Episode 7x23 "Brave New World (Part 2)"

Figured I'd bring back the classic.

The "Last Time on Boy Meets World" not only shows us clips of the previous episode, but also bits of the flashbacks from the last episode. It's pretty unnecessary. It's not a big deal, obviously, but any time they spend showing other flashbacks could have been used to show parts of Eric's journey to college instead. Like, if they were hurting for content, they should have shown that! I'll never let that go, I'm sorry.

The first actual exchange of the episode is between Eric and Alan. Russ does his "hiding how sad I am" voice to tell Eric that he won't miss him. I don't know where that leaves us. It seems like they want me to believe that the total parent-to-son disrespect of the last two seasons was all in good fun, that they were always just messing with each other. But I don't believe that for a second. What makes it harder is the clip reel showing us the best moments between Alan and Eric from Security Guy and Raging Cory. Amy gets the same treatment with clips of their creative writing class together in How To Succeed In Business. Eric had awesome relationships with his parents up through season 5, but then right at the beginning of season 6 (episode 3, in particular) they go out of their way to avoid him at Pennbrook, "He doesn't know we're here does he?" And it continues like that for two seasons. The previous episode, part 1 of the series finale, used Amy's lack of caring about Eric as a punchline, and what, now I'm supposed to forget all of that? Sorry, can't do it. Those clips were all awesome, it's just hard to reconcile them with the way Eric's been treated lately.

You may not know this, but big daddy rocks.

Next up is Jack and Shawn. They barely have any brother moments, so instead of clips we get Chet's ghost showing up in here in the kitchen while the boys talk. Unlike his previous appearances, neither Jack nor Shawn can actually see or hear his ghost. And honestly that makes it even weirder. It means that every time Chet talks, Shawn and Jack are just pausing their conversation and staring at each other.

Jack admits that he admires Shawn for his "money doesn't matter" way of life, and this admission inspires Jack to join the Peace Corps with Rachel. One of the comments (I would say who, but I can't seem to find it now...) suggested that Jack was being sarcastic when he said he wanted to join the Corps in the previous episode. I thought that at first, but then Jack adds on a point about sticking it to his stepfather, which made me think he was serious. This scene, however, pretty much guarantees that he wasn't being serious the first time.

Rachel comments "You're giving up your stepfather's money..." He was already cut off, but I guess she means that he's giving up the chance to get it back by working with his stepfather. I don't know. Chet is incredulous that Jack would give up that kind of money. I have to reiterate how weird it is. Watch this scene and imagine that every time Chet speaks, it's just silence in the kitchen. They're all just kind of looking at each other.

Chet is always funny and it's wonderful that they got him for this episode. After his tirade about money, he realizes how proud he is of his boys.

It is kind of unsatisfying that they can just bring Chet back whenever they want and have him state explicitly how he feels. Like I said, it's always nice to see him, but it cheapens his death in my opinion.

Arite here's the scene that no one likes. I don't wanna watch it. I've got ten minutes left in the very last episode and I still can't bring myself to watch it. Gotta check reddit, watch an episode of Friends, oh hey House of Cards new season, better watch a couple of those...

Why is Michael Jacobs's kid here? Joshua should be just over a year old, but here he is at least 3 or 4. Maybe they induced a miracle so that Joshua could have a conversation with Cory? Well then they shouldn't have used this kid because he doesn't know how to say his lines. He doesn't really even have any, he just says "okay" and "yeah" and stuff, it's so fucking difficult to watch. If they wanted a scene where Cory just talks at Joshua, they should have used the correct-age baby Joshua. He would have said exactly as many coherent things as Jacobs's son did.

STOP LOOKING AT THE CAMERA. STOP RUINING THE FINALE OF ONE OF MY FAVORITE SHOWS. And don't blame it on his age. Original Morgan was Meryl Streep compared to this guy. Maybe they just didn't have the budget for literally anyone else, so they had to use him. A mystery for the ages.

It's a shame because I like what Cory has to say here about growing up, but it's just so hard to focus with this kid's completely insane facial expressions. It worked in 7x09 when he "saw dead people" because he was supposed to be creepy. He's doing pretty much the exact same thing here in this scene, it's such a mess. I have no idea how this happened.

That line makes it all worth it though.

