Finally watched it. It has been so long since I saw it in 1988 when I was five. Was it just me or did it recycled from both "Rough Housing" and "The New Girl" quite a bit? Sure, it was easy to spot all those recognizable people like Seth Green, Juliette Lewis, among others...but were those bits almost verbatim in a way? They made Blair a Mrs. Garrett clone when it was so un-Blair like of her to do: Buy Eastland and become house mother. It didn't make a bit of sense at the end of the finale either. It really was trying to make the kids like the 1st Season kids, notice they almost use the exact same set like in the 1st Season? Identical. Mr. Mitchell is a Bradley clone...except much more dislikable and full of BS than Bradley. Am I the only that noticed this at all?

No, i noticed it. I also recently watched this episode because it had also been a long time (not as long as you, because i last saw it on nick at nite). However, i remembered not being a huge fan of this episode when i first saw it and i still agree with myself. It was very similar with them trying to get a new show going, but nobody wanted to see that... especially blair of all people! i liked where she was going with the law school. I think she could have made a go for herself in that profession. The show just didn't seem worth while anymore by this point, and you could tell they were trying to scrounge up anything they could!

Totally agree with you guys, I personally think the writers were desperate by this point to get something else going.

this actually was a good episode but it should not have been the series finale.if it was going to be the series finale they should have had the cast in more scenes.not just 5 minutes at the beginning of part 1 and 5 minutes at the end of part 2.they could have had jo tootie and natalie visit eastland helping blair set things up and have beverlyann decide to have andy become a student at eastland since blair was now in charge.if they couldnt do that then they should have at least had one more episode with the girls moving out of the house.it just felt like the casts scenes were so rushed for the final episode of the show.

You'll notice that Andy disappears and is never mentioned again at all.

I'm with you . . . never cared for the finale at all. Actually, I thought it was one of the worst finales of all time. There was just nothing at all going on in this episode that we'd see in a normal episode, which I didn't like. Every character was going off in a different direction, yet the series was over, so we never got to see anymore about it.

Yea, i think that Mrs. G should have somehow came back and they should have had a final conclusion of everything. Becuase Jo was already married, Tootie was engaged, and Blair obviously had another following in life, that should have been the 2nd to last episode. Beverly Ann could have had another calling that she needed to leave, and the girls were planning to move out so have mrs. g come back to sell the place (or something) i dunno... it was all left to guess, Jo was a married woman and should have been out of there anyways... there's practically no mention of the shop with the last half a season and it's obvious the girls wanted to venture their seperate ways, oh well.... we can't go back in the past to fix the mistake now, all we can do is gripe about it and pretend a good ending actually took place ;)

I wish thye would've done a series finale sending everyone off on their way instead of hoping the Blair spinoff would take off and hopefully get guest appearences.

I think a better finale might've had something to do with Mrs. G coming back with husband and she and Beverly Ann agree to sell the house. Then maybe Tootie ends up with a part on a major Broadway play, and maybe a newspaper or magazine loved an essay Natalie wrote and hired her on or something. Something that could've sent the show off with class and style and given all of the characters a respectable amount of time instead of being 95% Blair

If there was one "jump-the-shark" episode of The Facts Of Life, let's be glad it was in the two-part finale. I just didn't get the whole point behind such braindead ragamuffins in that episode. I remember one of them talked like a burnout teen, none of the kids in that episode were all cute, perky, and feisty
like in the first season. Boys in a co-ed Eastland: nice try, but.... And Blair as headmistress. Well, no one ever saw that coming before in previous episodes. It was like she dropped everything just to save Eastland (and prove that she had a heart of gold after all), no law school, no Casey in the picture, etc. Of course this was all part of a spinoff of Facts and was intended to give Lisa something to do (until she got settled into married, domestic life), but it did not look at all promising. It did not show a natural growth and maturity (at least in the time span suggested) of Blair to go from being college student with new responsibilities into that of being a headmistress, something more suited for someone more than twice her age and with more experience. She didn't go to college to learn anything about teaching, but got all her life lessons from Mrs. Garrett. Being a student of Eastland for all those years wouldn't necessarily equip her for the task of running Eastland.

At least it suggested that Blair actually made something noble of herself and used her wealth to save an important institution, a total turnaround from her spoiled, arrogant youth.

good assessment Ablarican. While I do think it was good that Blair got one big sendoff episode, I think maybe it should've been the penultimate episode instead of the absolute final episode (or two part finale). She could've bought Eastland, and then had one last episode where Mrs. G returns and the girls all go their separate ways. It sucks that the season 4 and 8 finales work better as "series finales" than the actual finale

It's also interesting that nothing about the final episodes were ever tied in to the Reunion movie. (Of course, the Reunion movie also could have used some improvement. I noticed that there was no major subplot involving Blair, just like 'The Facts Of Life Goes To Paris' saw her pretty much inactive, just dilly-dallying around the Parisian scene. Why was that? You'd think if anyone had some exciting stuff coming her way, it would be Blair.)

Probably it is due to the Jo popularity back then. I love the locations in the Facts of Life Goes To Paris...it's very scenic and beautiful. I want to go there sometime.

