User blog comment:Mattalamode/A Second Opinion: The Finale/@comment-32417538-20171223132626/@comment-31194372-20171225000845

I can get the fine line in mocking a trope and gleefully exploiting it - with "The Test," for instance, the show is at a bit of an impasse there - but I feel like "The Finale" is so dedicated to making a mockery that it serves to be more pointed than self-congratulatory. It's an episode that has a nice bit of grit to it; it uses deus ex machina to push its critique across more than because it's simply an "easy out." (I mean, the ending is the point of the whole episode, so I can't really call it "weak.")

It's also worth noting that this was written in case TAWOG wouldn't be renewed for a third season, so there's a nice and deliberate sense of finality; the whole series ending like this, in my opinion, would be equally as brilliant, if not more, but thank God it kept going.