Notes on Pop Culture: Great TV Finales

We've just concluded the traditional TV season and were treated to ample season/series finales. Most of them were moderately entertaining, some were really good and many were disappointing. I really liked the season enders for The Good Wife, Parks and Recreation (Councilor Knope!), The Mentalist and Scandal. I wasn't all that thrilled with the finales of Grey's Anatomy, Awake (was ticked that it was so confusing and now we'll never know the real story because it was canceled) and House.

The folks at Entertainment Weekly, meanwhile, time-traveled back to the recent TV past to select 26 season finales (not series finales) of which they were fond. Why 26? You'll have to ask them. Among the finales they honored:

The third season Mad Men finale when Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce was born in a cramped hotel suite.

The stunning conclusion of 24's first season where Jack Bauer's wife was murdered in the CTU offices.

The season two finale of Alias when CIA agent Sydney Bristow learned that she'd missed the past two years of her life and that her longtime love, fellow agent Michael Vaughn had thought she was dead and married somebody else.

The season two finale of Grey's Anatomy when Denny died and Meredith and Derek hooked up again. As much as I hated the Denny storyline, this episode, plus its selection of tunes (almost all of which I later downloaded) haunted me for weeks. However Grey's season six finale, with the mass shooting in Seattle Grace, Derek getting shot, residents dying and Meredith miscarrying could give the Denny dying season two finale a run for its money.

"Not Penny's Boat" season three Lost finale where Charlie died as a sacrifice for his friends and the whole series flashed forward for the first time. Let's just forget about that last season, okay? That never happened.

All in all, some excellent choices, although I would've added the season three finale of The Mentalist where Patrick Jane shot the man he thought was Red John (the serial killer who murdered his wife and daughter), the fifth season finale of the Gilmore Girls when Rory moved in with Richard and Emily after dropping out of Yale and the season one finale of Friday Night Lights where the Panthers won the state championship, Tami learned she was pregnant and Eric took a job at a college a plane ride away from Dillon.

What was your favorite TV show finale, this season or ever?