series finale

[Will and Grace Fanatic]

How do you think I Love Lucy should have ended if they had done a proper series finale? I don't believe they really gave it an official series finale.

[James28]

As iconic a series as I Love Lucy was (being the first sitcom to be produced using the multi-camera setup and to feature an ensemble cast, the show that started the syndicated-rerun phenomenon, and placing in the Top-five of the Nielsen year-end ratings for its entire run), would anyone find it strange that it never had a proper series finale? I don't know what such an episode would have been like, because it's not like I Love Lucy had any multi-episode storylines that needed to be wrapped-up sooner or later or anything.

I am going to ask this: What if I Love Lucy became the first U.S. broadcast-network TV show to have produced a proper series finale episode instead of Leave It to Beaver or The Dick Van Dyke Show? I think this would have a huge "butterfly effect". Would this have meant more long-running TV series in the decades since then announcing their proper endings in advance instead of just being abruptly cancelled at the end of the season? Or at the very least, quietly wrap up every one of its ongoing storylines and still end with a regular episode, leaving no cliffhangers whatsoever? Also, would this have meant actual series finales (like those of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, M*A*S*H, Cheers, and Friends) not feeling as special?

Let's say the decision to end production on I Love Lucy came during January or February of 1957. A one-hour series finale is produced in April and airs in May, so in the end, there's 182 episodes (two more than it has in real life). That decision would mean that we don't get the Lucy-Desi Comedy Hours that aired throughout the next three years. Instead, Lucille Ball takes a five-year break from television and star in a couple of feature films and that Wildcat musical. I Love Lucy still becomes a major success in broadcast syndication to this day.

[stevea]

This could have been interesting: the Ricardos in what would appear to be an alternate universe.

Lucy asks, and Ricky immediately and without hesitation or argument decides to put Lucy in a show, and they collaborate and put on a great song and dance routine at Club Babalu. As a surprise Bob Hope is in the audience, and Ricky invites him up, and the three do a comedy routine.

Fred decides to buy Ethel new furniture for the guest house, and a mink coat.

Lucy tells Ricky she has balanced the couple's budget, and as a reward he decides to buy her another Don Loper original.

In the next-to-final scene Lucy's mother visits, Ricky welcomes her, she calls him Ricky, and announces she's taking care of Little Ricky while.... (Ricky takes it)

"I'm taking you on a two month vacation to Hawaii." The whole cast does a curtain call, and the final scene shows a plane taking off for Hawaii.

As was said there would be no one hour specials to follow. It might have meant the Lucy Show would begin a year or two earlier. That could have made the first season be totally different, because Gale Gordon would possibly have been available for it.

[James28]

Originally Posted by stevea

As was said there would be no one hour specials to follow. It might have meant the Lucy Show would begin a year or two earlier. That could have made the first season be totally different, because Gale Gordon would possibly have been available for it.

I don't know about shifting the entire runs of The Lucy Show and Here's Lucy by one or two years. And would it have been possible for Lucille Ball (or any actor) to be on the main cast of a broadcast sitcom and a Broadway musical at the same time? I don't think so, because scheduling conflicts will result.