So in that sense, yeah, it was a finale that robbed us anything tied to 95% of the rest of the season, but brought things back to the middle of Season 2, where Noah gets to correct his errors. Another clue to this is how he hauntedly recollects telling Alison about reading Peter Pan to his kids. Peter Pan is a fantasy, as is Noah's POV. Not the unreal horror that Noah lived through in Season 3, but an idyllic non-reality--wishful thinking.
In the first Alison POV in season one that Noah is not part of, she is at Gabriel's grave, and she is reading "Peter Pan" (which it seems she does when she visits the grave because she opens to a bookmarked chapter and it must have been his favorite book) on what would have been his birthday, and she is crying because she is still devestated by his loss.(And then has to go to this farce of a dinner with Cole and his awful family..and he has the nerve to be cold to her because she's late for lasagna). When she meets Noah in
his POV at night by the beach and they are walking, he asks her what her favorite book is and she says "Peter Pan" and he says he he reads it to his kids. That is what he was remembering. (It was not haunting to him, it was haunting for her. Peter Pan is about a boy that never grows up--Gabriel). At that moment he thought he was meeting this sexy young waitress. He had no idea she was married with a dead son and severely depressed and cutting herself, and he didn't find out about Gabriel until the Block Island episode.
If this was indeed going to be the finale to the series (I think she tweeted she was editing the final episode and that was before they were renewed) they probably filmed certain scenes that could have gone either way and edited them when they knew they had another season.
So to me, his being in the bookstore and seeing Peter Pan (and hearing Alison's voice-over) was him thinking about her, and the first time they spoke after meeting at the Lobster Roll (and also a call back to her loss of Gabriel). If there was no season 4, we know that he thought of her, the book reminded him of her (and her loss) and knowing that even in Paris, with his new squeeze Juliette, part of her was still with him. That was their way of having Alison in the finale.
Remember, this episode could have been THE END. She was not ending it with Noah's "wishful thinking" and a fantasy.
I can't wait to see how they tap dance out of this horrendous season. Almost every review I read was scathing as were the comments. Maybe 2 reviewers and 10 people (and that includes those of you at IMDB) liked it. It was despised.
Remember us, for we too have lived, loved and laughed
reply
share
catbookss
8 years ago
In the first Alison POV in season one that Noah is not part of, she is at Gabriel's grave, and she is reading "Peter Pan" (which it seems she does when she visits the grave because she opens to a bookmarked chapter and it must have been his favorite book) on what would have been his birthday, and she is crying because she is still devestated by his loss.(And then has to go to this farce of a dinner with Cole and his awful family..and he has the nerve to be cold to her because she's late for lasagna). When she meets Noah in his POV at night by the beach and they are walking, he asks her what her favorite book is and she says "Peter Pan" and he says he he reads it to his kids. That is what he was remembering.
Yes. There was nothing about Alison reading Peter Pan to his kids, only to Gabriel. Seeing the copy of Peter Pan in the Paris bookstore, reminded Noah of Alison. That's all.
I agree the dinner the night of Gabriel's would-have-been birthday was awful. I was surprised they, and especially Cole, were as insensitive as they were. It was only a year or two afterwards, but okay, whatever.
If this was indeed going to be the finale to the series (I think she tweeted she was editing the final episode and that was before they were renewed) they probably filmed certain scenes that could have gone either way and edited them when they knew they had another season.
I guess I can see it if they thought it was the show's finale and had short notice, but even still, the finale sucked. It didn't work as a show finale, or a season's, and I'm someone who
liked this season, with the exception of the first episode, and, FAR worse, the finale.
reply
share
Smelling-Salt
8 years ago
Just so we're clearly, I am proceeding on the theory that what we're shown here, especially in Noah's POV, is his idealized arrival at this place of peace and resolution to most of the "loose" ends in his life.
I see him recalling the Peter Pan discussion with Alison as reality haunting him in this idyllic vision. It's like a bell ringing with a tone of familiarity. Noah's face turned so serious for brief second there. There was an Alison, there was all the tragedy and pain and loss that he discovered in her and that had unfolded in him. This was a kind of piercing of the veil by reality into Noah's happy little story.
This is my theory, and perhaps my effort in vain to salvage some poetic virtue in this sad, weak, otherwise incoherent mess of a season finale.
I found some parallel in Etienne's awakening and in Juliette's and Sabine's momentary hope and excitement that he had returned from the abyss of his advanced dementia. How short lived that was.
Is Noah's "recovery" his happy story also something that is to be so heart-wrenchingly short lived?
reply
share