......technically, the end was last night, but I'm still about 4 1/2 episodes behind and planning to catch up today!
Fair warning--if you have not watched this show, SPOILER ALERT for potentially 7 seasons worth of spoilers!!
So, pretty much fell in love with this show about 4 years ago (didn't have access to Showtime when it started, but i was able to catch up on Netflix around 2008 or so). Granted, the basic story line is completely stolen from the British movie Saving Grace, which came out in 2001 i believe, written and starring one of the loves of my life, Craig Ferguson.... (really great movie)
.....housewife becomes widowed, has no money, starts growing and selling pot to make ends meet. Literally...identical basic plot lines....how they got away with not crediting the makers of this movie when they made Weeds is beyond me. Jenji Kohan must know people in high places; but i digress.....
Though the basic plot was the same, Weeds definitely took the whole drug dealing in the suburbs to the next level. Frolicking around Agrestic for three seasons, to the tune of "Little Boxes", we dealt some drugs, married a DEA agent, got said DEA agent killed, burned our house down, and fled the lovely suburbs on a segway as the neighborhood burned down in our wake. The first three seasons i think are my favorite...
When they left Agrestic is when the story-line took a downward turn for me. I mean, there are drug dealers all over this country, but being a drug dealer in a small, suburban, "Anywhere, USA" is what gave the show appeal: it wasn't the rough and tumble of downtown Baltimore like in The Wire. Once you do away with your theme song, head to Mexico and discover a mysterious underground tunnel across the border is when you kind of lost me....
But, luckily not everything that's shitty stays shitty (though how the show survived after writing out a character like Celia Hodes is beyond me...she was hilarious). Seasons 4, 5,6 and 7 flew by, honestly, without much recollection to me (i should probably re-watch this show at some point...don't remember most of it..i think Alannis Morrissette was in there somewhere??). HOWEVER...the season 7 cliff hanger was pretty great: crosshairs targeted on Nancy from a distance and then the screen goes black as a rifle goes off...what the fuccccccccck?!?!?! Probably the best cliffhanger for this entire series. The first episode of the final season, we finally find out who got shot and if they're alive (AND we finally had "Little Boxes" back as a theme song, thank Christ). Surprise surprise, she's fine...albeit, a tad messy....and with a bullet in her grey matter...and several months of rehab ahead of her...but ya know..fine.
So as my beloved show comes to an end, i reflect on my disappointments....like why did Justin Kirk not win any awards for this show? He's genius...I fell in love with him when i saw the Angels in America miniseries, which he also was phenomenal in. Seriously...give this man every award on the planet
After 8 semi-good, semi-stupid seasons, i bid one of my favorite tv shows good-bye....and can only hope the finale is not as open-ended like Lost or as shitty as Ally McBeal..I've been disappointed so many times in the past.....so, so many....please don't suck.
