Critic’s Rating: 2.3 / 5.0
2.3
And with 9-1-1: Lone Star Season 5 Episode 12, we have the end of an era.
What is there to say about 9-1-1: Lone Star‘s big series finale? They opted to rip our hearts out, psych us out, and then wrap things up happily for everyone we know and love.
Some characters got some sweet endings, while others simply coasted to the end, and the 126 lives forever.
The Series Finale Highlights Where the Season Went Wrong
I don’t even know how to review this hour for you all because I’ve been at a loss for words for how we started the season and its evolution since then.
We’re coming off a particularly bleak and rough penultimate hour with 9-1-1: Lone Star Season 5 Episode 11, leaving many of us under the impression that Tommy had succumbed to her cancer alone.
Well, that was a psych-out on the series’ part and something they took some time to confirm.
And I don’t know if I’m more upset that they introduced the idea in the first place or that they backtracked on it. Tommy’s cancer arc has not been great, and the character deserved so much better than it in this final season.
Not only was it a dark arc for someone who has already endured enough as it is, but the series didn’t have enough time to flesh it out properly.
Introducing the arc was unnecessary in the first place, and I’ll stand on that until the end of time. But not even committing to this ridiculous story they introduced adds insult to injury.
By the end, I can’t even appreciate that they pulled off an entirely impossible and unserious remission end after Tommy has been knocking on death’s door for the ten seconds they dropped all this on us in the first place.
The Only Thing Worse Than Tommy’s Fakeout Death Was Not Committing to It
Why? Because I feel insulted and frustrated by the cheap emotional manipulation of it all.
It’s still unfathomable that it felt like a fun idea to bring us to the brink of catastrophic disorder and bleakness only to flip it in the twilight hour.
Lone Star doesn’t earn its happy endings narratively. It’s just tonal whiplash that we’re supposed to celebrate in the end because “at least.”
“At least” revisiting a seasons-old deportation plot that they randomly dropped on us again for five minutes of “Impact” didn’t result in Mateo’s deportation!
Never mind that they would’ve detained Mateo for those five months until his hearing.
And so what he told the judge to “kiss his ass” after channeling the bravado of a middle-aged white man wouldn’t result in staying even if he was a first responder who has saved millions of lives and one overlooked that he considered marrying his girlfriend who didn’t want it or admitted to burning down a school.
Lone Star’s approach to the finale was “fixing” the most random, poorly conceived plots they hardly spent time on introduced in the first place during a finale and “gifting” us a happy ending.
It’s satisfying that all the characters are alive and happy, but it would be more gratifying if the narrative consistently and thoughtfully built up to any of these ends this season.
But they haven’t, so all that fluff in the end just feels empty.
The Final Season Lacked Connective Tissue Setting Up the End
In hindsight, I don’t know what the series was doing for most of the final season. We’ve had 12 installments, and I can’t pinpoint a single storyline that the season properly explored from the introduction, middle, and conclusion.
Owen’s PTSD and grief arc over his brother, which was prevalent in a quarter of the first half of the season, disappeared and faded away along with the horse saga.
Judd’s struggles without Grace sent him into a depressing downward spiral that felt rough for any fans of the character, as the series struggled to know what to do with him in Grace’s absence.
Sadly, it means returning to the station as a Probie (he deserved captaincy, so his happy fate tracks, even if the jump is simply bizarre), alcoholism, and no vestiges of the Ryder family or connections that have always been meaningful.
Tarlos had never felt so out of sync as a couple, which was alarming when they had just gotten married.
The Final Season Misuses or Sidetracks Many of Its Characters
We spent the first half of the season with Carlos lost in solving his father’s murder and the second half unpacking a bizarre adoption scenario with Jonah that was half-baked.
Marjan, Paul, and Mateo never had much of anything going on all season long. Even the race for lieutenant was an overhyped arc that was a flash in the pan.
Characters like Wyatt and Marlene were brought into the fold under the guise of possibly playing bigger roles, especially in Grace’s absence, but that never truly came to fruition or seemed to go anywhere.
I’ve always struggled with Wyatt’s addition, not because the actor isn’t lovely in the role — he is — but because of how it detracted so much from the original Ryder family unit.
However, the final season even misses the mark on taking full advantage of Wyatt, losing sight of him in the back half of the season. His own arc of starting a family vanishes offscreen, and we hardly see the father/son bond between him and Judd, most glaringly as Judd descends into darkness.
