An Ending With Possibilities, Covert Affairs “Gold Soundz” 

I am far from ready to say goodbye to Covert Affairs, but I have to say, if “Gold Soundz” is the last episode we ever see, I’m OK with that. It was a season finale that was surprisingly hopeful. And amazingly — everyone made it out alive. When the promo stills were released that focused on the Campbells, I was genuinely afraid something was going to happen to Joan and/or Arthur out of left field.

Instead, they were both offered brand new career paths — validating Joan’s rise at the Agency, and giving Arthur an opportunity to enter the Senate and clean the slate about why he left the CIA. It was an interesting turn of events.

Calder takes down the goon who attacked Stephanie and then he returns to her bedside, where he kisses her forehead and tells her he got him and waits for her to wake up.

There’s also a marriage proposal on the table from McQuaid to Annie, after last week’s admission, out loud, that they love each other. She doesn’t tell him yes. She doesn’t tell him no. But she expresses her concerns about their life, and the potential for death at every turn.

“What makes us so great is what makes this so difficult. Our jobs are risky. People I’ve loved have died doing this work.

“You can do this job and die, or not do this job and die.”

“I don’t want to lose you.”

“Then don’t.”

So they leave it on the table, but they’re together, hand in hand.

And Belenko survives — which was the biggest surprise of all. If they come back, the door is open for him to be an ally for the Agency.

At home, Auggie listens to Deckard’s debrief, and Deckard looks at Auggie as he tells the team his rationale for leaving, and we realize Auggie’s never heard this, or he never asked. It hits him that his friend had a point all those years ago, leaving the Agency behind so that it wasn’t all that his life ever was. And so he decides to take the reins of his own life and leave to travel the world with Natasha.

Unbeknownst to him, Annie returns home and is offered a role to come back in as part of Joan’s fancy new task force. She tells Joan it’s what she would have wanted months ago, but she doesn’t say yes to it now.

She also doesn’t tell Auggie that when he comes to tell her in person about his decision. She embraces her friend and wishes him well, and Piper Perabo and Chris Gorham have another one of those wonderful scenes where everything Annie doesn’t say is all over her face but Auggie does not see it. He knows she’s hesitant about something and calls her on it.

“Is something else going on?”

“I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“I just have a lot of big decisions to make.”

“Since when do you have trouble making decisions?”

“I know, I’m the first one out of the plane. Mission decisions, life and death, I can do it. But these…are more difficult.”

He puts his hands on her shoulders and tells her to close her eyes. She questions it.

“Wisdom of the blind. Close your eyes.”

“Closed.”

“I want you to look inside yourself. I want you to try to feel your instincts talking to you. Your intuition has never let you down before and it won’t now, so trust it. Trust your heart.”

The camera pulls back as she meditates on that, searching, and Auggie waits. Then she finds it, lets out a deep breath, and opens her eyes. “Got it.”

Like I said, a lot of hope for a show that’s usually fraught with looming danger. I was waiting for a last-second gotcha that turned it all on its ear. Instead, everyone is in a good, safe place, and we can say goodbye to them knowing that they’re not in immediate peril. Last season’s finale, which I loved, was similarly peaceful and hopeful but Annie wasn’t home yet.

If they come back next year, there are so many new threads to pick back up. It’s not a reset, but it’s another evolution in a show that’s allowed all of its cast to wander different paths, stray apart, and then come back together. I do hope we see them all again. If we don’t, I love where we leave them. I’m OK with saying goodbye here.

Chris Gorham said during a press call last month that he wouldn’t want to end the show here. Until USA announces a renewal, this is what we have. And it’s as fine a closure as any.