Spoilers ahead.
These sixTV showsbetrayed their audiences with their story decisions, and some of them still hurt years later. A bad storyline ora bad ending to a TV showis one thing, but an arc or finale that betrays its audience is a whole other. A TV show that betrays its audience took its time to do so.
Anyone can make a mistake with a TV series. It’s almost inevitable when it comes to long TV shows. EvenThe Officehas its cameraman storyline. When a show betrays its audience, though, that’s less forgivable. That means the series made a promise about something, and then reneged on it, and that betrayal can sour even the most ardent fan.
Derek “McDreamy” Shepherd was one of the main draws ofGrey’s Anatomyfor 11 seasons, accruing a popularity that rivaled Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) herself. The Chief of Surgery at Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital,Dr. Shepherd was involved with some of the biggest storylines of the series.
Despite the moniker, McDreamy was not solely the “Prince Charming” ofGrey’s Anatomy. There are layers to Shepherd and to Patrick Dempsey’s performance. He’s not just a smoldering heartthrob; he can be a cold and mechanical surgeon when he needs to be, and he’s almost off-putting at times.
The car crash that kills him comes out of nowhere, and fans were rocked by the sudden turn of events.
Then he dies in season 11. The car crash that kills him comes out of nowhere, and fans were rocked by the sudden turn of events. This wasn’t a character who frequently put himself in harm’s way, so there wasn’t much foreshadowing. His character had gone through so much, and now it all felt like a waste of time.
Dexteris a strange show because there are some seasons that could be ranked among the best seasons of TV ever, and some that could be ranked among the worst. A storyline that betrayed fans comes in one of those seasons and involves Deb (Jennifer Carpenter) falling in love with Dexter (Michael C. Hall).
In case you were unaware, Deb is Dexter’s adopted sister. At the end of season 6,Deb’s therapist helps her come to the realization that she’s actually in love with Dexter. The feelings aren’t even reciprocated. Deb just fawns and cries over Dexter while he keeps doing Dexter things. Like murder.
Maybe in the time ofGame of ThronesandThe White Lotus, incest plotlines would not be viewed with such hesitation, but in this scenario, they definitely were. The show did not even attempt to explain how weird the situation was, instead making viewers uncomfortable and disappointed.
The mystery teen drama seriesPretty Little Liarswas never particularly concerned with being the most down-to-earth TV show, but it at least generally tried to stick to some internal rules. The finale of the show completely threw out those rules,ending with an absurd, though admittedly memorable, final episode.
Based on Sara Shepherd’s novel series of the same name, the show veers wildly from the books around season 2, so by season 7, we are in completely unexplored territory. Yet, the finale still comes as a shock, because it’s revealed, without any preamble, that Spencer (Troian Bellisario) has a twin sister.
An evil twin is about as clichéd as you can get.
There was little buildup, and it was a lazy and unoriginal solution to the conflict in the show. An evil twin is about as clichéd as you may get. While it’s not as ifPretty Little Liarsseason 7 was a great season to begin with, the finale felt like the show wasting the time of fans who stuck around.
The final episode ofScrubsseason 8 is a fantastic capstone to the show and was intended as the final episode of the hilarious, moving, and surprisingly realistic series. After deciding to leave Sacred Heart, J.D. (Zach Braff) imagines what his future will hold, set to the tearjerking “The Book of Love”.
It was the perfect goodbye, and then the rug was pulled out from under everyone when it was decided thatScrubswould be coming back for season 9.Never has another season of a show felt like a cynical attempt by a network to retain viewership, and season 9 feels like an unwelcome, late-arriving party guest.
The ninth season is sometimes referred to asScrubs: Med Schooland brings back most of the original cast members.
Most fans don’t even consider season 9 to be a part ofScrubs. You can argue that there’s nothing wrong with having more J.D. antics, but the existence of the season does lessen the impact of the season 8 finale. It’s the quintessential example of aTV show that ran for too long.
At the end ofHow I Met Your Mother, we finally learn who this titular mother is. Tracy Mosby (Cristin Milioti), the “Mother”, becomes a main character in season 9 of the series. There you have it, after all this time. Then we get to the betrayal. The Mother has actually been dead for six years.
It feels like a major betrayal to have put nine seasons of effort and interest into this relationship only for it to be revealed that it’s been over for six years. We get to know Tracy in this final season, andjust as we’re beginning to like her, they hand-wave her awaylike she was never even there.
To make things worse, Ted (Josh Radnor) then gets together with Robin (Cobie Smulders) (a whole otherHIMYMissue), so it feels like the writers got annoyed with their own conceit and jammed everything together to get the ending they originally wanted. It should have been calledHow I Met Your Stepmother.
Thelater seasons ofGame of Thronescan feel like slap-in-the-faceafter slap-in-the-face, and everyone has that moment, usually in season 8, where they threw up their hands and asked God, or the spirit of George R.R. Martin, why they stuck around so long. The worst of these moments has to be with Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau).
Jaime was one of the best-developed charactersin the entire show. While the Starks were turning into unkillable robots, Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) was being reduced to an ineffective quip-machine, and Dany (Emilia Clarke) was being rushed through two seasons' worth of character development in a few episodes, Jaime’s arc remained intact.
That was, until season 8, episode 4, “The Last of the Starks”, when theTV showinexplicably decided to have him backtrack on everything he’d become. Suddenly, he’s spitting venom at a crying Brienne (Gwendoline Christie) and proudly championing the cruel things he’s done. He says he’s a villain after all. Well, you fooled us, Jaime.