Secondary Characters Struggled As Well
I even bitterly chuckled when they left him sitting in his wheelchair as everyone ducked under their desks, leaving Carlos to shield him with his own body. Oy!
Marlene’s presence in Owen’s arc with the horse could’ve frankly been an email. And other members that could orbit in the lives of the 126 fell by the wayside, too.
They ushered Trevor off the series relatively quickly.
We don’t know anything more about Paul and Asha, and the series didn’t even make a reasonable attempt at reintroducing Joe before a random Marjan wedding during 9-1-1: Lone Star Season 5 Episode 10.
It’s like the season ping-ponged around with no connective tissue to lock down a theme for the final season.
Additionally, there was a distinct lack of emergencies during this final season, most likely reflecting a tight budget, especially as they geared up for this epic asteroid/nuclear meltdown event.
The Asteroid/Nuclear Meltdown Brought the Drama
The destructive event had its moments.
The cold open with the professor on campus lasted longer than I envisioned.
And the notion that scientists would’ve figured out and alerted the public that an asteroid was hitting until an hour before it happened was an absurdity I expect from this show.
It turned out the asteroid wasn’t even the worst issue.
The pending nuclear meltdown is what teased the most damage and almost resulted in the loss of everyone we loved.
9-1-1: Lone Star’s Final Call Allows Tommy and Owen to Be Ultimate Heroes
The event set Tommy up to make a heroic comeback, weakly gathering up enough strength to head to the station and reunite with her paramedics to save lives as best as she can because that’s her purpose.
If she had to die right there on that floor doing it, she happily accepted it. Again, Gina Torres does some impressive work, whether it was all the tear-inducing scenes with Tommy’s late husband or drilling into the Doc’s head to save the day.
I’m longing for the next time she’ll be on my screen again.
It wouldn’t be 9-1-1: Lone Star if they didn’t milk its last disaster to make Owen Strand the ultimate hero. He’s always the man who will sacrifice himself for the greater good and all those around him.
His hero complex doesn’t allow for anything else (and his past traumatic history with loss, too, of course).
Unsurprisingly, he left his squad in a puppy huddle to tend to each other’s wounds and exchange their last words as he staggered and crawled to the red button to stop all of this.
The Finale Teases Owen’s Sacrificial Death
Shrapnel would not stop Owen from reaching that button, and naturally, in the most dramatic fashion, he clicked it at the exact last second and collapsed from his effort.
They even played with our emotions and teased his death.
It was apropos for the type of apocalyptic film energy this whole thing gave. The hour played up to all of those tropes — I had a brief flashback to watching the Apollo 13 film as a kid.
There were sweet spots in it; Judd’s telling Marjan, Mateo, and Paul that he loves them more than his own brothers is enough to move anyone. It also made me genuinely wonder why we never met Judd’s brothers.
It was a nice nod to how this version of the 126 became just as important to Judd as the original group pre-series, adding a full-circle moment for the man most resistant in the series premiere.
The Writers Finally Remembered Judd and Tommy’s Friendship
The finale also seemed to remember that Tommy and Judd are best friends, much to my delight. He barely wanted to leave her side at the college when he saw her tiring herself out.
And it was nice to see him barging into her home and acknowledging his feelings about her cancer since that has been lacking the entire season. She even gave us a final “Juddy.”
The absence of Tommy and Judd’s friendship this season has been one of the most frustrating aspects for me, and I hate that they only opted to revisit it in the end.
Those two serving as the captains at the firehouse they raised in the ranks in is endearing, and it could be fiery, as we’ve seen what it was like when Judd was interim captain before.
The 126’s Happy Endings are Nice Enough, But Narratively Unearned Due to Poor Setup
It was hard to feel anything about Marjan’s pregnancy, as it was just there and fun for a mini Firefox joke. And outside of menoring Jax, we got nothing with Paul.
The pathway to T.K. and Carlos adopting Jonah, presumably because T.K. gave up his job to become a stay-at-home dad, was as unsatisfying as the desire for Jonah to call him some nickname like “Papa bro.”
The scenes were cute, but the energy and chemistry felt off, and I never envisioned T.K. wanting to give up his job or passion again or trading one in for another.
Carlos still felt disconnected from this arc.
And the disconnect between the Strand men lingered to the end, too. But, hey, at least Owen is happy to be back in NYC running things.
Over to you, 9-1-1: Lone Star Fanatics.
How did you feel about the series finale?
Was the big asteroid/nuclear event satisfying?
Which ending was your favorite? Sound off below!
Watch 9-1-1: Lone Star Online
Article by:Source: Jasmine Blu
