Seven Seasons of Chaos, and That’s It? Tyler Perry’s The Oval Owes Its Viewers a Better Ending

Over the weekend, I finally found time to binge-watch all 22 episodes of the seventh season of Tyler Perry’s long-running political drama, The Oval. Seven seasons. Years of emotional investment. Countless twists, betrayals, conspiracies and enough White House chaos to make one question the occupants of any presidential mansion.

And after all that, this is how we end things? Dear Tyler Perry, after seven years of loyalty, surely we deserved better than a finale that leaves us stranded in a sea of unanswered questions.

You mean to tell me I have invested seven seasons of my life in The Oval, only for the show to leave me hanging like this? Nah, Tyler Perry. Come back and try that again. We need answers, closure and, quite frankly, at least two more episodes. Because right now, the maths is not mathing.

And I know I cannot be the only viewer staring at the screen wondering: THAT’S IT? Seven seasons of chaos, and The Oval really looked us in the face and said, “Closure? Never heard of her.”

Season seven, episode 22, titled ‘The Filthy Rat’, was released on September 30, 2026. If this is indeed the series finale, then the show has left its audience with a rather significant problem: some of its most compelling storylines appear to have been abandoned at the very moment they needed resolution.

First, Priscilla and Simone. Did they survive the bomb blast? Their fate is precisely the kind of question a finale should answer, particularly when the audience has spent seasons becoming invested in the characters and their place in the wider political drama.

Then there is Jason, whose encounter with a lethal injection administered by Victoria leaves viewers wondering what happens next. Is he alive? What are the consequences of Victoria’s actions? And are we expected to simply move on without knowing?

Sharon’s storyline presents another loose end. What becomes of her after Kareem directs the Mexican cartel towards her? Does she escape, survive or suffer the consequences of being caught in a dangerous web of criminal intrigue?

And what about the Vice President? Did he die after being poisoned?

Then there is Cross, Alex and Agent Kane, whose involvement in delivering the smoothie to the Vice President raises further questions about their fate. Are they held accountable? Do they escape the consequences of their actions? Or is there another twist waiting in the wings?

These are not minor details tucked away in the margins of the story. They are questions surrounding characters, decisions and conflicts that have helped sustain the series. Leaving them unresolved risks making the finale feel less like a deliberate conclusion and more like an abrupt interruption.

To be fair, The Oval has built its reputation on outrageous twists, high-stakes political intrigue, volatile relationships and cliffhangers designed to keep viewers coming back for more. Unpredictability is part of the show’s appeal. You rarely watch an episode expecting everybody to behave sensibly or for the White House to enjoy a quiet afternoon.

But a series finale operates under different expectations. A season finale can tease the next chapter. A series finale must contend with the story that has already been told. It does not need to answer every conceivable question, explain every character’s future or tie every loose end into a neat little bow. However, it should offer some meaningful resolution to the central conflicts it has spent years developing.

That is where The Oval risks falling short. There is an art to leaving an audience thinking about a show long after the credits roll. There is also a difference between an ending that invites interpretation and one that leaves viewers wondering whether they accidentally missed an episode.

The former can be a bold creative decision. The latter can feel like unfinished business.

And for a show that has thrived on keeping its audience hooked, the distinction matters. Seven seasons deserve more than a collective “What just happened?”

Television audiences invest more than their time. They invest in characters, relationships, theories and the emotional highs and lows of a fictional world. In the age of streaming, that investment can mean spending an entire weekend catching up on episodes, avoiding spoilers and joining online conversations to make sense of the latest twist.

For international audiences, including viewers watching from Kenya, that attachment is part of the pleasure of following a long-running American drama. The White House may be thousands of kilometres away, but compelling storytelling travels. Political intrigue, family dysfunction, power struggles and betrayal are hardly confined to one country’s television screens.

That is why the ending matters. Viewers do not necessarily demand happy endings. Sometimes the most satisfying conclusion is tragic, uncomfortable or deliberately ambiguous. Characters can die. Villains can escape justice. Good people can make terrible decisions. A show does not owe its audience a fairy tale.

But it does owe its storytelling some intention. If a character’s fate is left uncertain, that uncertainty should contribute to the meaning of the ending. If a major conflict remains unresolved, the audience should have reason to believe that the ambiguity is deliberate rather than the result of a story running out of room.

Otherwise, the cliffhanger stops being a storytelling device and starts feeling like a broken promise.

To the fans who have stuck with The Oval through seven seasons of political scheming, explosive confrontations and enough twists to fill several emergency meetings, I feel your pain.

We have questions. We need answers. And we would very much appreciate a little closure. Perhaps the intention was to leave audiences debating the characters’ fates. Perhaps there is a creative rationale behind the final episode’s unresolved threads. But if *The Filthy Rat* is truly the final word on this universe, I cannot help feeling that the story deserved a more considered goodbye.

Dear Tyler Perry, we have been loyal. We have watched the drama unfold. We have survived the betrayals, the conspiracies and the chaos. Surely, we can negotiate two more episodes? Because seven seasons of emotional investment should not end with viewers conducting their own investigations into what happened to half the cast.

For now, I am left with one final question: was that really the ending, or did somebody forget to upload the last two episodes? Tyler Perry, the floor is yours. And please, for the sake of our collective sanity, let the answers be forthcoming.