"Jon and Kate Plus 8" comes to an end
Photo credit: AP | Kate Gosselin, right, from the reality TV show, 'Jon and Kate Plus 8,' leaves court, Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2009, in Norristown, Pa., after a hearing regarding her split with her husband Jon Gosselin.
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Happy Thanksgiving, Jon and Kate.
No, strike the "happy."
Thanksgiving, Jon and Kate.
Five seasons of "Jon and Kate Plus 8" - Cara, Mady, Alexis, Hannah, Aaden, Collin, Leah, Joel - and this is what we ended up with. Anger, bitterness, recriminations, tears, cows, lemons, faux happy family scenes, and two people who still don't know how lucky and blessed their lives have been.
>> PHOTOS: Click here to see highlights and lowlights from Jon and Kate Plus 8
There's a lesson in here somewhere. Apparently it's been lost on them.
What a ride. Finally, the ride did grind to an end last night. Maybe this will be a happy Thanksgiving after all - for the rest of us. Enough is enough.
Said Kate Gosselin of the split - with Jon or the show? - "It's sad. It's needless. It's useless. It's totally avoidable." When she said this, she was sitting on a tiny white couch - a love seat, perhaps, ironically enough - with a brown striped pillow, lumped and lonely, propped up next to her.
That's where Jon would have sat. She seemed hardened and cold, but not too cold because she has to get ready for a new TLC show next spring.
The kids "don't know about the girlfriends at all," she said. "That's too warped for them, too unhealthy."
As always, Jon came off like a jerk. TLC, which had to scuttle the show after he denied film crews access to the mansion, made certain of that. (Both are involved in bitter counter-suits.)
>>VIDEO: Click here to see the last moments of the show
But Jon Gosselin also has a perverse genius for making a fool of himself.
Of his fast new life, he says, "when I get sick of [New York] city, I go back to my country place and chill." After scolding the children while making lemonade, he says, "I move fast 'cause I wanna get out of here."
There were trips with Kate and the kids to a local dairy farm. Jon helped raise money for the Wernersville fire station.
It wasn't entirely clear when some of these scenes were filmed, given that Jon has been hit with a breach of contract lawsuit.
But it was also abundantly clear this split-screen style of reality TV couldn't continue, with Jon in one place and Kate in another, both faking a grim, joyless sort of happiness for the cameras one last time.
What a bummer. At least the kids are still cute and innocent. In time they'll learn what their parents did to them, and to each other.
>> PHOTOS: Click here to see highlights and lowlights from Jon and Kate Plus 8
