How Neighbours tricked fans with its emotional finale storyline

Neighbours spoilers follow from the show’s series finale.

How do you end a show that’s never really supposed to end?

It’s a dilemma that thankfully doesn’t crop up too often in Soapland, but it was exactly the question faced by Neighbours boss Jason Herbison and his team this year after the long-running series was cancelled by Channel 5.

In various interviews from the show’s producers and cast, we were promised a celebratory ending which would honour Neighbours’ impressive legacy.

Explosions, earthquakes or other variations of a soap apocalypse were quickly ruled out. We were assured that life in Ramsay Street would continue, at least in our imaginations. Phew.

In recent days, though, fans had started to suspect that they’d been slightly misled over Neighbours’ final storyline. Despite all the talk of Ramsay Street being eternal, one by one, various residents announced sudden plans to sell up and move on.

Before long, fan favourites Susan and Karl Kennedy stepped out onto the Street and found themselves surrounded by For Sale signs. Even the Rodwell family, who’d barely unpacked after moving in weeks earlier, were mysteriously moving on.

After a few days of dramatic “We’re moving!” announcements from half the cast, Neighbours superfans on Twitter started to get slightly ticked off.

There was something depressing about the thought of a sudden Ramsay Street exodus. Robbing viewers of the comforting thought that life would go on as normal in the fictional world of Erinsborough seemed too cruel.

We were starting to hear echoes of Channel 4’s Brookside, which famously ended with Brookside Close boarded up ahead of demolition and everyone moving on to start afresh.

Fortunately, as Neighbours’ hour-long finale aired on Friday night, fans quickly realised they’d been led up the garden path with one final soapy twist.

The idea of Ramsay Street existing without popular characters like Toadie, Melanie, Terese, David and Aaron was surely unthinkable – and it turned out that Neighbours producers felt the same way.

After Toadie and Melanie tied the knot, the happy couple were greeted with some video messages from old friends and neighbours, who wanted to wish them well. There was a running theme in their musings: Toadie should stay on Ramsay Street.

Before long, Toadie and Mel dutifully obliged and announced that their move was off. It was a trend that was catching on all round – Paul, Terese, David, Aaron, Nicolette, Kiri and the Rodwells were all sticking around too.

Only Chloe Brennan seemed likely to move on, planning to move to Sydney with Elly Conway after their romantic reunion. A reconciliation also aired for Paul and Terese, ensuring that all dedicated shippers could end the evening happy.

The sudden and implausible u-turns over who was coming and going were the kind of silliness that could only work on Neighbours.

But with all the media attention and spoilers focused squarely on the list of returning cast, the fate of Ramsay Street’s residents was a sleight of hand that provided an element of surprise on the night. Judging by some of the miffed reactions on social media this week when everyone seemed to be moving, they had us going for a while there.

The Neighbours finale benefited from being plotted by a team who genuinely love the show. Executive producer Jason Herbison (who penned the finale) and script producer Shane Isheev were dedicated fans of the soap long before they were steering the ship.

The wedding of Toadie and Melanie, and the recent return of the Ramsay Street history book, cleverly provided reasons for former characters to return or make video cameos.

Guy Pearce’s character Mike Young slotted back in effortlessly, playing a central role as he took a trip down memory lane with Jane Harris.

The much-hyped return of Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan as Scott and Charlene Robinson was a heartwarming moment which provided plenty of nostalgia, but as the stars themselves reportedly wished, didn’t overshadow proceedings.

Unsurprisingly though, there was a clear ’80s focus for the benefit of returning viewers. This could have risked alienating the fans more familiar with the ’90s and ’00s eras, but the final segments pulled it back by shifting focus.

It was a genuine delight to see familiar faces like Margot Robbie (Donna Freedman), Natalie Imbruglia (Beth Brennan), Delta Goodrem (Nina Tucker), Jesse Spencer (Billy Kennedy), Kym Valentine (Libby Kennedy) and Carla Bonner (Steph Scully) making video cameos in the show that made them household names.

The returns from Beth and Flick, who randomly bumped into each other in a park, were gloriously silly. And what on earth was Philip Martin randomly doing there at the end?

Producers also left a few loose ends up in the air (it is a soap after all), with intrigue surrounding Amy Greenwood’s revelation that she’d found someone to father a child with her.

While the strength of Neighbours is always in embracing the ensemble cast, there’s no doubt that Jackie Woodburne stole the show as Susan Kennedy.

Jackie, arguably the most beloved of all the current Neighbours stars, had the well-deserved honour of wrapping things up as she wrote her entry into the Ramsay Street history book.

Tears will have been shed on both sides of the world thanks to Susan’s heartfelt voiceover, reflecting on Ramsay Street and what it meant to her.

This included Susan’s thoughts of those who couldn’t be there, allowing poignant cameos from dead characters like Madge Bishop, Sonya Rebecchi, Doug Willis and Hendrix Greyson. Even supervillain Finn Kelly popped up again.

Susan commented: “Everyone deserves a place in the history of Ramsay Street, even those who watched us from afar. Together, we have been the perfect blend.”

The unmissable reunion of stars past and present seemingly proved irresistible to Australian viewers on Thursday night (July 28), where the show topped the 1 million mark for the first time in 13 years. This was largely because Neighbours had been promoted back to mainstream station Channel 10 for the finale.

This is sure to raise questions over missed opportunities. Neighbours was in a creative slump when Australia dumped it to multichannel in 2010, but ironically improved significantly in the years that followed on its digital network. By 2013, the show was on top form again.

Sadly, few in Australia were watching and the show became entirely reliant on its UK funding from Channel 5, which we now know was a precarious position. Could the show still be running strong like Home and Away if it had been put back on the main channel sooner?

The buzz surrounding the finale shows the strength of the Neighbours brand, so at Team Digital Spy, we’ll always hold out hope that the wonderful world of Erinsborough can be revisited on our screens sooner or later.

Check out Digital Spy’s other Neighbours finale coverage:

– Channel 5 breaks silence on Neighbours ending, fan reaction and big finale night plans

– Neighbours star Takaya Honda on secret exit plan and show ending

– Neighbours star April Rose Pengilly on show axe, Elly return and Chloe memories

– Neighbours star Geoff Paine explains Clive’s absence and teases show ending

– Neighbours star Charlotte Chimes on scrapped Nicolette story and show ending

– Neighbours star Richard Huggett on Glen Donnelly ending and show finale

– Neighbours star Lucinda Cowden on axed stories, Mel and Toadie, and show finale

– Neighbours star Stefan Dennis on why the axed soap deserves a lifeline

– Neighbours star Alan Fletcher on show ending and Izzy return

Read more Neighbours coverage on our dedicated homepage