I for one loved the final season of tmmm. It’s getting a lot of hate for not doing this or that or just not being 100% a happy ending (how dare it be bitter sweet??? She’s?? Isolated from her loved ones because of the inevitable cost of her ambition and fame??? ImPoSsiBle!!).

When we first started with the flash forwards of Midge’s children and we saw how estranged they were, I admit I wasn’t too pleased, but as the season was coming out I was also doing a rewatch, and the more of the old seasons I watched, the more s5 made sense. This is where we’ve always been headed. Every big turn in the series has always presented Midge with the question “will you choose your domestic life or your career?” and she chose her career. Every. Time. Over men, over family, over her children. Even when she was presented with Benjamin, ostensibly an opportunity to try and make it work with a man who actively supported her career, she walked away from him because she knew that he would never matter to her as much as being on stage would. To be honest, I think the flash forwards were nearly kind. They started out rough in the first half of the season with the estrangement, the several failed marriages, and the implication of a falling out with Susie, but eventually they balanced out. She fought with Susie, but they eventually found their way back to each other. She was distant from her family, but she still loved them and used her money to support her mother’s dream. She got everything she wanted because she made a choice and she took it as far as she could.

As far back as s2e7 (and honestly even before that), this message has been explicit in the show with that painter showing Midge his master piece and explaining how it ruined his life because he put everything he had into that. The epilogue is showing us Midge’s version of that, and tbh, it still pulls its punches, because she still manages to have meaningful (if distant) relationships with Susie, her family, and Joel whereas the painter’s story was somehow even more depressing.

Was s5 perfect? Of course not. Some of the scenes didn’t land for me, and there are things I wish they would’ve done differently, but when it comes down to it, this was a pretty good conclusion. It showed how the characters grew, and how they were still exactly who they always were. It gave every character an ending that made sense for them (even when some of them made me sad) and honestly, Midge’s four minute set on the Gordon Ford show (which could not possibly have been just four minutes) could not more blatantly have been a thesis statement that the show never once veered away from. Everything was building to this conclusion, and I for one found it satisfying in the way that a well crafted story/conclusion is always satisfying, even if it’s a conclusion that makes people uncomfortable.