Everybody makes their way outside to the patio (Joshua is inside for good now) and oddly enough, Rachel and Jack head off without a word. The others are going somewhere very mysterious where "he" will be waiting, and Cory is left to say goodbye to his family.

We get a couple clips from season 1 between Cory and Alan. This pairing deserved better treatment. As Cory says goodbye to Morgan, she gets two clips as well, and they take up about the same amount of time as Alan's. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I do like what they did with Morgan though. She doesn't try to be snarky or funny, she just tells Cory to take care of himself. Definitely the right way to go.

It's time for the last scene in Mister Feeny's classroom. Feeny himself enters first, followed by Topanga, Cory, Shawn, and Eric. The first three take the same seats they always had in high school, which is just beautiful. The decision to leave out Jack, Rachel, and Angela was entirely necessary and hardly needs mentioning. It wasn't even much of a decision, I think everyone knew this is how the last scene had to look.

The students ask Feeny if he has anything left to teach them, and he explains that he does not, and that they're all ready to go meet the world. He does have some parting advice for them though.

That is my favorite Feeny line in the entire series, and perhaps the most inspirational moment I've ever seen on television. A lot of that comes from the lack of cliches. There's no "you can be anything," or "you can have anything if you work hard enough," or "the power of love," none of that. Just very real, personal advice, Hearing "try" makes me think back to The Eskimo where the students thought Feeny just wanted Shawn to try, but that wasn't so. The trying was meaningless if Shawn didn't also believe in himself and dream of something bigger. And in Security Guy, Eric certainly had the dream of going to college, but he needed to believe in himself and try as well. We can look at Topanga's recent journey as well. She believed in herself and tried as hard as she could, but she also needed the dream of something bigger (this job in new york) in order to keep growing. There are other examples, but you get the point. You gotta have all three. That line from Feeny is perfect. And of course doing good speaks for itself.

As Eric says, there's only one thing left to take care of.

I have to point out that Feeny told Eric he loved him back at Feeny's wedding, but rather than detracting from this scene I think it just adds to that scene at his wedding.

It's time for everyone to hug Mister Feeny and say goodbye. The actors are all crying at this point, as am I. I think it was Rider who said that they only did one take of this because everyone was crying for real. It's all overwhelmingly emotional. I doubt I'll ever be able to watch this without getting choked up. Topanga and Cory both have nice things to say, but Eric's and Shawn's lines stand pretty high above the other two since they had real development arcs with Feeny.

Feeny offers Shawn a handshake but Shawn goes for the hug instead, it's a nice touch. Obviously I have to mention City Slackers. You see that moment and you want to go watch City Slackers, and then The Eskimo, and everything in between. Rider is completely falling apart here, it adds this raw power that you can't get just by acting. It tears me apart, every time.

The audience laughs when he says "I blame you for that" but it kinda just... makes me cry... I think it's way more emotional than funny. But that's fine. Eric has thanked Feeny for his help getting into college on multiple occasions, and it's been two seasons since then, so this was the right thing to do, to look at how Feeny has affected Eric's future rather than his past.

Cory's up last, and there's really not much there except for Feeny revealing that his real name is Cornelius. They have a wonderful goodbye hug, and once the students have all left, Mister Feeny gives the last line of the series.

And there we have it. Everyone loves this episode despite the Joshua nonsense, and it's not hard to see why. It drags out every emotion that a series finale should. As I said in the last post, a lot of series have a climax in their finale, and then a rushed conclusion in the last few minutes. This finale was all ending, all closure. It's damn close to perfect. This last scene is definitely the best scene of the season, and one of the best of the series. It captures that feeling from the earlier seasons, and that's no surprise since it was so focused on school life. 

I'm going to make a sort of Epilogue post tomorrow. I'll talk about my final thoughts on the series as a whole, and on the blog and the future. There will probably be a few top 10 or top 5 lists, and I'm excited to see your own lists and final thoughts in the comments. I've also got some news about a project for Girl Meets World that I'm looking to be involved with. A lot of you have had really kind words as we reached the end, and that means the world to me. If you want to add your own, I would absolutely love to see them, and I love everything that's been said so far, but I'd prefer to see it on the post tomorrow, if that's okay. Just so we can talk about this episode on this post.

I hope to see you all on that post tomorrow! Either way, thank you for reading.

I'm gonna get Pizza Hut to "celebrate."