Six Feet Under Over

R.I.P. "Six Feet Under"! Last night's premiere of the season finale was heart-rending and stunning. As today's review in the Los Angeles Times agrees, the final sequence which featured the incredible song "Breathe Me" by Sia (Furler, of Zero 7's Destiny fame) was the highlight of the episode, and the fifth and final season.

The one thing that people always want to know when they fall in love with characters and the medium that the characters reside in ends is "what happens next?" Triple hyphenate (writer, director and creator) Alan Ball answered all these questions in flash-forward by showing us glimpses of exactly when and how each of the major characters died (sequentially: Ruth, then Keith, David, Federico, Brenda and finally, Claire at the ripe old age of 102 in 2085). As Sia's chords and haunting voice envelop the viewer one is able to piece together the arc of each of the main characters lives. David and Keith stay together, get married, their kids follow in the mortuary business and Keith dies in a shooting at an armed car robbery. Brenda and Billy are together at the end of their lives just as they were in the beginning of their lives. Claire (looking fabulous with straight strawberry blonde hair) re-unites with her cute but conservative Republican lawyer who loved her at Ruth's funeral and marries him, but dies alone in her bed, rheumy-eyed and remembering at the ripe old age of 102 in 2085!

It was sad and poignant and exciting--a fitting end to the best drama on television for 63 episodes from 2001 to 2005.