I really liked the ending of the series a lot; I thought the final two episodes tied together the loose ends I cared about and finished on a theme that really highlighted the core messages of the show. To me, it was exactly the ending I wanted for the show. When they announced Distant Lands, I immediately felt annoyed, because I thought "they're going to take a nearly perfect ending and risk ruining it by adding more crap to it??"
Initially I wasn't going to watch Distant Lands because I was afraid it might tarnish the series for me, but eventually I caved and was surprised to find that it a) didn't do anything to ruin the original ending, and b) actually had interesting ideas to share that the show is better for having. I thought Obsidian and Together Again really did a great job continuing the series in such a way that it didn't negate anything I loved about the original show, and posed some more interesting thematic elements about the characters. I don't know if it's Pendleton or someone else in the Cartoon Network staff, but whomever is in charge of Adventure Time really seems to know what they're doing. I get the impression that they will only allow a new thing to be added to the franchise if it has a good reason to exist.
Fionna and Cake did a great job maturing the series a bit, without it being gratuitous. It ended so well that I'm a bit concerned that they renewed it for a second season, but I've been wrong twice before and I'm cautiously optimistic that they'll keep up the quality.
Haha, this happens so infrequently I don't even kno how to reply - I agree with everything you've said and felt exactly the same about distant lands. I thought it was brilliantly done - still AT but not near enough to the story that I don't want changed, even retroactively. They didn't - instead nailed the nostalgia and all the feels
The finale theme song is the one I was meaning earlier, I'll get emotional if I think about it too much. It was all just so well done. That episode demonstrated how far we had come - we all grew up with Finn, he made it. That's the end.
I could write a book about how I feel about this show.
I remember Adam Muto being someone I thought was more heavily involved in the direction of the later seasons than Pendleton - he also leads the Distant Lands project I think.
Initially I wasn't going to watch Distant Lands because I was afraid it might tarnish the series for me, but eventually I caved and was surprised to find that it a) didn't do anything to ruin the original ending, and b) actually had interesting ideas to share that the show is better for having. I thought Obsidian and Together Again really did a great job continuing the series in such a way that it didn't negate anything I loved about the original show, and posed some more interesting thematic elements about the characters. I don't know if it's Pendleton or someone else in the Cartoon Network staff, but whomever is in charge of Adventure Time really seems to know what they're doing. I get the impression that they will only allow a new thing to be added to the franchise if it has a good reason to exist.
Fionna and Cake did a great job maturing the series a bit, without it being gratuitous. It ended so well that I'm a bit concerned that they renewed it for a second season, but I've been wrong twice before and I'm cautiously optimistic that they'll keep up the quality.