Probably I was five and I didn't understand the whole plot in the finale, but seeing it now made say that I didn't enjoy that idea at all. Was it just me or were the jokes much more sexual this time around? Sure, the early Facts of Life jokes were at other times based on sexual situation jokes, but in that finale it was done in such bad taste.

Well not much left for me to say :lol: you all took the words right out of my mouth

Probably it is due to the Jo popularity back then. I love the locations in the Facts of Life Goes To Paris...it's very scenic and beautiful. I want to go there sometime.

Probably I was five and I didn't understand the whole plot in the finale, but seeing it now made say that I didn't enjoy that idea at all. Was it just me or were the jokes much more sexual this time around? Sure, the early Facts of Life jokes were at other times based on sexual situation jokes, but in that finale it was done in such bad taste.Yeah, there was this one girl stuffing her bra who said, "Do I over-boob?" And I thought, what in the world?? :confused: I know that tons of teens have self-esteem issues and feel inadequate, but this just felt tacky. I guess they were going for the more "teen realism" concept back twenty years ago, the whole Guns N' Roses trashed youth kinda
deal. The one thing that was so much better about the first season was that the whole sexual undertones were tongue in cheek, like a really naughty late night "girls gone bad at private school" B-movie thing that was popular in the late 70's, with just the right splash of teen humor and realness that didn't go overboard. Case in point: Remember Nancy in the first season writhing on the floor trying to fit into her jeans? Loved that part. :eyes: Nice and suggestive as well as not too far from real scenes in teens' lives.

Case in point: Remember Nancy in the first season writhing on the floor trying to fit into her jeans? Loved that part. :eyes: Nice and suggestive as well as not too far from real scenes in teens' lives.

Aint it the truth, I've done that plenty of times.

You guys are right: i thought the same in this last 2 episodes when they chose BLAIR to be the new headmaster, that she kind of took the MRS. G role & i thought it was very sweet! (it showed how much she had grown + learned from her surrogate mother). But remember she didn t have any other choice cos the old headmaster was quitting lol! I thought she did a very good job, helped the new girl & acted with intelligence, tact.....
PS: it is true though they made BLAIR look like an "airhead" in the FACTS OF LIFE REUNION & that made me really angry!
On THE FACTS OF LIFE GOES TO PARIS they gave JO more major roles but BLAIR was also quite active (remember she kept bumping into "sleazy guys)
The 5 of them had major roles in that movie i d say which is why i liked it a lot more than THE REUNION 1.:rolleyes:

I have to do some research on the final season of FOL. Jo got married? Tootie engaged? I dont mean to sound naive but I barely remember the last couple of seasons of FOL because I havent seen it in such a long time. I do remember something with Blair and Eastland. She probably bought because she actually enjoyed Eastland. You saw that she went from this stuck up person to a person that actually liked Eastland and actually like Jo, Natalie and Tootie.

I would have liked to see Jo and Blair as co-headmistresses, but I guess even if the pilot had been picked up, the focus would have been on the young girls again. A magic like the four FOL girls and Mrs. G just does not happen all the time.

And IMO, Blair was Blair. Bumbling, good-natured, eager to learn, smart and just a tad self-centered. She was never meant to be a second Mrs. G.

If the spin-off was ever to have a chance, the producers should have retained the characters and their personalities. And kidnapped Nancy, forcing her to remain.

Lastly, what is it with the over-use of parents divorcing? Whenever's something wrong with a girl, it's usually that at Eastland. Blair, Molly, and now that girl in season 9 (I think that was Mayim Bailik, who plays Amy Farrah Fowler, from the big bang theory). I mean, I know this is a big and serious issue, but in a pilot, shouldn't you do something outstanding, completely different? The FOL pilot had a lot of girls, which was different from The Different strokes setup. The first FOL episode had a girl feeling uncomfortable because of her lack of feelings for boys. The first episode for Jo introduced a completed different element into the group--all these were 'firsts', and they mattered in making the show go on. In the season finale, I don't think the producers really tried.

Then finale looked life a recycled rehash of past plots. The headmaster looked like a Mr. Bradley clone with his constant condescending remarks, the Chug-A-Lug redo, the divorce affecting a student, the bra jokes (ala Tootie in Season 1). Plus Blair clearly looked overmatched and was such an air head in Season 9.

Then finale looked life a recycled rehash of past plots. The headmaster looked like a Mr. Bradley clone with his constant condescending remarks, the Chug-A-Lug redo, the divorce affecting a student, the bra jokes (ala Tootie in Season 1). Plus Blair clearly looked overmatched and was such an air head in Season 9.


I need to watch season 9 again, but the BLAIR from MRS G's era was never an 'air head': she had learned so much from MRS G!

I believe the writers did turn BLAIR into a POD during the later seasons though (especially 7) and it is a shame to see, that everything she had learned from MRS G just went to waste!!!!:eek::eek::eek:

I don't know why they kept doing that to the BLAIR character and not the others: it's like the writers hated her or what???

I liked to believe that BLAIR would have made a great headmaster though, and from the episode i remember watching 'The beginning of the end' (or something similar) she helped a new girl fit into 'Eastland' and wasn't doing a bad job at all if i recall?;)

Anyway, i'll have to watch it again when i'm done with my rerun (i'm on season 4 just now)

:so:so:so