The Entourage Series Finale was garbage.
Allow me to elaborate.
I’ve actually been defending Entourage for the past 3-4 seasons while the rest of the internet has increasingly treated its irredeemable terribleness as a foregone conclusion. I haven’t been arguing that Entourage is a “good” show or even something I particularly enjoy, but I feel an inexplicable and perhaps misguided duty to evaluate exactly the ways in which the show is now “bad,” and have continued to watch it almost for no other purpose than to avoid turning into one of those “Show X SUCKS now” people who hasn’t seen that show in 3 years.
The thing is, I don’t really enjoy Entourage and I never really laugh at it, but I have a hard time criticizing a show that so clearly delivers what it professes to deliver: A semi-voyeuristic glimpse into the lives of well-off showbiz people whose problems aren’t truly severe by any real-world estimation. THIS IS WHAT THE SHOW IS ABOUT. Complaining that the characters on Entourage are douchey, delusional rich people navigating relatively stakes-free dilemmas is akin to complaining that the characters on Ice Road Truckers drive trucks on ice too often.
When evaluating the relative goodness and badness of seasons of Entourage, it has to be within the context of knowing that Ari is gonna hurl lame insults at his staff, and Johnny is gonna make “Todd Phillips Movie 101″ cracks about hitting on girls, and that the problems of these people are going to magically solve themselves from time to time to keep the half-hour comedy free of earth-shattering (or even earth-denting) drama. We’ve known these things about Entourage almost from Day One, just as we quickly realized that the star actor in the show is by far the worst actor on the show, which requires such huge leeway on our part that criticizing specifics after that seems almost spiteful.
So basically, that’s my Entourage non-defense defense in a nutshell. Now, even taking all of these enormous concessions into account, I will again say: The Entourage Series Finale was garbage.
Here is a rundown of the loose ends that were bewilderingly and insultingly ‘tied up’ in the finale:
- Vince and a British journalist decide to fly to Paris to get married after going on ONE date together. Not only that, but two episodes prior, Vince first meets this journalist and tries to win her over with his movie-star charm, and this absolutely disgusts her because she’s a strong woman who’s intelligent and independent and doesn’t date clients and is clearly Entourage’s half-assed attempt to counterbalance years of claims about the show’s misogyny.
WHY THE F**K ARE THEY GETTING MARRIED AFTER ONE DATE? How is this good for either of them, or something we as viewers should accept or celebrate? How is this journalist — who we’ve seen several times very specifically not being attracted to Vince and belittling Vince’s intelligence and rolling her eyes at his pathetic attempts to woo her — not only all of the sudden attracted to Vince, but also so attracted that they agree to pull an insane romantic stunt that literally seems like another show’s parody of ridiculous series finales? Three seconds after attempting to create a female character with more brain cells than Premium Cable nipples, Entourage ended up making her the most insultingly ridiculous female character in Entourage history.
At least when Vince is banging random aspiring starlets on an episodic basis, it’s believable because star-f***ing Hollywoodites do obviously exist and are acting incredibly within their character on the show. By turning around and stabbing the one “intelligent strong female character” in the back and making her even more bimboey than the bimbos, the Entourage finale reached new levels of the exact bizarre misogyny they seemed determined to dispel, to say nothing of the embarrassingly lazy writing of having this journalist character COMPLETELY 180 in a one-episode span to allow for a convenient-as-f*ck ending.
- WHY DID ARI AND HIS WIFE GET BACK TOGETHER??? We just spent two seasons exploring the complete and utter dysfunction of the Golds’ relationship, showing Ari’s tireless devotion to his job as well as his pathological, almost homicidal disregard for his wife and family. In the finale, he up and quits his job after a one-minute phone call with his daughter and he and his wife move to Italy in another “there is no f***ing justification for either character doing this but it’s the finale so can’t stop now Italy!!!”
Then, for good measure, Eric and Sloan get back together too after a series of terrible fights and Eric spitefully sleeping with Sloan’s ex-stepmom. The deterioration of these two relationships was, ironically, one of the more engaging and believable plot points of the past two seasons, but rather than handle these borderline actually-realistic life scenarios with legitimate emotion uncharacteristic of Entourage, they ended up resolving them as Entouragely as possible, with both couples just suddenly ending up back together and everything being fine because it’s the Series Finale and we’re out of time (but leaving it open for an Ari spin-off).
Are we honestly supposed to be happy about the outcome of either of these relationships? This series couldn’t have been wrapped up in a more lazy “deus ex machina” fashion if a god literally wheeled itself in on a machine and fused the couples back together with lightning sound effects.
– Then, the part that made the least sense of all: WHERE THE F**K WERE ERIC AND SLOAN GOING ON THAT F***ING PLANE? Vince just announced he’s getting married in Paris, he spends a day gathering everyone up so they can all fly to Paris together, then when E and Sloan finally get back together, Vince announces he’s gotten E a private jet that will take him anywhere in the world, and the entourage shares a tearful goodbye as Eric and Sloan get on their separate jet together.
WHY WOULDN’T ERIC AND SLOAN BE GOING TO VINCE’S F***ING WEDDING? Why was any of this happening? WHY ARE YOU FOUR GUYS SAD, YOU STILL F***ING LIVE IN THE SAME F***ING HOUSE, YOU’RE ONLY BEING FAKE SAD BECAUSE IT’S A SERIES FINALE AND THE SHOW WANTS TO CREATE THE ILLUSION OF AN EMOTIONAL, TEARFUL FAREWELL. Would I cry before a friend of mine goes on a two-week honeymoon with his wife? AND WHERE ARE E AND SLOAN GOING? “Have fun in Paris at your F***ING WEDDING, Best Friend Of Mine! We’re gonna go knock China off my bucket list!”
Nothing about the Entourage finale was happy or sad or emotional or comical or believable or interesting. You know what else is also none of those things? Garbage.
Also, the Sloan “pregnancy” twist? Garbage. Come on.
And the part last week when Turtle thought he lost all his money but actually Vince bought his stock and kept his own stock so they actually got super rich? Super garbage.
Also, the scene when all the Entourage characters jumped in that garbage and started throwing garbage at each other and yelling “This is garbage”? That was weird but entertaining.
