KA: You hate Jack on Lost! So do I. You get into this question in the book with some of the individual shows that had disappointing endings, but I want to ask about your personal feelings: How much do you as both a fan and critic care about how a show ends? (I will say that I've found that terrible conclusions very much affect my memories of loving a show: I retrofit that love. And never want to re-watch them.)
AS: As someone who went back and re-watched large chunks of these shows in order to write the book, I really didn't find my experience affected by knowing how things ended, whether well or poorly. Those early Lost episodes are still amazing. My favorite Sopranos episodes aren't ruined because I'm thinking of the scene at the ice cream parlor (which I've kind of grown to like, anyway). For me, I think the opposite becomes much more true: that a great ending is more likely to retroactively raise my opinion of a show than a bad ending is to diminish it. The Shield was an excellent show throughout its run, but I think the thing that elevates it into the discussion with the HBO and AMC shows for a place in the all-time pantheon are those last two episodes. That's a case of a serialized drama doing everything we've said throughout this era that we wanted them to do: paying off almost every major story thread, and in the most emotionally powerful way possible. And when I was looking back over old Shield episodes, I found my interest raised even over some periods I found patchier at the time.
The ending for Lost did affect my opinion for the rest of the show. I have no interest in re-watching it.
){kind=link}