Fin

And so it ends.

The final scene finds three friends talking to each other, ecstatic about a dream coming true, and bathed in the happy glow of love – both romantic and innocent, with the tiniest tinge of bittersweet.

That’s Dawson’s Creek for you. I remember the time I watched the finale on primetime tv. I hadn’t realized that it was actually the last episode; I had been spending the previous months ignoring the show because I thought it was going nowhere.

Watching entire series again on DVD, I knew I was right. The show didn’t seem to be going anywhere in its final season. The love triangle was still there, but wrung dry after almost six years. Some characters had stagnated, particularly Dawson. Kevin Williamson must have been tearing his hair out at how Dawson was progressively deteriorating. I mean the show was semi-autobiographical, after all. If he had stayed on instead of leaving after Season 2, would that have made any difference? Or is Kevin simply as boring as Dawson? Ah well, as Pacey always said, the issue is moot.

And Eddie…what a cardboard cutout. Bland to the point of puking.

The last two seasons really made no sense in terms of character and story development, except maybe for the sporadic sparks between Pacey and Joey - too few and far between to really keep us riveted for more than two episodes at a time - and Michelle Williams’ noteworthy performance. I like that girl. The rest was just fluff, fillers for the finale, which would have been more beautiful if the show actually ran until the year when the ending was set. I guess the producers had to settle for a fast forward, due mainly to the plummeting ratings. Too bad. DC could have done a “Friends” and lasted a decade. Friends had that sustainability factor that not a lot of shows have. I guess because they also dealt with stories that did not completely revolve around the characters or one single running theme all the time? They just went the flow, kind of the same way Seinfeld (the ultimate “sitcom about nothing”) did.

This was difficult to do with DC. DC was originally very focused; expansion meant veering away from the essence of the show: the coming of age of a boy and a girl sharing a bed in a small town, and the best friend who burst their bubble. Making it more complicated than it already would spell disaster, if done improperly. And that’s exactly what happened in Seasons 5 and 6. Too many new senseless subplots and secondary characters that had no real impact on the main cast. Audrey would have been enough, but no, they had to throw in Charlie and Eddie and CJ and other forgettables who ended up sleeping with half the cast. And yeah, their “it’s a small world after all” bit was getting too bizarre. Boston is way too big for 10 people to be playing sexual musical chairs all the time. Get a life, people.

It was so inconsistent, too. One episode it was Eddie, the next it was Pacey, the next it was Eddie again. Where was the protracted tension that made us fall in love, where was the sincerity? And why was Pacey making out with a chick barely three months after his devastating split with Joey? After two years of “True Love”, how can the writers tease us with anything less? Everyone was so out of character, it was as if the show had a mass layoff and the old writers were replaced by overexcited interns.

On the other hand, not deviating meant that DC would be trapped in its own story. So I guess they were just trying to evolve. But the attempts to add more layers to that story proved hugely unsuccessful, largely because the writers seemed to get lost and forget what they were writing about in the first place.

The only way out was to search through all the muck that had piled up, and go back to the heart of it all, the very reason Kevin Williamson created the show. It had to take Kevin himself to do that, too. Glad he went back to write the final two episodes.

That said, I love Dawson's Creek, flaws and all. I'm happy for all of them (sure, even Dawson). When I finally turned off my DVD player at 3am the other night, I was still crying. The following day I felt an unexpected void. Like something had been snatched away so suddenly. All over again I had that "it's finally ended, what now?" feeling. Even though I knew the end was coming and what exactly happened - down to the last spoken words - there I was the morning after, feeling somewhat lost, but also relieved. Glad it was over, but wanting it to continue. The answer was there, but so were questions. Wondering, but ultimately at peace.

But I guess that’s what stories do. No matter how many times you see, read or hear them, the experience never fully wears out. It takes you somewhere, every time. It brings you something new every time. An added meaning, a new realization, another snippet of life relived in memory.

That feeling stays, sometimes filling you up, other times receding to the subconscious. But it’s always there.

And thanks to bootleg DVDs, it can always be revisited. ;)

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Speaking of Michelle Williams...may Heath Ledger rest in peace. So sad. :( Parang kelan lang yung 10 Things...hay.