Every once in a while, a news event comes along that is so surprising, so impossible to have predicted that you can feel history being made. We’re not referring to whatever nonsense is happening in Iowa, though, because everybody could tell that was going to be a shitshow. No, we’re talking about the announcement that Showtime has decided to cancel Ray Donovan after seven seasons. That’s surprising on its own, because it seemed like Ray Donovan would keep trucking along forever, but it’s especially surprising because the show—despite being the big thing on Showtime for years—won’t be getting a proper goodbye season or series finale. The show’s seventh season finale, which aired back in January, is now the finale episode of Ray Donovan.
This comes from Deadline, which says Showtime foreshadowed that the end of the Liev Schreiber-starring fixer drama would be coming sooner rather than later, but even then it seemed likely that it would get a final season to wrap up whatever else needed fixing in Ray Donovan’s life. But alas, we have reached the end of Ray Donovan, and now it’s up to us to figure out what a post-Ray Donovan life even looks like.
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Man this sucks. I know it’s arguably been wheel spinning for a while now but to leave it on a cliffhanger is a disgrace to loyal fans. Least they could do is wrap the story up with a 2 hour movie or something.
My wife will lose her mind if she won’t be able to watch Ray kill Angelina Jolie’s Dad.
Liev Schreiber had apparently grown impossible to work with. Many of the episodes of the 7th season had to be rewritten day of, because he refused to work that day.
Which is such a script flip because you’d think it would be Voight, soul-sucking vampire that he is.
Really? Liev has always struck me as one of those consummate professionals
I heard he would leave post it notes that he signed as Roy Donovan to the shows directors.
I looked around and haven’t heard any of this to be true. “Gary Levine, confirmed to our sister site Deadline that Ray Donovan was “nearing the end of its run,” adding that a renewal decision would be made “in the next few weeks.”Levine went on to note that the series was always intended to run “about seven or eight seasons.”
Shit. What was the cliffhanger again?
I know there are a lot of people that love this show, but honestly, i never really thought it was that good. Decent, yes, but nothing better than that.Probably the biggest problem is that Ray is a “fixer” and he usually ends up causing the main story problem in the first place. Bunchy is just annoying, and Terry never really ever seems to have any point in any season. Avi and Lena were the true stars of the show, IMHO, and they wrote the former off as a drug addict for some dumbass reason like 3 seasons ago. I guess the actor was having some off the set issues? Then Lena just leaves for no reason (I know Katherine is on that Showtime L-word show, i guess thats why)Also, they should have put a bullet in Mickey’s head in season 1. What an awful, repetitive, annoying character.
The biggest problem was that it was a show about stupid characters repeatedly doing stupid things. Well-acted characters, for the most part, but incredibly stupid nonetheless.
that’s a big reason i finally stopped watching. at a certain point it just felt too much like wheel spinning.
This is bullshit. I’ve been saying (including in comments on this site and Vulture) that the story really needs to wrap up. This season proved that — went around in circles and just seemed listless. But you HAVE to give the show a true wrap up. You can’t just END it like this. Crazy. I mean, what happens to Connor?! (No, I’m only kidding on that).
I suspect that Liev will take some time off and in time we will probably end up doing some movie (NetFlix, etc) where he is someone like Liam Neeson’s character in Taken. It’s in his wheelhouse and his fans would love it.
He should be John Clark in Tom Clancy’s Jim Halpert season 3. Was pretty effective in Sum of All Fears.
The Jack Ryan series doesn’t have the rights to John Clark (it’s owned by a different studio with Michael B. Jordan attached as Clark).
Hrm, now that I think about it, he did have a Clancy book dedicated entirely to him, just thought it odd that somebody *else* would have exclusive rights to a secondary (if very important) character.Not a bad choice of actor to play him, though.
Yeah, I’m disappointed too that he can’t be on Jack Ryan (and what happened to his standin) but at the same time I’m on board for Jordan.
Yeah, it had been forever since I’ve read any Tom Clancy, so I thought that Matisse guy was John Clark and I was just mis-remembering his name – right up until what happened to him in Season 2.
My first Tom Clancy book was Rainbow Six (I read the book before I played the game, but I think the game made me aware of the book. I’m getting old…). So John Clark was my first main Clancy character so when I read his older stuff, it was weird to see him more background (It makes a ton of sense, but it’s like you watch a season of Fraiser and go back to watch Cheers and be like “WHERE’S FRAISER?!”). Throughout everything, I always enjoyed him more than Jack Ryan though. So when Matisse was throwing out random names in season one I was like “oooh it’s John Clark!” and then…apparently not! It was disappointing.
