Burn Notice: Series Finale

Burn Notice concludes its seven-season run with an episode written and directed by the series creator Matt Nix. We begin with a flashback that recaps the season with a voiceover (VO) that includes all the reversals that have transpired this season. One version of a flashback is when the director or screenwriter replays scenes from a previous episode to help retell what has gone before it. Normally in screenwriting one is instructed not to use VO, as it can indicate a failure to elucidate themes and plot points that the writer intended to convey. However, Burn Notice flips the script—pun intended—and makes the VO an integral running trope for the show. Michael Westen, (Jeffrey Donovan), routinely explains the whys of spy methodologies and motivations to the viewer via VO.

Westen and his crew have been rehired by the CIA and infiltrated a domestic terrorist network. But Michael may be in too deep and forgotten which side he’s on. Having the protagonist switch sides is a time-honored tradition for television serials dating as far back as Miami Vice in the 1980s. It is arguable whether the main character switching sides signals that a series has run out of creative steam, but a case can be made.       

The final episode begins as a “chase,” both literally and figuratively. Michael Westen and Fiona Glenanne (Gabrielle Anwar) have reunited and rekindled what one might refer to as a “Hepburn and Tracy” type of romance. with banter and flirty dialogue heavy with sexual tension. Their dialogue is also filled with innuendo and in-jokes from the run of the series that impresses upon the viewer just how intimate the two leads have been over the course of the series.

Sam (Bruce Campbell) and Jesse (Coby Bell), frequently the comic foils, bicker about what type of beer they are going to purchase at one point, despite being on the run from the CIA. Burn Notice has always done a good job with the interplay between its main characters. Frequently the characters’ dialogue overlaps, which is not something that is easily accomplished, and is usually used to heighten the comic aspects of a scene.

At one point Fiona mentions that she has some C-4, a plastic explosive, in her purse. This use of “Chekov’s Gun” lets us know that an object of great usefulness will come into play later in the episode. And it does, as they use the C-4 to cover their escape.

Later in the episode, Michael has a conversation that calls back to the premiere episode and references how the show began with Michael’s “Burn Notice”, or when an undercover agent is disavowed by the CIA. We also are given a VO that reinforces the bonds that the characters all share and hints that Michael may have a death wish that will keep the audience in suspense regarding his survival. But this is what is known as a red herring or false lead.

After escaping the gas station from the open we cut to Jesse and Michael’s mother Madeline reinforcing that Jesse, an orphan, actually has a true family and it is the Burn Notice crew. Madeleine literally goes out with a bang, followed by frenzied cross cutting of music, and slo-mo.

The episode’s villain, Kendrick (John Pyper Ferguson), calls Michael and asks him non-too-subtly what it is he wants. This dialogue is a triple metaphor for the episode, the scene, and the series. Kendrick then dies, blowing up the building with both Michael and Fi inside. Fade to black. But wait!

We fade up to the interior of the CIA Director Strong’s (Jack Coleman) office with Sam and Jesse discussing their punishment for all these years of aiding the now-deceased Michael, only to their surprise the director tells them that he has persuaded the higher ups to release them because they eliminated Kendrick and his network of international terrorists. Sam repeats for the final time his first line from the series that “spies are a bunch of b**chy little girls.” This is what is known as a callback and is used as a sort of present for faithful viewers. 

Director Strong tells Sam and Jesse that Michael will get a plaque and a proper funeral, which is all he ever wanted anyway. Cut to Sam and Jesse at Michael’s funeral where Sam gives Michael his 21-gun salute as befitting a true U.S. military officer. 

Michael gives the last VO of the series, explaining the life of a spy and how he no longer needed it. Cut to a slo-mo flashback of Michael and Fi running down a hallway and jumping trough a window into the water below escaping the explosion.

Quick cut to Jesse and Sam having one last snappy repartee in which they reveal that they will continue to live the covert espionage life. We cross fade to a house in the snow far away from the Miami set location of the show and a snow globe that says “Miami, Florida.”

We zoom out to see that Michael’s nephew is asleep on his lap and Fi has curled up beside him. Michael looks confused as to what to do with the boy and Fi tells him to just leave him where he is, asleep. Michael asks Fi what he should tell his nephew what he used to do when the child is old enough to understand, and Fi repeats the opening lines to every episode of the show, only a little differently, “My name is Micheal Westen, I used to be a spy.” Another callback. The End.

The episode does a very good job of employing callbacks and dialogue to wrap up the narrative thread of the show, and the use of the red herring technique in the middle of the show was particularly effective.