The series finale played a brilliantly dangerous game.
Warning: thisInside No.
Rip our hearts out, why dont you,Inside No.9.
Who saw that twist coming?
The setting was a swanky club hosting theInside No.
The guest stars were a night skys worth of realInside No.
9s guest stars from across the years.
After a montage ofInside No.
Then a final happy (?)
ending saw them give in and finally make themuch-discussed1970s-sitcom-style No.
9 bus episode they teased last year.
Fans know about it.
Blurring the line between the real and the made-up gave this finale jeopardy.
Because ifthatwas real, then how much else could be?
The number nine, for all its talismanic presence in this show, means nothing at all.
Its part-trinket, part-game, just like the silver hare statue hidden in every episode.
Their steady partnership is the common factor behind this whole endeavour.
So to make viewers lean forward, what better thing to put in danger?
Those are just stories.
Jeopardising this bedrock real-life friendship was much more dramatically potent.
And it really worked.
Because woven in with the satirical, reference-patchwork story was something totally unironic.
To theirs and to ours.
To a decade of everybodys life having passed in betweenepisode oneand episode 55.
For all the finales self-deprecating mockery and clever nods, there was nothing ersatz about its emotion.
