Season Finale Sunday -- "Prior Commitments"

These actors would be even happier if they got a break after Season 2!

Yes, it's true -- Sunday night's season finale has what I believe to be a network television first.  You can correct me if I'm wrong, I'm sure you will, but if any other shows on the big 4 have done a gay wedding on prime time, no one gave me the memo.

Regardless of the history we're making or not making, "Prior Commitments" is by all accounts a fabulous episode.  Directed by Executive Producer Ken Olin, and written by fellow EPs Greg Berlanti & Monica Owusu-Breen & Alison Schapker the episode does what any finale should do -- wrap up one box and hint that there's another waiting behind it.

Me thinks you'll likey. 

Today was quite enlightening.  It started out with a hearty debate about the merits of a New York Times review of our show -- which left some of us in stitches, and others a bit irate.  To quote one writer/producer, "She went to a lot of trouble to say what a guilty pleasure the show was, but only mentioned all the reasons the pleasure had to be guilty." 

I'm not linking to the review, but you can access it easily via that old thing, the World Wide Web.

Then the entire writing staff convened for something like 8 hours and drank 347 coffees.  Some of them are still here, trying to figure out what agonies and ecstasies to put our beloved Walker Family through.  Through my office wall, I can still hear David Marshall Grant yelling about it.

Just so you know, since the writing staff is working straight through the summer (and in fact through April 2009), I will continue to be here, and will likely have more time to post sweet nothings in your ears.  So keep checking back.

-- and I'll try and get that music guide updated for y'all.

Thanks for all the love and enjoy our finale,
Dan

Comments

[Jackie]

Must of missed something who is Ryan? The baby picture?

I just wanted to know who was performing the song at the end of the show. I believe it was called "can't find my way home"

[GR]

Were the last ten minutes suppose to be a blank screen imitation of the Sopranos? Was this network wide or only on my Washington D.C. affiliate?

[will]

Ok. I'm emerging from a temporary funk. I went with a friend this afternoon to see "Baby Mama" (I actually wanted to stay in and see a Bernardo Bertolucci film that arrived from Netflix). "Baby Mama" is a smashingly unfunny "comedy" starring SNL's Tina Fey and Amy Peohler. I'm not going to recount a plot, because these aren't characters and it just demeans you.

I will tell you that Amy Peohler, the surrogate for the infertile Tina Fey, pisses into a bathroom sink when she can't unloose the child-proof toilet latch; and you can tell that the filmmakers mean it to be delightfully silly... It's really depressing to hear people in the audience laughing at bottom of the barrel jokes. You lose faith in the american people. I felt spiritually numb leaving the theater. I also saw it at an ArcLight Theater and had to shell out $25.00 for 2 seats and $8.00 for 2 bottled waters.

That's my sordid backdrop to the B&S finale. About 8:30 pm PST here. An hour & a half to go.

[Jude]

I would love to know who sang the version of Cant Find My Way Home that played at the end of this episode. Can anyone help me?

[suzanne mckendrick]

Can someone please tell me the make and model car that Kevin Walker drives?(The convertible used in the pre-wedding road trip). Thanks.

[Andre - West Palm Beach, FL]

Thank you all for another fantastic season of Brother and Sisters. Also thank you for such a beautiful season finale, the wedding was so touching and gives me hope that we all will be able to marry legally in this country someday. Please thank all the cast and crew for an awesome show.

[SoCalMika]

hey, tonites episode was extremely good...i cannot believe the news about the new walker....
tell me u guys are up for another season?

[Pam DeVe2@aol.com]

What was the last song sang tonight on the last show...Pheobe snow singer? Thanks Pam Warren

[Jenn]

I just have to say that this show is one of the best on television. This is the only show that I look forward to every week. The writing for this show is brillant..keep up the good work. The finale tonight was perfect but of course frustrating because nobody likes to wait all summer for their favorite show!!! Again, fantastic job by the writers and actors. I only wish that Brothers & Sisters would have had a 2 hour finale like Desparate Housewives because it's such a better show.

[Michael]

What is the name and artists for the song played at the end of the season finale?

[will]

"Prior Commitments"

written by Greg Berlanti, Monica Owusu-Breen, and Alison Schapker

directed by Ken Olin
---------------------------

The family seems oddly casual about Rebecca not being a Walker anymore (Nora: "...nothing has really changed!"). One moment she is; the next she's not. It's all a day in the life....

I like how Kevin impulsively massages Scotty's shoulders.

Please. What a convoluted Rebecca storyline. Of course nobody's reaction approximates what might actually transpire in life. We're firmly steeped in garden-variety TV dramaturgy here as everybody seems to assimilate this new information within seconds, then they all just move on to the next thing (considering that "The Other Walker" was weighted down with heavy psychodrama about this same issue in reverse, this is curious).

