iZombie Series Finale Review: All’s Well That Ends Well (Season 5 Episode 13)

iZombie has never been one to fit any mold, so why would we come to expect any less from this series in its final moments?

At the end of it all, iZombie Season 5 Episode 13, “All’s Well That Ends Well,” doesn’t give us a conventional ending and that’s okay because this show has never once been conventional.

From the show’s love of puns to its love for brutally killing off Liv’s boyfriends, we’ve never really known what to expect next but we’ve always known to expect the best.

And the best is what we got. From teenage girl to co-dependant salsa dancer brain, this zom-dram-rom-com never sacrificed what made it different and in return, got to go out with a glorious bang.

There is a road map “All’s Well That Ends Well” could have followed. One where Liv takes the cure to live a happy mundane life with Major in Seattle and continue her career as a morgue technician with Ravi until they both retire with grey hair.

There’s a time where iZombie could have given Liv this life and we would have been immensely satisfied. But in a surprise twist, The CW gave iZombie a chance and then another until the show grew into this much bigger entity. Its priorities changed over the course of five years and so did Liv’s.

This show never lost sight of its origin story, but returning to that origin became farther out of reach with every new risk introduced to these characters. It is because of these very risks that Liv and Major choose not to take the zombie cure in the end and live out their days as immortal recluses on a secluded island. 

It’s not the ending we originally pictured for our heroine Liv Moore, but it is the ending that makes the most sense for iZombie at this point in time.

iZombie’s finale is overflowing with so many wild and wonderful surprises, it’s nearly impossible not to be entertained!

First is the unexpected shout out to Kristen Bell when Liv is mistaken for The Good Place actor on a plane. Not only is this name drop an adorable way of comparing these two kickass blonde leads but it also means The Good Place and a Seattle full of zombies exists in the same universe. Do with that as you will.

Of course, Peyton, our beautiful badass has to go and get killed in a blazing gunfight that is every bit as sad and heroic as one would expect.

However, with any death on any show there comes that odd moment of hope. Hope that Blaine will be selfish enough to try and scratch Peyton. Hope that the loose zombie mythology of this show would be enough to save her even after her heart stops.

That hope hardly ever pans out these days, so iZombie must have been in a generous mood because not only do we get bombarded moments later by a pissed off zombie Peyton — but damn if she doesn’t look just as amazing rocking that white streak.

Her death may not have been surprising but iZombie’s dedication to giving us shock value without sacrificing the developments of its characters is very much a treat I did not expect.

And Major, I always need to sacrifice myself for the good of mankind, Lilywhite somehow manages to survive for once, which is a surprise in itself. Having Ravi be the one to trick Major into executing a plan that doesn’t involve him dying at the end is such a testament to their epic bromance and I’m so glad we got this small moment between the two loveable roommates.

Now if only Minor could have been there to witness such a beautiful moment…

You may think an episode full of fake-outs would be irritating to watch but with a Major and Peyton that are very much alive because of those fake-outs, I can’t seem to find any reasons to complain.

We are used to expecting the worse from television these days and so to have iZombie use that to keep us on our toes is actually quite clever. It is incredibly refreshing to go into a show expecting the absolute worst and come out on the other side knowing not one bad thing happened to the characters we love, yet we feel just as captivated.

iZombie sacrifices a lot for this finale with no punny scene tags, no brain personas, and very little of the precinct morgue we’ve come to love like a second character.

Thankfully, the series has already made up for most of this heartbreak with a fantastic penultimate episode that encompassed everything we’ve come to love about Liv and Clive’s partnership and their time in the Seattle precinct.

And the finale has plenty of its own fanfare to keep us satisfied. That entire scene where Don E pushes Blaine into the well, so in turn, Liv can push Don E into the well, and then Peyton can show up and make a joke about pushing Liv is everything.

It’s very cathartic to see Blaine’s downfall followed swiftly by a beautiful reunion between Liv and Peyton. The smile on my face during this scene is genuine and big because this friendship has always felt so incredibly endearing it can’t possibly be acting.

 

It’s all the other little details sewn into the final storyline that really makes this finale work.

It’s Johnny Frost making an appearance and asking for his execution to happen before his next alimony check. It’s Clive smashing the glass door running into the hospital. It’s Ravi tackling the commander on live television.

It’s Clive and Dale finally having a baby together and naming her Olivia, after the best partner Clive ever had. It’s Major professing his love for Liv in a voice mail and being forced to take his shirt off one last time.

This finale is overflowing with easter eggs and that will make you far more emotional than the larger plot of the episode.

