You had to wonder how they were going to end it. The series was getting a final season of only six episodes, the books are way ahead of where the series is…so what are they going to do? They picked an interesting way of handling it.But we’ll get to that.

From the first moment I sat down to watch The Expanse I was aware that the creators had managed something special. The show was airtight in its continuity even though the plot was complex. The story, pacing, acting, production value, effects and direction were all being done by people who were not only the best, but the best at working together. There was nothing janky or unpolished, nothing corny or poorly executed. You could just submerge yourself in it and be carried away by the current without worrying for even a moment that some aspect of it was going to be unexpectedly bad. I knew I could trust this show. I could watch it without clenching my teeth, waiting for some clunky, kludgy, poorly thought out plot point or a forced motivation that didn’t make sense. I knew there wouldn’t be any hand waving of the show’s internal logic or plot holes. Someone did the difficult work of making sure that everything was not only done at the highest professional level, and well integrated, but that it made flawless sense overall.

So after six seasons they had the difficult job of sticking the landing. Was it a perfect 10 of an ending? Kind of. There’s a lot of good space battles. There’s a lot of good acting, a lot of good everything. 

Plot structure spoilers ahead. I will not reveal specific details, but I will discuss generalities.

I had one problem with the ending. In order to set up a workable finale you have to lay the groundwork in advance, which they did. But in order for the set-piece ending to take place, a number of anticlimactic things had to happen, which frustrated some of the dramatic tension. And the set-piece itself comes about in a less than climactic way. Someone more or less just…suggests the solution, and then, albeit with tremendous emotional difficulty, they just do it. It involves a bitter personal sacrifice for one member of the team, and this is handled very well. So they do have to pay a price for it, and that makes the ending work. I just think it could have worked better. Having read a summary of what happens in the books that inspire the show, this is true to the source material. 

As for the rest of the season I can’t complain. Everything was built up in the service of the final episode and all of those episodes were done with the usual excruciating cleanliness and attention to detail. No notes, as the expression goes, well done. 

But I mentioned earlier that they picked an interesting way of wrapping up the series. What did I mean? They didn’t try to conclude all of the story lines that were going on. The series ends with a clear admission of the fact that a lot of things didn’t get neatly tied up, that these characters still have a lot to do, and this is only where the TV series is ending. I’ve never seen a series end quite that way before. It worked pretty well, and I salute The Expanse creators for thinking of it. I will miss this show rather badly. It’s a benchmark example of how this sort of thing is correctly done. I just hope we get something else like it soon, because it was a hell of a good place to get lost in.