Pixie Styx

Just now catching up, but I thought the episode did pretty well as a series finale. It didn't tie everything up in a bow, but it gave us some sense of where things are headed -- about as much as real life can: Ava gained the courage to tell someone she loved them and the confidence and security in her identity not to have to hear it back. Luke is now aware of both the good and bad he's inherited from his father and the risk of repeating the cycle. Jim and Jackie know that they need to prepare for Jackie's further decline; Jim is ready to step up and is willing to get support from Paul and Ally. Leah is happy with her life -- she may be open to a partner again but doesn't need one. Paul and Ally may or may not eventually stay together, but they end the series where it began -- in bed, debating about who is going to get up and care for a child who won't sleep. But this time, for the next generation, they decide to get up together.

Same here. I assumed the snow globe was a reference to the finale of St. Elsewhere, which famously suggested the entire show was a product of Tommy Westphall's imagination. Indeed, I'd venture to say, based on that and the Wizard of Oz references, that the entire show was a dream. Ted hasn't been away for three years -- he gets out of the car with one suitcase and is returning home after a shorter trip, still married to Michelle. (If you need in-show theories, he went to interview for the Richmond job but turned it down.) Having experienced in his dream what it would be like to let things go and deal with his demons, he'll use that in his life in Kansas going forward.

The "but what if the photo is?" banter was so corny, I honestly thought it was an homage to the locker room scene in Amy Schumer's "Football Town Nights" parody.

A lot of current TV writing seems to be like this, allowing viewers to hash it out on social media. Compare, for instance, the current reboot of Law & Order with the older episodes. This resonates with me. I tend to enjoy puzzles/mysteries that are character-driven -- where the reveal is something about the characters we didn't know -- more than puzzles/mysteries that seem to exist as an overlay on top of the characters, which sometimes seem to exist primarily to spur discussion on social media. Season 1 felt more like the former to me, and Season 2 felt more like the latter.

And there's nothing to prevent the timeline of Season 3 from taking place before Season 1. (I really hope we don't see Tanya again, though.)