When I finally stopped reading the Jack Ryan/John Clark books, John Clark was clearly the more action-y (and, to me at the time, cooler) character, so I was definitely taken aback by how directly involved in military actions Jack Ryan is in the show.
He does a lot of documentary narrations. Quite a list of things so being PBS’s “American Experience”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liev_Schreiber#Narration_and_voiceover_work
I don’t know if they’ll ever do a TV miniseries for American Tabloid, but Liev Schreiber would be my pick for Pete Bondurant.
And thus comes to a close my five-year struggle of consistently confusing Roy Donovan for Bosch.
Based just on promotion pictures, these shows like exactly the same.
I think the big difference is that I’d watch Bosch because I’ve enjoyed Titus Welliver in several other things and Ray Donovan looks like someone took Mook #2 from any crime movie and made him the lead.
I’m currently bingeing Bosch right now (just about midway through season 4), and while its no Shield, its overall better written and acted than RD ever was.
I always confused it with Rectify, in that they were both Showtime productions with inscrutable titles.
Old Man Sabretooth
Man, if this is what Showtime does to its favorites… god, I hope Work in Progress will be fine.
Work in Progress is so amazing, and I hope it gets more coverage!
Daryll should’ve smoked Mickey (you know the scene I mean), he was so damaged and so ready – and while it would’ve left his future unresolved, it would’ve at least brought Mickey’s bullshit to an end – the sister’s plot was resolved, the Sullivan’s were all history – and had they got another season, it could’ve kind of been an epilogue to finalize the remaining Donovan stories (and I really wanted to see Terry get some closure, however that worked out …)
Mickey is one of the worst characters on any TV show in recent memory. Not only does he have exactly zero redeeming qualities, but he actually makes me angry when he’s onscreen.
All the hatred for Mickey?!!! Just goes to show what a magnificent actor Jon Voight is. The greatest actor of our time!
I don’t see how anybody could say Jon Voight is the ‘greatest actor of our time’. He’s very, very good, but nowheres near the ‘greatest’.And to be fair, I don’t think any actor would do any better—-the character itself is terrible, I wasn’t criticizing Jon’s performance.
Right? I mean, Voight does a fantastic job with the character, almost too good 😀 I do like how he’s allowed to continue to be such a f-er, and his sons just continue to allow him – shows the level of dysfunction in the family.
Right? I mean, Voight does a fantastic job with the character, almost too good 😀 I do like how he’s allowed to continue to be such a f-er, and his sons just continue to allow him – shows the level of dysfunction in the family.
If the writers would have known that this was the last season they could have easily wrapped it up. A few changes here and there and everything could have been finalized one way or another. I bet one additional show could do the job as well. And yes, I also seriously wanted Daryll to ventilate Mickey’s skull too. Since it was sort of up in the air whether or not a new season would happen, I was thinking that maybe the writers would have known at some point before the public did and that they were writing for the end of the show. All those seasons of torment porn and no money shot.
Holy smokes, yes, just give them a made-for-SHO-movie, sort things out, resolve the Mickey situation. It’s pretty disappointing, we get a terrific season, that sorts of out a bunch of things, but still leaves major plot points just hanging …
Yeah, a two hours final chapter movie/extended episode would be perfect. They could probably still pull it together before the cast scatters to the wind and the public largely forgets about the show/loses interest. It was a decent enough show with enough fans that I think it deserves at least that much closure. I’d even take a single hour Sopranos-ish ending, like they’re all in one room, pisssed at each other, all pointing guns at each other, then you hear a gunshot or multiple gunshots on a black screen and it’s over. Or maybe cut to a final shot of Bridget slightly in the future and she’s looking really rough while she drunkenly sits in a skeezy bar, chain smoking, and talking to some random barfly about being the only ‘survivor’ of the Donovan curse. Shit, something like that would be an easy enough episode to make.
