CaptainRed's Interpretation of the HM Finale [If you have your own interpretation, feel free to email me]

Seeing the whole thing, I'm really sorry this show is canceled(or at least that I found it so late). Still, it's kind of weird that the creative team says they'd like to continue the show after having produced an episode that works so well as the last episode.

I actually found the focus group pretty funny, but I've been in writers' workshops before, something which the focus group bears a strong resemblance to. Heck, I'm in one this semester at school. Anyway, Junior, Fenton, and Walter and Perry were all playing like they were members of a real focus group, by mimicking the behavior they thought was what a focus group did. Junior, Walter and Perry took to screaming "it sucked" as much and as loudly as possible. Fenton took a slightly different approach. Fenton mimicked the inevitable member of the group that "knows the craft." Thus, he runs through every buzz word he can dredge up, though still in the negative, since that is what he thinks focus groups do.

Watching the episode a few more times, I have to say it was brilliantly done.

"It's never real with you. It would be nice if, once, you wanted to be a biker.... You can't live in a fantasy world your whole life." This is McGuirk to Brendon... but it might as well be Mcguirk to himself. Through various means, in the episodes I've seen, Coach Mcguirk has tried to live in a fantasy world. Hell, his car is a pretty fine example of this.

Then there's the great Andy Hardy moment a few seconds after that quote. "Dad, can we have a man-to-man talk? I need to talk to you about the ending of this movie." Major bonus points to anyone who gets that one.

Then there's the discussion about whose grill it is, ownership in general. The idea that one gains a certain level of ownership in something by investing time and effort into it plays into the movie discussion. The focus group complains, but that group holds no investment in the movies it watches, so it doesn't matter what it thinks. Ultimately, this episode argues against my stance on the Star Wars Prequels(that being, when your work gains an audience, that audience takes a share in the ownership of the work, and you are responsible to that audience in all future efforts on that work)

"Don't get mad at us Brendon; we're your audience." "Yeah, you NEED us." This question is the reason for the focus group's existance. Does the artist NEED the audience. Their answer? No. A small dog isn't a cat, and a movie doesn't become a puppet show just because few(or no) people see it. The artist and his art exist either way.

Thinking some more about the last scene, I've come to a slightly adjusted conclusion. The camera falls behind him. Everyone else in the car is in front of him. Not only that, but they're moving with him. Brendon held onto the camera alongside of him as long as he could, but eventually he had to let go of the camera. In a very Roger Smith way, Brendon will never lose that camera, because that camera is a part of his memories — his actual memories, and his memories as represented by the tapes. But his future lies with the people in the car... his family. McGuirk drives Paula's car. They all discuss where to eat lunch in the haphazard manner that many families do.

Brendon doesn't need to share his ideas, hopes, and fears with the camera anymore. He has lots of family to share them with.