This episode stays true to the nature of these characters and their humanity, so it’s hard to find room to care about the bigger threat of a zombie apocalypse and the fact that it never fully pans out.

So is iZombie’s choice to shy away from the bigger storylines worth it for the little moments? I have to think so.

I would have loved an epic showdown between Liv and Blaine and I still don’t fully understand why we didn’t get that, but that doesn’t make Blaine and Don E’s ending any less of a good one just because it isn’t the one we wanted.

Leaving Blaine’s fate up in the air at the bottom of that well is still very much on par for this show. And his last moments are spent giving an epic villain monologue, which is so on-brand for Blaine it’s kind of hard to be disappointed.

The same goes for the time jump and the show’s choice to bypass the zombie/human war by 10 years. At first, you want to dismiss this ending because it’s confusing, polarizing, and nothing like the one we expected to get. But in these final moments, we get to see all five main characters happy and together, possibly for eternity.

With nowhere left to go and no story left to tell it doesn’t matter how we got to this point or how bizarre the circumstances are, no one dies and this show got to do one last crazy thing without any consequences.

This show’s future has never been certain but a future with more iZombie episodes is almost certainly not going to happen. So I love that the series had to go out on a note that was both final and open to interpretation.

I don’t love how much time we waste with the Dead Enders and Fillmore Graves soldiers but I do love a happy ending and against all odds, iZombie gave us that. More importantly, this show gave us married Major and Liv full-on snuggling on a couch endgame, so how can anything else possibly matter?

We can’t say goodbye without acknowledging the greatest part of this show — the phenomenal cast. From the main cast to the revolving door of recurring guest stars, it hasn’t been hard to fall in love with each and every character that walks into the morgue.

Thank you to Rahul Kohli for bringing the loveable British goofball Ravi Chakrabarti to life and setting a unique comedic tone for the series on day one. Thank you to Robert Buckley for setting such a high standard for male characters going forward and for never letting a guy named Major take himself too seriously.

Thank you to Malcolm Goodwin for bringing a character to life that tried desperately to be stoic and intimidating but grew into a big softy with a genuine love for D&D and his crazy little zombie partner. Clive’s character development has been a truly remarkable thing to watch.

And thank you to Aly Michalka, for not only being a Disney Channel icon but for taking Peyton Charles, a character that was prioritized for her looks, and absolutely destroying all female stereotypes with a determination and strength that was a force to be reckoned with.

Of course, we owe everything to one zombie in particular.

Rose McIver’s portrayal of Olivia Moore is one that will stick with us long after the series. She has played dozens of different characters every season, from Frat Bro to Drag Queen, with incredible talent, accuracy, and comedic charm every step of the way.

Her multiple personalities are a thing to behold, but it is McIver’s ability to give Liv her own redeeming and loveable qualities that make her time on this series so rewarding.

Like a box of chocolates, you never really knew what you were going to get with Liv. Yet, she has been the show’s guiding compass through five hectic seasons, giving this zombie show the human anchor it needed in order to succeed.

McIver may never get the recognition she deserves but fans of this show know she killed every single scene in that iconic white wing and lab coat. We leave this series knowing there may never be a character on television again as lovely, smart, funny, and vulnerable as Liv Moore.

All hail our iconic zombie queen!

From day one, iZombie has been unconventional, unpredictable, and wonderfully wacky — so it seems only fitting that Liv’s story ends just the same.

All that matters is this: a bizarre show about a psychic zombie who helps solve crimes defied all odds and was renewed for not only one but five whole seasons; not once did any main cast-members leave the series for any reason; and every single character got the ending they deserved.

They say perfect endings don’t exist but I say iZombie came pretty close.

Top Lines from “All’s Well That Ends Well”:

Liv: Lady next to me says she recognizes me from somewhere.
Liv: She’s looking up The Good Place. She thinks I’m Kristen Bell.
Ravi: She will be sorely disappointed.

Peyton [to Liv]: How funny would it be if now, I knocked you in?

Major: The way I make all my decisions these days is by asking myself “what would Liv Moore do?”
Whatever happens, know this. It’s always been you. I always loved you and I always will.

Clive: Hey, babe. How you doing?
Dale: I’ve been better.
Clive: I don’t know about you but I’m ready to meet our kid.
Dale: God, I love you.
Clive: I love you, too.

Major: You tricky son of a bitch. You just had to be the hero, didn’t you?
Ravi: Next time though, it’s all yours.

Thank you, iZombie, for everything!

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