Z/Web

Today was a sad day as what frequently was one of the best shows on TV for many years came to an end. I don’t know why it ended; if ratings were low or the creators were burned out, but I’m still pissed about it. When they announced last spring that this fall season would be the end I thought my heart would stop. Monk has consistently been one of the few shows I can watch any time, any where, in any mood. It is funny, heartwarming, intriguing, clever, and just all-around wonderful. Other shows sit on my DVR for months before I get around to watching them (I’ve got 15 episodes of House queued up right now and I love House, but I have to be in the right mood). Monk I often watched the same day (on special occasions I managed to save it for watching during Sunday dinner). It was not always perfect or consistent, and sometimes it got repetitive and predictable, but the thing about Monk is that I didn’t care: even a bad episode of Monk was better than most good episodes of other shows.

This final two-part episode resolves all the show’s mysteries. While I’m glad it ended that way instead of suddenly and without any resolution, I’m not that impressed with the conclusion. Yes, Monk finally solves his wife’s murder, and no, that doesn’t magically cure his OCD (though it helps), but the mystery itself didn’t seem too mysterious (it was extremely predictable) and Monk didn’t have to do much sleuthing or anything brilliant to capture the bad guy. The finale tries to hit so many notes and resolve so many things it feels scattered and weak. My preference would have been to have changed this around: had him solve the murder in a brilliant way in part 1, then deal with all the ramifications and resolutions in part 2. Instead they tried to spread the murder across both episodes and crammed the resolution into the last half hour and it felt forced and awkward for me. Not so poor that it ruins the series, but not going out with a bang as I would have wanted. Monk needed to do something brilliant in this episode, some thing only Monk could do, and instead he has the murderer handed to him on a silver platter. Lame. I still love this series, though. I hope it lives forever in reruns and I really hope the books continue and I would love for USA to do a Monk TV movie once a year like they did with Columbo and Perry Mason and other series.