Kitty's storyline holds zero surprises. Matthew can make "nothing" moments work by sheer force of weird, slurry, nuanced line deliveries, but Calista can't. Calista needs material. Kitty & Robert's scenes seem to drift into some nebulous limbo ether whenever they appear (the only thing I could firmly focus on was that they were both wearing glasses. Beyond that, I can't tell you what happened).

Scotty's "Did you smoke a bong and listen to Led Zepplin, too?" is a decent line. 10:27 pm... I looked at the clock. Kevin entering Scotty's parents house in Arizona and Justin and Tommy simultaneously easing down the car seats is a nice visual with that background music. We rarely get such authentically outdoorsy shots (B&S is all about interiors), and I like the open air. It's refreshing. A weird thing about formulas: I noticed in "Desperate Housewives" that the formulas no longer work so well for me. The wink-wink music, the omnisciently narrated endings. "Brothers and Sisters", too, has become fixed into a formulaic rut, and shots in the wide open air, like Justin & Tommy, jar me to think that there could be more than those damned oppressive interiors & forced banter were given (trust me, I LOVE banter. But not when it's canned).

I'm really sorry. Couldn't get worked up about Kev & Scotty's wedding. Emily VanCamp looks irradiant though. She shimmers. She underplays so refreshingly and she reinvents that old-school glamour in a modern way. She can light up the small screen (this from a very gay man. too).

Sarah's "What if there's another 'R'?" (a quasi-camp line); Saul's "I'm gay" which reminded me of a comedian bombing on stage. (I sensed a THUD; who's RESPONSIBLE for this mechanical dialogue? You're quickly spending all that great goodwill you accumulated for Saul last week).

The last scene with Kevin & his dad is wonderfully evocative. At least it feels STEEPED in something. It should have had more going on in it as it was so beautifully composed. Matthew really is an astonishing actor. We get new facets each week (on marginal material! just think what he might do with a first-rate script).

Kevin's "Ryan/Rebecca" revelation to Sarah is followed by a nice bluesy ballad, strategically placed, to goose us up for the Justin/Rebecca kiss (which Emily made work). Again, I felt expansive only in this last moment due to the authentic outdoors and Emily & Dave's delicate, relaxed line deliveries.

I wanted to like this thing a whole lot more. "Moral Hazard" was better scripted. Line for line, the dialogue felt fresher, had personality, held capacity for wonder. Very little of the "Prior Commitments" script felt assembled by human hands. It a computer could create an episode, it might resemble this. Character reactions and dialogue did not go the way life goes. And there was no fizz (crackle) here.

Damn. I so wanted to end this review on a hopeful note.

[Kathleen]

For the life of me i cannot picture who Ryan is, am i missing something?

[JoAnne]

WOW!! WHAT A FINALE !

You guys are back on track.
I enjoyed every minute of it and I guess I forgive you for what you did to Rebecca...by next season all will be forgotten because it looks like there will be some really good and bad stuff happening.

going to be a long summer without my favorite show.

can't wait to see what everyone else has to say.

[ms_den]

So Uncle Saul "came out",does that mean that Michael Nouri will be back? Loove Michael Nouri!

[Judithal]

Best Finale of any show ever!!! I couldn't have asked for more and wouldn't have changed a thing. The actors did a marvelous job because they have the best writers on TV ever!. Looking forward to the next season if you can get it together before you drown in all that coffee you're drinking. How many bathrooms do you have on that floor? Just wondering....

[janet Jaszewski cole5412@msn.com]

I just loved your show, but it is now a GAY TV SERIES, I THINK YOU HAVE GONE TO FAR, we are christians, do you have to make everyone GAY ON THE SHOW AND SHOW IT EVERY WEEK, I think you have made a wonderful show very disgusting, its okay to have variety but you have gone too far and i think your sponsers should take an interest for what they are paying for for the general public and the general public does not want this in their face every week.DISGUSTING DISPLAY

[Erin]

I hate that your show got poor reviews. I absolutely love this show; I have been hooked since the very first episode--ever. It is so heartwarming to have a family that loves each other as much as the Walker family. Some shows annoy me when characters are faced with decisions and never pick a logical one--just one thats good for television. With Brothers and Sisters, everything makes sense. They seem like real people, with real problems, making real decisions. Keep up the good work-- don't go too hard on the Walkers ;)

God Bless-
Erin

[Norman]

I just have to say that last night's wedding episode was completely brilliant and beautifully written. As a gay man, I don't really ever expect to see a sweet honest storyline about a gay relationship on television, but you guys have delighted and surprised me (and I am sure a slew of other viewers) with the honestly and lovingly handled storyline of Kevin and Scotty culminating in last night's sparkling finale, truly the best hour of TV I have seen in a long, long time. Thank you so much!

