SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers from the series finale of “Hacks,” now streaming on HBO Max.
Deborah Vance was never really going to die. But as “Hacks” said bon voyage with a series finale that took viewers to Paris and back, the series’ creators knew they needed to heighten the stakes with its lead characters one last time. And that came in the guise of a serious illness that threatens — but then ends up solidifying — the unbreakable bond between Deborah (Jean Smart) and her protégé, Ava Daniels (Hannah Einbinder), something that has been built up over the course of five seasons.
In series finale of “Hacks,” Deborah reveals that the cancerous mass she had removed in a previous episode has spread — and she has no interest undergoing chemotherapy treatment. Instead, befitting her need to forever be in control, Deborah wants to go out on her own terms, and travel overseas to an assisted suicide facility. “I want to go out on top,” she tells Ava, who is not happy at all with the idea.
But as much as she’s against that plan, Ava knows she has to be there for Deborah. After some light protestation, she joins Deborah on an end-of-life jaunt to Paris. While in the City of Lights, the duo have the time of their lives. They load up on baguettes, haggle with shopkeepers, tour the Louvre, stay out late at a disco and take loads of selfies.
Deborah and Ava have never been closer — and that’s when the jokes start flying. As they’re about to travel to Deborah’s final rest stop, they two begin riff about what Deborah might enjoy about being sick. As those creative juices start flowing, the superstar comedian realizes her illness might be fertile ground for a new special. And she wants Ava to help her write it.
“The purpose of having her be sick was for the ultimate redemption, the idea of the comedy and writing together saving her life,” co-creator and executive producer Lucia Aniello tells Variety. “We wouldn’t have had her die. There’s no reason for her to be sick, except to tell the story of how, in the end, she is saved by her want to continue to write.”
As Jimmy (Paul W. Downs) reminds Ava over the phone, as the episode ends: “I think you saved her life once, so it makes sense you’d do it again.”
The entire “Hacks” finale was a bit of a bookend to the series open. Aniello says this is pretty much how she and fellow creators Downs and Jen Statsky originally pitched the “Hacks” ending when they first sold the show. “Deborah being inspired by her banter with Ava is obviously the inciting incident to the pilot,” she says, “and so, to have it also be the way the show ends is why this was always the idea from the beginning.”
The three creators wanted to close up “Hacks” on “a very hopeful ending for Deborah and Ava,” Statsky says. “The show ends with them together, because ultimately the show was always about them coming together and cracking each other open and making each other better.”
Statsky compares Deborah’s decision to live as “like the final boss in the video game of her character evolution. This is a character we’ve seen for five seasons now, where control is something extremely important to her. It’s a defense mechanism, it’s how she approaches her career and relationships. Through the relationship with Ava, she softened a bit and let go of that. Part of that growth for Deborah is the conclusion she comes to at the end of this finale, in terms of letting go.”
So no, Deborah was never going to die, and there were never any alternate endings beyond what wound up on screen. “We had been building to this the whole time,” Statsky says.
The “Hacks” finale also wraps up multiple storylines — as many of Deborah’s staffers and friends are now working at The Diva, the new Vegas casino she opens with Marcus (Carl-Clemons Hopkins) and is being managed by Marty (Christopher McDonald). Josefina (Rose Abdoo), Damien (Mark Indelicato) and Kiki (Poppy Liu) are all accounted for as well.
Back in L.A., Jimmy and Kayla (Megan Stalter) have their own redemption moment, as Jimmy discovers that Latitude boss (and Kayla’s father) Michael (W. Earl Brown) is siphoning million in residuals from dead clients. When he and Kayla expose Michael, and force him out, they take control of the talent agency — well, a smaller version of it, after half the Latitude team defects. But it’s a victory for the duo (and their assistant Randi, played by Robby Hoffman) nonetheless.
“Jimmy and Kayla get to do the ‘Hacks’ thing, which is both be hard funny, but also have very grounded, emotional moments — because they are put through quite a trial professionally this season,” says Downs. “That’s been, I think, really rewarding, personally as a performer, to do as Jimmy, but also to do with Hannah and Jean and Meg — those more emotional scenes as well.
Adds Statsky: “The dynamic between Kayla and Jimmy, we didn’t realize what it would be until Meg and Paul got together. And then we realized that there was something, truly, I think, one of the all-time great comedic duos with them. And so it was like, ‘We need to write more to this!’ It’s an interesting mix of planning out the Ava and Deborah arc, but then also allowing this wonderful ensemble to grow, and getting to be lucky enough to write for those actors.”
