(this review originally published in UpPortland Magazine)
After an unprecedented 113 episode run, NBC’s Superstore concluded its six-season run in March 2021 with the two-part season six finale, “Perfect Store”/”All Sales Final”, marking the end of an important era of working-class American comedies – and perhaps part of NBC’s identity as a whole, as the network looks at an extremely uncertain future in its iconic lineage of sitcoms.
It’s been a strange ride for Superstore from the beginning; after being green lit in January 2015, the series was given the undesirable “mid-season replacement” label, not debuting in the NBC lineup until a full year later in January 2016. And yet somehow, Superstore survived an 11-episode first season in a terrible Monday night time slot, and was rewarded by becoming NBC’s Thursday night comedy anchor next to The Good Place for the majority of its run.
It seemed Superstore was destined from the start to be one of the 2010’s many promising comedies cut down before they were able to find their rhythm – and more importantly, their audience. But unlike Powerless, Free Agents, Abby’s, or any other handful of failed NBC sitcoms from the last decade, NBC believed in Superstore – and that faith was rewarded throughout the series’ run.
Anyone who has listened to The Mid-Season Replacements podcast will know I’m conflicted on whether Superstore will be remembered in the highest echelon of early 21st century comedy, like its network counterparts Community, The Office, Parks & Recreation, and 30 Rock. “All Sales Final” only added to those concerns, as the finale shifted to the Amy/Jonah romance nobody cared about, and spent more of its time wrapping up plot lines nobody really cared about, and throwing a few cheap and tacky (if undeniably heartwarming) endings at the audience.
Despite that, Superstore‘s record as an important comedy of the time remains unblemished: it is arguably the closest the network’s gotten since The Carmichael Show, an ensemble comedy with an unusual one-two punch combination of hilarious character bits and punishing capitalist critique.
For a brief time during its third and fourth seasons, Superstore really was a great series, offering a pro-labor, anti-corporate arc for the ages, as Jonah and Sandra attempted to form a worker’s union, while Amy found herself ascending into the corporate management structure of Cloud 9’s parent company. But as quickly as that story bubbled to the surface, it dissipated into the background, leaving a pleasantly hilarious – if not as consciously relevant or philosophically engaging – series in its midst.
There’s something to be said for a series able to build that kind of legacy in the Age of (Way) Too Much TV: from their arc on Mateo’s immigration, to the fantastic season six premiere “Essential”, Superstore‘s ability to mix in ridiculous characters like Cheyenne and Marcus into meaningful stories about immigration policy and retail work during COVID-19, Superstore was a show that nimbly moved from “socially relevant” to “pointlessly goofy”, pivoting on a moment’s notice (or one of the show’s many, many cutaway jokes poking fun at the observational sport of watching humans be idiots while shopping).
Superstore, even when it wasn’t telling its best or most important stories, presented itself with an effortless confidence much of comedic television (especially on broadcast networks) could learn to admire – with one of the most diverse ensemble casts in recent memory, to boot. Although Superstore proved in the end to be terrible at romance and bad at endings (whoo boy, the preachier moments of “All Sales Final” are a bit rough to get through), it had already solidified its reputation as one of the most consistent, versatile comedies of the decade, as witnessed in everything from season two’s “Black Friday” and “Tornado”, to season five’s “Zephra Cares” and this season’s hilarious “Conspiracy”.
In the end, “All Sales Final” doesn’t try to make a case for its own legacy; instead, it focuses its attention on its characters, and offering a hopeful outlook for the many blue-collar workers built into the DNA of Superstore‘s setting and cast of misfits. And though one might fault the show for throwing a bunch of quick, cheap endings at the audience, there’s no denying the powerful final image it offers, the crew of Cloud 9 reunited at a family BBQ, unmoored from the stress of underpaid, underappreciated work, and embracing each other as family. Though some of Superstore‘s smaller points and lessons may fade with time, those touching last moments spent with the crew, prove that the 40+ hour journey was more than worth the ride.