Valerie Cherish is not humiliated. Hurt? Sure. Insulted? You betcha. But never humiliated, and in its final five minutes, The Comeback hammers home exactly what it’s been driving at this entire season. The aesthetic shift away from its mockumentary beginnings wasn’t simply to give the show more freedom to move. It was an attempt at having the audience view Valerie differently. The finale’s epilogue offers a startling clarification for the show and this season. When Jane tells her that she’s watched Valerie spend 20 years in an “industry that offered you nothing but humiliation,” her frame expands and transitions from black-and-white to color. It’s the final statement on what creators Michael Patrick King and Lisa Kudrow have been showing us through these eight episodes, breaking away from the way that Jane’s camera has traditionally shown her. It was Jane’s camera that viewed Valerie as the victim of humiliation, not Valerie’s. The transition in this final talking head is their concluding statement on who Valerie has become: a totally realized version of herself. Finally, we see it too.
Just look at how Valerie carries herself throughout the episode. Like “Star Billy” heading off to the second row of Marc Jacobs’ fashion show, it’s time Valerie managed herself, and, you know what, she does that just fine. When a joke falls flat, and Al Assist hits a paywall, Valerie throws on her EP hat and hires Evan—insert your own nepo-baby joke about Kudrow hiring her son, both in reality and on television. But her biggest moments came from supporting another panicking co-worker, whether it was a fellow actor or her boss. The small moments were just as telling. She now has the power to give her Mark her phone when she starts doomscrolling comments, and when she leaks the season two news to an audience, it doesn’t become an episode-long conflict. She simply moves on. Like PDP breaking the Emmy, it’s going to get fixed, but what’s important is that she was ready to let it go.
Like so many great shows, The Comeback doesn’t close the book on a big, dramatic change. It’s more of an opportunity to see how Valerie has evolved throughout the season. The moments of personal and professional growth largely happen matter-of-factly, with season-long arcs coming to a close in passive, unremarkable ways. How’s That?! premieres to strong ratings and scores a second season. Mark patches things up with his ex-colleague, who offers him a new job. Patience secures the Nivea collaboration. Meanwhile, things that should kick off conflict, like AI Valerie’s weird arms, seem to pass right by her. The show reached its emotional climax last week. The only thing left to do was say goodbye.
That’s probably why tonight’s finale is so low-key. There wasn’t much more for Valerie to do because she had the confidence to deal with anything. Even her meeting with the Big Three, Jack Stevens (Bradley Whitford), Ben Morrow (Justin Theroux), and Matt Wright (Adam Scott, relishing the opportunity to play a Step Brothers-esque dick again), doesn’t shake her resolve. As they push her to speak on behalf of writers at the How’s That?! press conference, she keeps her cool and refuses to be pushed around. Her show may have no writers, but she does have 200 other employees to worry about. The Comeback has trained us to expect the worst, that Valerie will always operate out of fear or misplaced ambition, but the other shoe never drops. She simply hears the Big Three out, considers the offer, and ultimately helps their cause by being honest.
With Val’s story largely wrapped last week, tonight’s episode is primarily about sitcoms, and it’s a nice reminder from Kudrow and King, who’ve spent 20 years off and on mocking the form, that sitcoms matter. It shouldn’t be surprising that the last we see of Valerie, she’s sitcom-splaining callbacks to her Academy Award-winning director. To Valerie, sitcoms matter as much as the “Lesbians Of Triblanka.” Sitcoms matter to her audience too, and simply because some executive has figured out how to wring a little more revenue out of canned laughs and pratfalls, that doesn’t mean Valerie should be embarrassed by her art or her journey. Humiliation doesn’t serve her. Paulie G. was the one humiliating himself through ego and cruelty. And he was nothing more than a roadblock on her journey. But “good enough” for NuNet isn’t good enough for Valerie, and she’s not going to kill herself for a show that won’t even hire a showrunner. That can be AI Valerie’s problem. She wants to make sitcoms that connect with people and have cultural relevance. Her happy ending is making something of lasting value, and as Diane from Cheers once put it, all’s well that ends well.
The low-key nature of the episode is led by a casual step in the right direction for Valerie. Apparently, by not trying too hard and standing up for herself, she can earn the respect of her peers. It’s so easy to imagine a season two version of her meeting with the Big Three in which Valerie, not Matt, looks like the asshole. The only conflict left is from NuNet. As it has in every other department, AI is replacing Valerie. After she gets Brandon back on track (“You’re allowed to feel this way for 30 more seconds”) and goes off script at the press conference, admitting that the AI hiccup was solved by humans, she re-gifts her success candle and says goodbye to her dream. However, the show doesn’t end Valerie’s story; it leaves it, closing the “Rome is burning” season on a hopeful note. She’ll persist, and continue doing Emmy-nominated work.
The Comeback ended things on its terms as its actual network is consumed by the type of industry-wide consolidation the show would normally satirize. Valerie’s story is one for the humans who like watching and creating these shows. Sure, one day, an exec will successfully get slop on TV and burn through productions as quickly as Netflix does. That is, until How’s That?! isn’t worth the tokens it costs to produce. But there will always be room for quality, like Mrs. Hatt, and there will always be room for Valerie Cherish.
Ultimately, the show that began as a sitcom send-up softens toward the genre and reminds viewers that shows shot before a live studio audience have artistic merit, assuming networks properly support their creators. Like Jane’s expanding frame, we started out seeing Valerie one way and left seeing her another. Instead of the story of a delusional actor making another run at stardom, we got a story of persistence about a woman (of a certain age) finding a little dignity. Valerie didn’t come back. She became the person she needed to be, one who looks for greatness, not good enough. The Comeback found what it was looking for.
Stray observations
Frank is on fire this week. My two favorite lines from this sad sack: “This is what happens when I feel joy,” and “I just wish Jack Stevens was here last week when I got my finger stuck in the faucet.”
Speaking of Jack Stevens, I’m truly going to miss all the fake television show titles from the show. Tonight, Stevens added a few to the pantheon, including Judge’s Table and She-R. But the one that really got me was The Commute, which is deeply funny to me.
“Not all the hate is about AI. ‘The sheriff walks too slow. Did he have a stroke?’ No, I did not. That’s my character walk.”
I’m still a little unclear on how the AI Valerie will work. Would How’s That?! be a Sonic The Hedgehog situation with a CG Valerie and Frank is the James Marsden or would the whole show transition to AI?
We are truly blessed to get one more visit from Tommy, who offers two more classics: “Back in my day, men weren’t even allowed to wear ChapStick,” and “I should get out there. I brought a friend. She sometimes forgets where she is, [whispers] and her name.”
Who is going to write the sitcoms after the space war?
Well, that’s a series wrap on The Comeback. I know that this season was a bit more divisive than expected. But the show justified the change and landed the show in a hopeful place, one that pays off the decades of investment made by Kudrow, King, and their audience. Valerie Cherish has long been a symbol of survival. This season hammered that home by also giving the character some much-needed dignity. Sing it, Val:
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