Unpopular opinion, perhaps, but I think Ellen DeGeneres absolutely could have made a major comeback at some point. It’s just that her attempted comeback this year hasn’t worked, and now she’s probably going to pack it in for good. The last season of her talk show – 2021-22 – collapsed under the weight of all of the accusations against Ellen and her producers. I believed many of those accusations, that Ellen had fostered a toxic workplace and that producers abused their authority and that many people hated working there. After the show ended in 2022, Ellen went away for a couple of years, then she decided to come back to standup. She filmed some of her shows for Netflix comedy specials and I’m not sure there’s much of an appetite for them, given the subject matter. The subject is: Ellen on the back foot, trying to make jokes about how people thought she was mean, and they were being mean to her or something. It wasn’t even a pivot, nor was it funny, probably because she’s still trying to process what the hell happened. Well, she’s done with all of that, it seems:

Ellen DeGeneres said during a recent stop on her “Ellen’s Last Stand…Up” tour that she is done with fame once she plays her final shows, which will be filmed for a new Netflix special (via People and SFGate). During the audience Q&A part of the show at the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts in Santa Rosa, one fan asked if DeGeneres would return to movies after the tour ended or perhaps try her hand at Broadway.

“Um, no,” DeGeneres answered matter-of-factly. “This is the last time you’re going to see me. After my Netflix special, I’m done.”

Another fan pushed DeGeneres to once again voice the character Dory from Pixar’s “Finding Nemo” and “Finding Dory,” but DeGeneres responded: “No, I’m going bye-bye, remember.”

DeGeneres kicked off the “Ellen’s Last Stand…Up” tour earlier this year and recently canceled four dates on the lineup. She’s been using the shows to address the misconduct accusations that hit as “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” was coming to an end after a nearly 20-year run.

The talk show ended amid a series of reports detailing allegations of racism, sexual misconduct and intimidation behind the scenes. Variety also reported on crew members’ frustrations with how the production handled compensation during the COVID pandemic. DeGeneres gave an on-air apology and three producers were fired after WarnerMedia conducted an internal investigation.

[From Variety]

My question: if Ellen is, as I said, still processing what happened over the past four years, why did she even attempt this standup comeback at all? Why not wait and go to therapy and figure out what’s next and really think about it? She still has tons of A-list friends and she still has fans. People would have loved to see her stage a real comeback after she grew and became a better person. Oh well.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.