This Is Us boss breaks down show's finale and opens up about spin-off chances
This Is Us spoilers ahead.
The series finale of This Is Us aired across the pond yesterday (May 24), bringing six seasons of time-shifting family drama to an emotional climax.
Half of the episode took us back to a pretty non-consequential day in the early '90s, with Rebecca and Kate Pearson lapping up the delights of a lazy Saturday while brothers Kevin and Randall were taught how to shave by their dad Jack.
In the present day, the 'Big Three' attended their late mother's funeral before pondering what the future holds – with Randall looking destined for the White House presidency.
The action then took us outside of time and space itself, continuing Rebecca and Jack's reunion in the afterlife previously teased in penultimate episode 'The Train'.
But just before the screen cut to black forever, This Is Us concluded with a young Randall sitting on the couch with his dad, soaking up the Pearson clan's laughter.
"We wanted to make this show about the continuation of life and not the end of life — and kind of hug the audience a little bit and try and capture something that's more about family and the simplicity of family," creator Dan Fogelman told Entertainment Weekly.
"And the underlying message of the entire enterprise here, which is that people die, but they don't leave the painting. And I think [we] did that here...
"It's not just ending with a death; it's ending with that person carrying things forward. That OG Pearson couple is being carried forward into the future generations of their family. That was the ending I wanted to leave people feeling."
On the simplicity of the finale, he went on to note: "So much of the narrative about this show has been about these big, surprising twists and the deaths of major beloved characters.
"But at the end of the day, what I think really drew people to the show was just the simplicity of family stories and remembering your childhood fondly from your adulthood.
"I thought: How confident, how cool and how important it would be to just end on a day with these kids, at an age you haven't seen in a while, that was just a simple regular day in the life?"
Not for the first time, Fogelman (also a producer on Only Murders in the Building) addressed the prospect of some form of spin-off, be it a series or feature.
"So much of the show is borne out of my experiences and what's inside of me and my familial experiences, both as a member of a family now and as one when I was a child – as well as the experiences of my writers – but I do feel like I may be tapped out for a while... My well may be drained of family stories," he said.
"So I don't think a spin-off is happening anytime soon. I don't really understand what a movie would be, but you never know."
This Is Us aired on NBC in the US, and Amazon Prime Video and Disney+ in the UK.
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