“Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” bids goodbye

February 24, 2019

Kimmy achieves her goals in the final season.

Nominated for “Outstanding Comedy Series” for the 2019 Emmy’s, the second half of the concluding season of “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” ends the show on an uplifting note as the character recognize their potential and part ways to pursue their own dreams.

Standout episode: “Sliding Van Doors”

The nearly hour-long episode presents an alternate universe that diverges from the moment Kimmy chooses not to set foot in the Reverend’s van to see the movie “Sliding Doors.”

Alternate-universe Kimmy becomes the high school queen bee, accompanied by a gaggle of friends and her quintessial football boyfriend. Ellie Kemper slides into the role of basic white teenage girl so easily that by the end of the episode it’s hard to see Kimmy as anything but the person she could have been.

The alternate-universe Kimmy, living her sheltered life, constantly argues she has earned everything she has by hard work, like her diploma and job as a news anchor.

Ironically, everything different in the universe is due to chance and the subsequent butterfly effect: because Kimmy is never kidnapped, she becomes a news anchor, Titus becomes a movie star, Jacqueline marries Mikey and many more women are kidnapped before the Reverend is caught. The show proves it’s easy for privileged alternate-universe Kimmy to believe she would have succeeded as easily as she does had she been kidnapped, when in reality everyone is to some extent bound by chance. In this world, Kimmy chances on finding that her high school sweetheart is cheating on her with Donna Maria.

Kimmy admits to Titus that she chooses not to think about what might have happened to her had she never been kidnapped; instead, she chooses to focus on what she can do with her life in the present.

“Can’t you jamocks even blow up a building right?”

Much to her chagrin, Lillian gets to teach Artie’s spoiled millenial daughter Sheba Goodman a lesson in taking responsibility, something the rich and delusional girl has never done in her life. With the help of a stripper judge and pep talk, Lillian instates Sheba as the caretaker of Artie’s Farties, a group of disadvantaged children assissted by a charity her father founded.

However, when Lillian is cast out of her house/tugboat, she decides that she’s been living in the same place for too long and resolves to go down with the house. Confronted with the ghosts of her two lovers, Lillian stubbornly refuses to leave the apartment before it’s ‘ploded. By a fluke, Lillian survives to do greater things than haunt her gentrified neighborhood as a ghost, finding new ways to harass yuppies.

“The circle of life.”

The wayward Titus’s life is frazzled when ex-boyfriend and forever love Mikey announces that he’s getting married to his new boyfriend, seemingly out of nowhere. The heartbroken Titus opts to focus on his broadway debut at “The Lion King,”

Following advice from Kimmy, Mikey forces himself in a moment of heroism to confront his true feelings and admit he’s still in love with Titus.

Ultimately, Titus gets to live the luxurious life he’s always striven for, becoming a real Broadway star with Mikey at his side. In a way, this conclusion is the most satisfying of the season: Titus is reunited with his estranged lover and the dream he gave up on decades ago.

“I still have to believe that this is where I’m meant to be, because if I didn’t … I’d go crazy.”

While Kimmy originally believed she needed to travel to London to realize her dreams, Kimmy finds her true purpose in the book she wrote earlier in the season. When “The Legends of Greemulax” becomes a hit, Kimmy realizes that she can make a real impact on children by sharing a story, even if it isn’t necessarily her story.

Kimmy’s realization is bittersweet as she is evicted from her tugboat/apartment, leaving her to say goodbye to the cherished friends she once roomed with.

The story starts where it ends, at the grand opening of a roller coaster at a Gremulax-themed park where Kimmy and Lori Ann reunite to chase roller coasters as mother and daughter.