The series finale of Men in Trees aired on ABC last night. Of course, the proper response to that statement is, "What, was that show still on?" But if you're one of the loyal viewers who followed Anne Heche and her Alaskan friends' snowbound love troubles through six different time slots and two sometimes broken-up seasons, you probably found the episode to be a fitting, if not entirely satisfying, conclusion.
As many have pointed out, the show was very much like a combination of Northern Exposure (with a New York fish out of water in the Alaskan wilderness) and Sex and the City (creator Jenny Bicks' previous project, which also featured a relationship writer pondering questions about love and gender roles). And last night's episode brought out one of the show's most frequent themes: how money and power issues can cause problems between manly men and equally strong women. Luckily, most of those problems were solved, for the time being anyway, by people simply calming down and talking things out. Verbal Marin and taciturn Jack, sophisticated Jane and down-to-earth Sam, and even former prostitute Sarah and celibate minister Eric all seemed to settle their differences -- and, as far as any of us will ever know, will remain happy couples forever.
That leaves us with poor, doomed Patrick and Annie. A sweet (okay, maybe too sweet) young couple so happily enmeshed that they even created a new last name for themselves, they recently fell victim to a plot line that was pure soap opera: On their wedding day, Patrick was hit by lightning and contracted amnesia. Not only did he forget Annie and everyone he knew, he forgot his own personality, and became something of a loutish jerk. Then, by the time he recovered his memory and his sense of himself, Annie had begun discovering the charms of a macho local hockey player. The last two episodes prominently featured a heartbroken Patrick getting rejected over and over by his former fiancee. Not only was this turn of events sad, but it seemed a lot less real than was the norm for this show.
Of course, it seems likely that another season of Men in Trees would have brought Patrick and Annie back together, just as it would have created new troubles for the happier couples. That's the way series TV works: People get together, then they break up, then they get together again, until the show eventually ends. All we can hope for now is more good roles for the excellent cast -- especially the underrated Heche, who was terrific as the warmly assertive but self-questioning relationship coach.
Still, Heche is taking one thing away with her. . . as nearly everyone knows by now, she and costar James Tupper fell in love while playing girlfriend and boyfriend, and left their respective spouses for each other. Just a couple of days ago, a court ordered her to pay a hefty settlement to her ex-husband, despite her claim that the cancellation of Men in Trees will sharply curtail her income. So maybe the show was right all along -- in the end, it all really does come down to money and power.
Photo: ABC
