Grade: B+ | Genre: Comedy Summary: The chaos just fed on itself until the family lunacy hit fever pitch. While it was far from the best I've seen from Arrested, it was a quality set of episodes that aptly closed out this series of innovative comedy. Quality television and ratings bonanzas rarely collide in the television cosmos. For each Lost and Desperate Housewives that prop up this universe, you have the Scrubs and Arrested Developments of this world, hording just as many Emmys while battling tooth and nail simply to make sure they have a time slot from week to week. It's hardly a fair system, but it rests on the almighty advertising dollar so its not going to change no matter how blue in the face we get. Truthfully, it's high time we relocate all the grade-A television to the cable tier of the dial anyway, giving the writers and producers the creative flexibility to push the outer bounds of fun and decency. Such is the situation devilishly funny Arrested Development finds itself after three embattled seasons at Fox. The network has finally pulled the plug on its best series after jerking its fans around all season by putting the comedy on extended hiatus and even crunching the series finale up into four episodes and planting it on a Friday night of all places. If it weren't for my priceless DVR box, I probably wouldn't have caught a single episode of season 3. Enough huffing and puffing about the evils of Fox, let's take perhaps our final look at Arrested Development.

For the final episode, George Bluth (Jeffery Tambor) finally comes to trial for his treasonous actions, building homes in Iraq. Before they serve him up to the legal sharks, they take him on a dry run on a new television show called The Judge Reinhold Show hosted by none other than Judge Reinhold. Yeah, amazingly he really did make it out of the 80's. Who would have guessed? If that weren't enough zaniness, William Hung is the show's Paul Shaffer, performing during the cutaways with his Hung jury. God, I'm going to miss this overdose of cheese. Michael (Jason Bateman) wants to defend his father, dreaming back to the days his legal career sputtered to an end during a play in elementary school, but George will only let him take on the mock trial. Each member of the Bluth family is asked to testify against dear old dad so Lucille (Jessica Walter) talks Buster (Tony Hale) into lapsing into a fake coma to keep him from spilling the beans. Michael slyly records a conversation with the prosecutor, badgering him to give up the goods on his father or start spooning with Bubba in the big house. Michael wins the mock trial, and William Hung is singing his tone deaf little heart out.

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Michael stumbles across a secret room in the Bluth family house, which has Tobias' gay porn stash as well as incriminating family documents and photos. In his quest to track down the mysterious N. Bluth, he discovers a photo of what he's convinced is his older sister, Nellie. He digs up an old Compaq suitcase computer of his fathers and gets a number to track down Nellie. Nellie, played by Jason's own sister Justine of Family Ties fame, is actually a prostitute, but the train isn't going all the way to the station in Michael's head on that one. Michael hires Nellie to whip the Bluth Corporation into shape and sure enough every male employee walked out that day with a fresh spring in his step. Michael finally learns the truth about Nellie's profession and her not being his sister.

It seems Nellie's not the only one who isn't Michael's sister. Lindsay is actually adopted, not to mention three years older than she first thought. When she finds out, the first thing she does is to jump her ex-brother Michael's bones. He chunks her off of him, saying he doesn't do older chicks, only to end up awkwardly nuzzled in bed with Tobias. Jerry Springer could make an entire season out of covering the Bluth-capades. So the company is finally out from under the shadow of George's shady dealings after Buster and Michael go over to Iraq to spring Gob out of prison for trying out his Biblical chops by burning a bush. You see the Iraqis got all excited thinking he was burning Bush. Common misconception I'd imagine. While the Bluth boys are in country, they run across a house full of Saadam look alikes, and a dummy nuclear warhead the CIA planted to gather Intel on the Bluths. The government cuts a deal to keep their secrets under wraps and soon George is doing his best rendition of "Free Bird." So at the end of the day, Lucille sells the Bluth Corporation for pennies on the dollar to rug wearing Sitwell. The SEC pounces on their gala party, by boat mind you, to finally take these shady Bluth's down. Michael and George Michael manage to escape in Gob's yacht with five hundred grand and a course set for Cabo.

If this all sounds like a horribly jumbled mess, it's because it was -- but in a very funny way. The chaos just fed on itself until the family lunacy hit fever pitch. It furiously tried to wrap-up all the outstanding storylines in a convincing manner, and I must say, it succeeded admirably. While it was far from the best I've seen from Arrested, it was a quality set of episodes that aptly closed out this series of innovative comedy. The producers are in talks to possibly move the show to Showtime or ABC. I certainly hope it finds new life on a smarter network, but if this was the Bluth's last hoorah, let me say it was fun watching you take a piss all over normalcy. Let no one ever say this series didn't have balls of steel for floating this widely unconventional series on network television.