At a “Hacks” finale event earlier this week, the cast got to watch the series-ender for the first time on a big screen. Einbinder called the finale “perfect as ever. Every time we have a finale of any season, I feel like it leaves off in like such a beautiful place, and I think what we get to see in this finale is representative of the entire arc of the series. It is representative of the depth of their love and the depth of their connection. So, yeah, I find it hard to ever predict where it will go, but it’s always a treat.”
At that same event, Smart echoed her co-star. “I had a little bit of an idea of how it was going to end, but I just thought it ended absolutely perfectly. I don’t think it hit me until I just watched that last scene. The relationship between the two of them was always at the heart of the of the show. I mean, the only thing that we missed at the end was that we weren’t with the whole cast and the whole crew. But it was kind of magical being in Paris, and in a way I think that felt right, because they were out of their element, they weren’t at home, and they were just trying to figure out what was going on.”
Smart says her favorite moment of the finale may be when Deborah asks to clasp hands with Ava — in order to reveal the truth. Throughout “Hacks,” Deborah has often roasted Ava for having comically large hands, calling them “catcher’s mitts.” But in the finale, Deborah confesses that her hands are bigger than Ava’s.
“We should say that we did write the hand joke before Hannah was cast,” Downs says. “And when Hannah read the script, she was like, ‘This is crazy’ — and there is a [younger] picture of her where her hands are quite large.” Einbinder says with a laugh: “My hands grew before the rest of my body.”
Smart also raves over the music choice for the very ending of the “Hacks” finale, as a drone shot starts on Deborah and Ava, walking down the Vegas strip, before launching into an aerial view. As the show closes on that dramatic swoop, the Judy Garland/Barbra Streisand duet “Get Happy/Happy Days Are Here Again” plays.
“They told me shortly before we did the finale that they were going to use that fabulous duet at the end, and I was so excited because it’s such an incredible piece of music,” Smart says. “But it was also perfect that it was not just that song, but that it was a duet.”
Earlier this year, Smart told Variety that this may be her favorite “Hacks” season, so she’s happy it’s ending on this note.
“I never asked them in all these years how the show was gonna end, even though they have known from day one how the show was gonna end, even before they ever met me,” Smart said in Variety‘s April 8 cover story. “I thought I wanted to be surprised, but then when I found out, at first I was concerned. I was surprised and a little taken aback. But the more I thought about it, I thought, ‘OK, I can see that.’ And I told them, ‘I trust you guys. I know it’ll be good, whatever it is.’ Because she has cancer and decides that she’s going to go to a clinic in Switzerland be euthanized. But then there’s a twist at the end!” Now we know.
As for Einbinder, who also cryptically discussed the ending in last month’s cover story: “I’m really happy with the ending of the show, and I don’t say this hyperbolically,” she said. “I’ve never been unhappy with anything they’ve ever done. But yeah, the ending, I think, is the epitome of what the show does — which is, the last episode has a lot of laughs and a lot of tears, and I think it’s all earned. I’m really happy with the way that it shakes out.”
Now that we know that Deborah isn’t dead, and there’s even another comedy special from her and Ava in the works, might there be an eventual “Hacks” reunion or revival? Aniello, Downs and Statsky are hesitant to say yes. But they’re also not saying no.
“Never say never,” Aniello says. “It doesn’t seem likely, but we love these actors, we love these characters, we love this crew. We are so lucky. I think in a perfect world, we would be making this show forever. We really would. So it is heartbreaking to us that it is over, and I think this sentiment out there that we’re choosing to end the show, and while it is technically true, we’re doing it to maintain a certain quality that we believe the show has been, and we just want that to be the way that people think about the show, and not anything less.”
The trio are now all set up under deals at Warner Bros. TV, and they’re already working on their next project. While they won’t reveal what that is, Statsky confirms that they went on a research trip for it a few weeks ago. “It’s something we’ve been talking about for a while now,” Statsky says, while Aniello adds, “I guess you could say we’re in early stages, early outlining.”
In the meantime, “Hacks” will be on the awards circuit for some time, allowing for cast and crew periodically to meet up and reminisce about their journey with the show for several months to come.
“We know this show is once in a lifetime,” Statsky says, “so we really feel so grateful and lucky that it all happened the way it did.”
Leave a Reply