Better Things final season review: So long, and thanks for all the feelings

In the end, all we have are our stories — and most of them, if we're honest, are small. Going out with a friend who has a bit too much to drink at dinner. Experiencing the stress of "packing shpilkes" the night before a big trip. Sharing a charged moment with the TaskRabbit guy. Most TV series traffic in Big Moments; Better Things is a show where events don't so much happen as they unfurl, at their own pace, in front of our eyes. In the fifth and final season (premiering Feb. 28 on FX), creator-writer-director-star Pamela Adlon leads her characters on a quest to understand their own stories — and sends them off to write the rest without us.

Sam Fox (Adlon), like many people who have crossed the threshold into middle age, is spending a lot of time lately thinking about her place in the universe. The season opens at the start of Sam's day; she checks her blood pressure, lets the dogs out, makes a smoothie — all while Eric Idle croons "Galaxy Song," Monty Python's ode to the mystery and miracle of existence. ("So, remember when you're feeling very small and insecure/How amazingly unlikely is your birth.") Sam's eldest daughter, Max (Mikey Madison), has been out of the house for years. Her youngest, 13-year-old Duke (Olivia Edward), barely looks up from her phone. Brilliant middle child Frankie (Hannah Riley) is still exploring the idea of gender identity and balks at terms like "daughter." Sam is as inclusive as they come, but this leaves her feeling unmoored: "I've always been the mom of three daughters — who would I be then?"

It's a big question, and with her empty-nest future looming, Sam turns to the past for answers. Her headstrong mom, Phil (Celia Imrie), has no patience for nostalgia. "What difference does all of this make now?" she scoffs. "A life, then gone." Nevertheless, Sam persists, digging through Phil's boxed-up memories and dragging her emotionally labile brother, Marion (Kevin Pollack, a master at repressed exasperation), to a genealogist to learn more about their family history. "That makes me feel like we're a part of a greater chain of history and humanity," she explains. "It gives me confidence somehow — like I'm important, and you are."

In a way, that's the legacy of Better Things. For six years and 52 episodes, Adlon's series has centered on the stories of everyday women — moms, sisters, daughters, friends — and elevated the ephemera of their day-to-day lives into art. For Sam, motherhood is the molten fire at the core of her being, and it's also the absolute apex of thankless misery. It's a drunken Max grabbing her face and exclaiming: "Mom! I love you so much! I would die if you died!" But it's also Duke sitting in the passenger seat as Sam drives, and then snapping at her mom for "listening in" on a "private" conversation with a friend. ("I'm sitting right next to you," Sam shoots back. "Do you want me to just pretend I'm unconscious?")

Not that being a daughter is any easier. Every phase of womanhood presents its own terrible-slash-wonderful challenges, and Better Things honors them all. Duke is deep in the hate hole that is female adolescence — desperately uncomfortable with everything about herself. "Like, I hate my face, like, I hate my body. I don't leave the house," she sobs, when called out by her best friend, Pepper (Emma Shannon). "I'm not good at anything." It's painfully relatable to anyone who's ever been (or known) a teenage girl. What a gift it was to watch Edward, Aligood, and Madison — exquisitely natural talents — grow up on screen.

This is a season of big changes and small victories, of overseas travel and ever-present work agita. Sam's agent (Mario Cantone) books her a film role in a period piece, which leads to a hilariously invasive fitting involving hoop skirts and corsets. Ron Cephas Jones (as himself) offers his old pal Sam a gig directing his new network sitcom, but it doesn't go as smoothly as she'd expect. Also playing himself this season: Danny Trejo, who bumps into Sam at a school volunteer event. (Though in Adlon's universe, Trejo has 18 (!) children, 15 more than he's fathered in real life.) Better Things has always been a sort of nirvana for character actors, and it's hard to imagine we'll ever be treated to another show that puts Cree Summer, Judy Gold, Alysa Reiner, Rebecca Metz, and Judy Reyes (as Sam's spiritual sisters Lenny, Chaya, Sunny, Tessa, and Lala, respectively) in so many scenes together. Diedrich Bader remains a droll delight as Sam's non-romantic soulmate, Rich, who supports Max during a major life decision. Even when they have their own issues to deal with — both Rich and Sunny find themselves reevaluating past relationships this season — Sam's people are always there, to support her, to eat her lovingly-prepared food, to drop by with pizza when she's too busy to cook.

Sam is a nurturer, a caretaker, happiest when she's surrounded by people she loves. Halfway through the season, Sam takes a rare morning to herself and goes jogging up and down L.A.'s Mattachine Steps, as part of a vague new commitment to fitness. The solitude is blissful. Then she passes a man (Tim McKernan) sitting on the landing, sobbing quietly to himself. Unsure for a second what to do, Sam takes a seat by his side, sitting with him in silence so he won't be alone. Soon a rude woman pushes past, snapping at them for taking up too much room. It breaks the tension, and Sam and Sad Guy burst out laughing. "Life's funny," says Sam. "Even when it's sad." It's another small moment, a short story whose power lingers despite its brevity — and it's the perfect epitaph for Better Things. Thanks for sitting with us, Sam Fox. Season 5 and series grade: A

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