Curbed with Enthusiasm

This is where I get to do my victory lap.  While I’m sure that I wasn’t alone in my prediction, that’s no reason to not celebrate.
 
As I wrote a couple months ago here, after the final season premiere of Curb Your Enthusiasm, that I suspected the show was heading “towards ending the same way that Seinfeld did – in a courtroom, with the star on trial for flaunting local laws.”  (In this case, it's for when Larry unwittingly gave a bottle of water to someone he knew standing in line to vote in Georgia.)
 
The finale has now aired, and – this is exactly what the show did.  Larry David, being Larry David, decided to double-down on the criticism of the Seinfeld finale, and pretty much did the exact same thing.  But…he did it wonderfully, filled with nods to the Seinfeld episode, and some tweaks to address things that didn’t work ideally before, and I thought it was hilarious.
 
Once again, the trial brought in characters who had appeared earlier in the series, who Larry had been egregiously selfish and obnoxious to, including a follow-up appearance from the week before by Bruce Springsteen who Larry had given COVID to, forcing him to cancel the final concert of his Farewell Tour. (Larry insisted that Bruce gave him COVID…)  However, there was one exception:  a prosecution witness against Larry who had not appeared previously in the show – a wonderful appearance by Alexander Vindman as himself, testifying against Larry David.
 
As I said, there were nods to the Seinfeld finale throughout, including one character trashing it ("I'm bingeing Seinfeld, and I'm up to the finale.  Alhough I heard terrible things about it, that you f*cked it up."), and a somewhat substance role here by Jerry Seinfeld himself who shows up at the trial for support.  And there were several valuable “fixes” to improve on the earlier show.
 
One fix was that they didn’t make the episode entirely about the trial, but had several subplots going on, all of which were very funny.  So, the full show was entertaining on several levels. 
 
Also, the trial itself was totally justified, since Larry did break the local law, after all (though they’re able to show it’s unjustified, as well, because it’s a horrible law that deserves to be overturned). 

But further, unlike on Seinfeld, where the characters were on trial in part for being self-absorbed throughout the run of the series, Larry David’s character went far beyond that -- utterly obnoxious, deeply thoughtless, sometimes intentionally hurtful, always yelling and argumentative about nearly everything, and even would say that he literally didn’t like people.  The Seinfeld characters were self-centered, but generally preferred to keep to themselves and not inflict their rudeness on others, in fact they even occasionally tried to be kind to people which is what would backfire.  So, it was hard to be “outraged” at them in the finale as being terrible people.  They weren’t.  Larry David’s character absolutely was.  If he was on occasion an innocent victim, it was usually because he’d put himself in that position by doing something unnecessarily self-aggrandizingly obsessive.  So, it was more fun and far more justified watching the parade of characters coming back, slamming him for his virulent transgressions and testifying against him.  His past should have nothing to do with the final verdict, of course, but it still made the anger at Larry fully believable and entertaining.  I never felt the outraged anger at the Seinfeld characters and its impact of their verdict was much warranted.
 
There was one other area of the Curb Your Enthusiasm finale that they improved, though it gives away some important plot points, so anyone who still plans to watch the episode, you should stop here.  Just know that at the very end, I’ll embed a three-minute scene from the trial.  It’s a lot of fun. 
 
For those who likely won’t watch the finale episode, or don’t care if anything’s given away, we shall continue. 
 
By the way, as I noted in my previous article on the final season, I didn’t watch Curb Your Enthusiasm much over the years.  Largely because I didn’t subscribe to HBO for most of its seasons, though I was able to catch up with certain episodes.  But also, once I did subscribe, I found him too obnoxious to enjoy in full doses.  What I learned to do was record the show and fast-forward through sequences.  It made it far more fun (for me).
 
Anyway, what they fixed as a major improvement was the very end.
 
Larry is convicted.  And the judge hates him so much, he’s sentenced to a year in jail.  There’s a funny scene of Larry in jail – when Jerry Seinfeld shows up and says, “You’re free!!”  I won’t explain how that works out, it was amusing, but the short version is that it’s declared a mistrial – thanks to something Jerry is able to discover. (So, Jerry Seinfeld is who saves Larry David, which is a lovely touch connecting the two shows).  But then there are two wonderful lines –
 
The first is that with the cell door now open and Jerry explaining the situation to him, a bewildered Larry remains inside, At which point Jerry tells him to come on, leave now, “You don't want to end up like this.  No one wants to see it.”  And then adds, knowingly, “Trust me.”
 
And the second is the topper.  As Larry and Jerry walk through the jail hallway away from the camera, Larry suddenly says, “Oh, my god” – and then there’s a long pause – “This is how we should have ended the finale.”  Jerry gets a look of angst and throws up his hands, “Oh, my god, you’re right.”  And they turn to walk away – when Jerry adds, their backs to the camera, “How did we not think of that???”  And the two raise their arms in dismay and both go, “Agghhhhhhhhhh…”

Producer-writer Jeff Schaffer was asked about Seinfeld's reaction.  He replied that "After we shot that jail scene, [Jerry] was excited.  He said, 'That was a joke 26 years in the making.  When do you get a chance to do that?"
 
That could have been the end, and it would have been joyous and perfect, though they had another scene that was very good and a fine way to go out.
 
But in the end, Larry David doubled-down on the reviled Seinfeld finale – and improved on it.  A great way to end.