Closure

The Closer
Series Final Two Episodes
Monday Aug. 6, 13
TNT Television
Five Scoops of Bosco


Review by Allen Bacon, The Daily Bosco


You have to admire any Television Show that chooses to go out at the top of it's game.

But when Kyra Sedgwick made the announcement that this would be her final season as Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson on The Closer and would close the series as we know it, it seemed like the show was still going strong and had more to give. 

The fact is, it has been over seven years since the show debuted.

After seven seasons and several Emmy and Golden Globe nominations/wins later for Best Dramatic Actress for Sedgwick, the show will close up shop for good on August 13 with the final episode. 

Time flies when you are having fun.

Sedgwick has been in the starring role for so long now, in fact you almost forgot she was a movie star with  an impressive resume before taking on this role.  The Closer was probably supposed to be a diversion for her.

It seemed like at the beginning of the last six episodes that this series was not going to end well and go out with a wimper. 

As is the case with   the TNT network, this current and last season was divided with about a six month hiatus between the sixteenth show of the seventh season and the last six episodes.

The first two shows after the hiatus were probably the worst in the history of the series in my opinion.  The second, an episode featuring Detectives Provencia (G.W Kelly) and Flynn (Tony Denison) was just downright silly and moronic all the way through.  Usually there is comedy in the show which is part of the charm of  The Closer, but to do an old tired bit...(yes we know Provencia and Flynn can be bumbling Detectives already)..for an entire episode was not in the true spirit of the series.

Before that show, I was thinking a good spin off comedy series would be to follow those two characters but after that episode,  I quickly changed my mind.  The silliness would just get old real quick.

The series got back on track in a hurry in the third episode after the hiatus with an episode of Chief Johnson going after a Doctor suspected of giving placeboes to cancer patients.  The back story being that her father on the show is being treated for cancer.

In that episode, which will no doubt get Sedgwick nominated for yet another Best Actress Emmy, she was able to re-establish how good of an actress she really is and sets up the probable reason why she is leaving the Major Crimes Unit in the series.   It also whets the apetite for her upcoming movie roles.  It will be great to see her back on the big screen.  You forget how great of an actress really she is and this role is probably holding her back from stretching out even further.

Most of the characters of The Closer are inked to come back in a series called Major Crimes. 

Historically, spin-off programs do not do well.  Think of shows like MASH, The Andy Griffith Show, and Happy Days who all had continuation shows after the major stars left.  And in this case the elements that made the show great, compelling, and charming... A woman Chief Officer from the South being thrust into the second largest Police force in America... Urban LA.  That dynamic will be gone.

And even though Mary McDonnel, who the new spin-off series will use as the main person, is a good actress in her own right, I don't see it lasting too long with the loss of Kyra Sedgwick. 

I hope the cast proves me wrong.