“Many Months Have Passed Us By” (“Finale” Recap)

There's not a lot more I could have asked for from last night's final two episodes.

While it wasn't nearly as sad for me as some of the things that happened (and still might) in my own life, I had plenty of opportunities to cry (and not all involving Alex).  But there were still some laughs as well.

It actually got off to a rocky start – based off Phil and Claire's comments inside the RV, I thought they were going to blame all of the chaos on Alex, because she quit her job at Helo, left her fancy apartment and moved back home again (maybe they should have blamed Arvin?).  I won't say that I was happy when it became more of an “it's all the kids' fault” story, but at least Alex wasn't alone.

Alex did agree with my sentiment about who should leave - if just Haley and Dylan and the twins were leaving there would only be half as many people living in the Dunphy house.

One other thing that started bothering me several hours after I watched this – I didn't really buy that Alex suddenly returning home would lead to the house becoming a complete mess.  Did they really go down that road again where Alex returning seemingly turned a good family bad (i.e. like in “The Long Honeymoon”)?  I was not happy about that development either.

I was happy though that they gave Alex and Arvin some time to develop/finish their story.  At first, I feared that the real reason that he wanted that meeting with Alex was either 1) the project was being canceled or 2) he wasn't going to hire Alex after all.  But, instead, Alex gets to work in another cold foreign land: Switzerland.  At least that won't be nearly as cold as Antarctica, and I'm guessing the food will be better¹.

And then, after a few back and forths about whether or not they'd become romantically involved (including Arvin being hesitant for, among other reasons, their age difference, a point I wondered about two seasons ago) they decide to send each other an “we are an item already – don't fire us for this” text.  In one sense I'm surprised Alex suggested this, given how that's where the trouble with Bill (remember him?) started.  Which finally led to a selfie kiss which turned really funnily awkward - hopefully the next several hundred won't be so, especially hopefully the most important one (the one that would come after “you may now kiss the bride”).

So Alex did get one somewhat happy ending (although I did keep fearing as the night went on they\d pull the rug out from under her at the last minute).   Too bad we won't get to see where that goes.

Which brings us to the second half, and the story of her saying goodbye to Haley and Luke.

In the beginning it was nice to see Alex and Haley just simply talking, without getting on each others nerves.  As the story was going on and they brought in Luke to help them re-do that video they did as kids (I think that disc they pre-broke wasn't really the actual video – their original plan was to get in one last messing around with Luke moment), it felt like it was just going to be a simple funny story to pass some time before the final big family farewell.  Not that there would have been anything wrong with that, but...


... I loved that they changed direction at the end, and turned it into what I thought was the most emotional moment in a night with tons of them.  Seeing them suddenly realize after playing around for a while that they really would miss each other and that hug really emptied my tear ducts.

The only small thing I wish had happened was hoping they would have kept the video running a little longer to capture that final moment for their parents.

I think  that scene where Phil and Claire were in the empty bedroom and Alex came in asking them to help her figure out how big her apartment was going to be (by converting meters to feet) was part of an attempt to show how even as everything changes over the years, the more they stayed the same.   I didn't think it worked that well for Alex nearly as much as it did for her siblings² - their moments were a better match for when the series began, but for Alex not to know a fairly simple measurement conversion seemed more like something that would have happened years before we ever saw her.

And finally I do wish we had seen Alex leaving for Switzerland.  Oh, well.

It's time for the final “Alex's Line Of The Night”. Since this was a two-part episode (although surprisingly on iTunes it's one combined episode), I decided to select one line from each part. One of them is (mostly) funny, the other...

Alex's Line Of The Night (Part 1): (answering Haley's question about how Alex couldn't see she was a babe)  ”Well, you did call me a frumpy nerd for 20 years.”
 
I know I just praised the fact that were getting along without sniping when their part 2 story started, but that line was funny (with a slight tinge of sadness).  And in its own way it showed how Haley has treated her better in the last few seasons.

Alex's Line Of The Night (Part 2): (to Luke as he was leaving after filming the Woofie video)  ”Stay.”
 
Just like I did with “The Closet Case” (Alex crying “I am alone”), for the last one of these I'm going with a simple line that totally tugged at the heart strings.

And with that, the blinds on the window into a remarkable young lady's life have been closed.  Hopefully what we don't see from here on will be wonderful for Alex nonetheless.

At some point (maybe Sunday, maybe middle of next week), I'll wrap things up here too.
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¹ I did try Swiss cheese once when I was a kid. I did not care for it.  But I've always been a very fussy eater.

² Haley was talking on her cell phone with Dylan, and Luke got his head stuck in something – not the banister this time but a bicycle lock.