Holy shit man, very nice, if it never happens (and it very likely won’t), I’ll just use your ending for my “in head canon” 😀
Thanks, but it seemed like that was sort of the direction it was heading anyway, so I just extrapolated a bit from the collision course they were on.A bit more in detail. Ray needs to get the brothers together to clean up the story with the FBI. They’re all sitting there in a room hashing it out when Mickey pops in. He still had most of the bonds somehow left and of course he was going to keep most everything, but he decides that he’ll give out a paltry one or two stocks to split up as the ‘kids’ legacy’ while yammering on about how great he is to do that much. Ray calls out Mickey’s bullshit on everything, including Mickey keeping most of the stocks. He grabs the briefcase and opens it up to confirm this while telling them that the bonds are ‘cursed’ and that they are all idiots for following Mickey’s plans. Mickey bitches back while lying about what a great, loving father he is and Ray just finally straight up plugs him right between the eyes! (I would LOVE that part!) A very frustrated and heavily conflicted Daryll immediately shoots Ray. Bunchy being Ray’s new ‘guy’ shoots Daryll just as Daryll shoots him back. Terry, the peacekeeper of the group just watches in horror as everyone else in now dead or dying. He slowly hobbles over and picks up Ray’s gun and with a VERY Shaky hand points it at his own head. His body falls onto the briefcase and completely soaks all of the already blood splattered papers in his blood. And just for closure, it cuts to Sandy driving whatever shitbox of a car as the FBI blocks off the road ahead of her. She rams the shitbox into the Fedmobiles and is nicely ventilated for her stupidity. There is a nice closing shot of blood dripping off that nasty rat’s tail as her body slumps over. (Okay, this is a massive stretch!) Meanwhile Lena is shown landing safely in L.A.. She is greeted by a bunch of adoring women and it is revealed that she has been living an even more massive double life as an iconic lesbian figure named Shane. None of her L-Word friends knew that she had made a lot of money in her double life working as Ray’s fixer! Okay, either that or she just gets away cleanly and lives quietly without any Donovans around. She’s more than smart enough to just disappear into the wind anyway. Some would seriously hate that L-Word ending, but I would laugh my ass off if Showtime actually had the guts to do it! I still like the Bridget in the bar scene. I added the smoking part while she is talking to the barfly because that sorta fit. While she is talking about her entire family being dead, she mentions her mother dying of cancer while she’s puffing away. If that ending doesn’t work for people who are Bridget fans, she could have just hooked up with that music guy that Smitty beat up, but I figure that he isn’t a cool dude to end up with since he was willing to be a (mutually) cheating asshole anyway and two cheaters together don’t tend to do well in relationships. Nah, I still think that Bridget just sitting in some super dingy Irish-themed dive bar, drinking her life away, is a better fit. So, do you have any good script changes to add to this? Or does this work okay? Seriously, it really didn’t take much to add in these bits and pieces, as I figure that’s somewhat how things might have worked out. The whole series seemed to show them as a doomed family who most definitely were not going to have a happy ending anyway.
SAY-BA TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTH! NOooooooo!
And yet Shameless is chugging right along Ray was a slow burn that I enjoyed. How Liev or Eddie Marsan never won an Emmy is beyond me. Bummer.
So Ray won’t get to kill Mickey and give him his just rewards. Sucks.I hope Shameless doesn’t do the same thing, I want to see Frank get shanked in prison like he deserves.
We all know the only reason to subscribe to Showtime
Billions will probably run another seven seasons now. Also can Showtime throw more money at David Lynch?
Yes, please!! All the money that David Lynch wants!
I didn’t even know it still on the air. It didn’t leave much of an impression.
We watch it and the most recent season is sitting on the DVR, untouched.I didn’t realize the season had wrapped.
Sucks, but also opens the door for a cinematic finale a la El Camino for Breaking Bad (though at least that series got a proper sendoff)
I really thought Ray Donovan had cemented itself as the Grey’s Anatomy of Dad crime fiction.Shocking
This is the second time today I’ve had a “holy shit that show is still on?” reaction specific to Showtime. The first was a commercial for the final season of Homeland. I honestly had no idea either of these shows were still in production.I’m not knocking on the quality of either show, honest. I was just legitimately surprised they were still around.
I never saw Homeland, but the obnoxious acclaim the first seasons got kind of turned me off it sight unseen. The show still chugging along with barely anyone caring it still exists is gratifying to me (I’ve never seen it though)
I watched the first 2 seasons of Homeland. The first season really is good television and worth the hype it received. The second season really tried to recapture the intensity of the first, but it just wasn’t there. I may have watched the first episode of the third season (I honestly don’t recall) before I peaced out. And I legitimately thought it had been quietly sent to a farm upstate some time ago, but apparently not.
Could you watch the first season as a stand alone?
Absolutely! The first season tells a full and very engaging story on its own. Honestly, possibly the biggest problem with the second season is that there wasn’t really anything interesting left to say about these characters that the first season hadn’t already covered. Just my opinion, anyway.
I’m surprised it got this far. Its an amazing cast but the characters are all terrible, the story was dreadfully stupid and the fact Jon Voight’s character made it past season 1 made it unwatchable.
Well, anything that fucks over Jon Voight is ok by me.
They’re going to have to come up with something really good to fill all The voids they’ve created with Ray being over and shameless coming to an end next season they need something worth paying for and thanks to the improper ending to the ray series and shameless’s nose dive over the last few seasons they need to do it quick. If there’s nothing worth watching why would I keep paying?
THAT SUCKS…😠