It feels like old news, talking about
ER's series finale. After all, the series wrapped in April 2009, fading to black after panning out to that last shot of County General Hospital. Tuesday (7/12), though, marks the DVD release of the show's fifteenth and final season to DVD.
I criticized the show's fourteenth season DVD setbecause by then, the show seemed to be running on fumes. There were some intriguing cases, but the show was showing signs of age. If it hadn't been for the Writers' Guild strike, season fourteen would have been the end of the show, but the season was shortened and they decided to give the show one more year to end. And season fourteen wore the stretch marks.
That's not to say that season fifteen doesn't have its own share of yawn-worthy filler. What separates it from its predecessor, though, is its obvious sense of finality. You know when George Clooney shows up on the show for the first time in ten years that the show's preparing for its swan song. These appearances, though, which include returning stars Alex Kingston (
Doctor Who), Noah Wyle (
Falling Skies), and Julianna Margulies (
The Good Wife), are spread throughout the season as part of a long goodbye. Season 15 feels like one big series finale, really.
Of course, it'll all be pretty meaningless to people who haven't seen previous seasons of the series. There are plenty of references and callbacks to past cast members or storylines from the show's lengthy run. The bonus feature "Previously on ER: A Retrospective" helps, but without having seen earlier seasons, a lot of the emotional impact that the season hopes to create is dampened.
In the end, the only people who will buy this season are people who already own previous seasons of the series. But, for a show that ran fifteen years, you'd expect that it deserves that kind of loyalty, even two years late.
Order ER: Season 15 (The Final Season) on Amazon. 
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