewatching and deeper thematic reading. Get Updates By subscribing, you agree to receive newsletter and marketing emails, and accept our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. You can unsubscribe anytime. Easily one of the most acclaimed shows ever to air on television and one of the most popular, Friends was an international cultural phenomenon during its original broadcast and remains a beloved favorite of audiences everywhere today. The finale, titled “The Last One,” is a two-part episode that wraps up all the show's long-running storylines, primarily Monica and Chandler’s adoption process and Ross and Rachel’s off-again-on-again relationship. A highly satisfying and emotionally charged conclusion, the finale was the most-watched television episode of the 2000s — that’s right, the whole decade. 8 ‘M*A*S*H’ Developed by Larry Gelbart, M*A*S*H is a war comedy drama series set during the Korean War that was adapted from the 1970 film, which was in turn based on Richard Hooker's 1968 novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors. The show follows the team of doctors and support staff who work at the"4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital" in Uijeongbu, South Korea. The series’ ensemble cast features Alan Alda, Wayne Rogers, Larry Linville, Loretta Swit, McLean Stevenson, Gary Burghoff, Jamie Farr, William Christopher, and more. One of the most defining TV shows of the 1970s, M*A*S*H covered a broad range of styles, genres, and tones over the course of its 11-season run, earning critical acclaim and high ratings throughout that time. Its two-and-a-half-hour finale, "Goodbye, Farewell and Amen," is easily the show’s most famous episode, a touching conclusion to the story that chronicles the final days of the war. The finale was the most-watched TV broadcast in US history until 2010, when the record was broken by Super Bowl XLIV, and it’s still the most-watched series finale and most-watched scripted episode of all time. M*A*S*H Like Follow Followed Drama Comedy Release Date 1972 - 1983-00-00 Network CBS Showrunner Larry Gelbart Directors Larry Gelbart Writers Larry Gelbart, Richard Hooker Cast See All
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