[JACQUELINE]

I LOVE THIS SHOW!!!!!!

[Grant]

All in all, the finale was fantastic. Many scenes between characters that were absolutely perfect. That scene between Nora and Kevin, or Nora and Scotty, or Nora and Rebecca (Nora rocks, as you can tell) were incredible. As was Rebecca and Nora (now if only you could write all the scenes in this storyline as well, you'd be getting less backlash from it by now). And Scotty and Kevin, all episode, pre-post-and-during the ceremony were amazing. A lot of magic tonight and I thank you for that.

Yet two bizarre and wrong choices did taint all the great choices you guys made tonight. Not completely, but to an extent. Having Justin and Rebecca kiss so soon, even awkwardly, was just a bizarre choice. It's too soon. You know it's too soon. And ending your season on it? Knowing what the audience thinks about it? Knowing that the show is meant to be about family? Why? That was an awful choice when you had so many other choices that really hit the theme of family tonight to pick from. Left a bad taste.

And Ryan, well, if this turns out to be as amazing as Rebecca's introduction which we all invested in, I hope you stick with it this time, huh? :) I doubt you can top what you already did well and then ruined, but I'll wait to see. I'm not sure why we should invest in it knowing you've already done this and you're willing to go back on it, so I hope there's a DNA test right away so we can know this guy is legit, because we need to know that.

Thanks for overall a fantastic finale, and I truly hope for a better season next year. I don't know what happened this year, but c'mon guys, step it up, eh? You're better than this, you're better than retconning season one, forced scenes between Justin/Rebecca, repeating another Walker sibling, soap opera twists and altering the dynamics of the show. This is all daytime television stuff. You're better than this, so start acting like it. Please.

[JANE FROM N.J.]

I LOVE THIS SHOW & EVERY ACTOR DOES A GREAT & BELIEVABLE CHARACTER. I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE THE NEXT "OPENED BOX" NEXT SEASON. CAN'T WAIT TO SEE RYAN, THE NEWEST WALKER!!!
THANKS FOR THE WALKER DRAMA... JANE, NJ.

[Colleen]

J/R or Not!So!Much! — that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of dumbfounding plotlines,
Or to write on against a sea of sharks,
And by ficwriting slay them?
— To stop, to watch no more;
and by quitting to say we end
The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks
That fans are heir to, — 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To turn it off; —
To read, perchance to think.....

Dear PTB:

It's over. SOOO over.

There've been some great moments (Road Trip Sarah, Teaparty, Ranchero, and last night's wedding, to name a few). Please give Kevin and Scotty the spinoff they deserve, because I'd watch that. But I can't go on like this.

We obviously want such different things. You love soapsuds: bubble baths aggravate my eczema. Your favorite flavor is butterscotch: I'm all about the bittersweet with hot chilis. You love to talk Wicked: I want to hear the songs. (You couldn't borrow Kristen? Or Taye? Or get Randy? And that wacky incidental music: as my friend put it so well, is the musical equivalent of a laughtrack.) You need the thrill of surfing in shark-infested waters, while I wake up every day to "Lorenzo's Oil meets Groundhog Day." No shortage of drama there.

You've got lots of new friends, and you'll do just fine. And I'll find a guilty pleasure that suits me.

Take care,

Wild Irish Mama
*leaves the building, singing "Won't Get Fooled Again"*

[JM]

JANET, GET A LIFE!!! THIS IS THE REAL WORLD. IF YOU DON'T LIKE THE STORYLINE, WATCH SOMETHIG ELSE. SOME OF THE STORYLINE IS HARD TO SWALLOW, BUT THIS IS OUR WORLD NOW, IT'S CALLED A CHOICE.WATCH OR DON'T WATCH. I LOVE WHAT YOU HAVE DONE WITH JUSTIN AND REBECCA (SINCE SHE'S NOT A WALKER) THEY HAVE A GREAT CONNECTION ON SCREEN. PLEASE FIND SOMEONE THAT LOOKS ALOT LIKE JUSTIN TO PLAY NEWCOMER RYAN. IT WOULD BE EXCITING FOR RYAN TO LOOK LIKE AT LEAST ONE OF THE WALKERS. IT'S GREAT FOR UNCLE SAUL TO BE GAY, PLEASE NO ON SCREEN KISSING FOR UNCLE SAUL. I LOVE ALL OF YOUR WALKERS. THANKS WRITERS & PRODUCERS FOR A WONDERFUL SHOW. PLEASE COME BACK FOR MANY SEASONS AND ALL PRESENTS CHARACTERS, ROB LOWE FOR STARTERS!!!

[Rich]

I am not a huge fan of the show, (but my wife loves it), anyway I did appreciate the music choice of Ellen McIlwaine's Can't find My Way Home.... nice choice. Great Song!