The Comeback Season 3 Review: Valerie Cherish’s Final Chapter

The Comeback season 3, which debuts its first of eight episodes on HBO this Sunday, March 22 at 8 p.m. EDT, does some of its best work throughout its blockbuster of a final season. While Lisa Kudrow’s Valerie Cherish has always been a hilarious entry point to TV stardom in all its forms, The Comeback season 3’s sense of finality allows for a different Valerie to emerge.

Throughout the run of The Comeback, which has gone through three very different iterations over the past two decades, viewers have been uncertain of what to expect. The show’s first season, which debuted on HBO in 2005, explored the advent of reality TV in a less-than-receptive Hollywood, but brought a distinct sense of heart into the mix by way of Valerie herself, simply hoping to keep going.

The Comeback’s first season, which masterfully layers one of the most incredible character breakdowns I’ve ever seen on camera with the switcheroo of Valerie’s overnight success, introduced the elements of cringe comedy that viewers should come to expect from the series. In the second season, which aired in 2014, The Comeback flipped its concept on its ear, bringing a hungrier Valerie into a space overly-saturated by reality stars.

When the thing that had made Valerie both cutting-edge and a social pariah became commonplace, Kudrow’s character had to crawl her way back to relevancy, nearly losing what she held close in the process. Valerie’s relationships, both with her patient-to-a-point husband Mark Berman (Damian Young) and her kindly, long-standing hairdresser and best friend Micky Deane (Robert Michael Morris), were in jeopardy.

Valerie learns the hard way that it’s tough to keep up with the times when they change so much quicker than they used to.

The ending of The Comeback season 2, which pulled away from the mockumentary style of the series and brought Valerie back into a somewhat darker, more difficult reality, is one of the best finale moments in modern TV. Valerie, watching her name announced at the Emmy’s from Mickey’s hospital room as she clutches both his and Mark’s hands, is a revelation in a completely different way.

I wasn’t sure that anything could top it, if I’m being entirely honest. I was fearful, as I’m sure some of you are, that The Comeback couldn’t possibly make a comeback of its own. I was worried that tackling AI could lead to a more moralistic, almost chiding style of comedy that the first two seasons of the series skillfully avoided.

I was fearful that Valerie herself, 10 years removed from our last visit and 20 from her debut, could feel unintentionally dated, or cringe in a way that doesn’t work in 2026. I was trepidatious to see how the show would function without Mickey, as Morris passed in 2017 after a battle with cancer of his own.

While all of these fears made sense from a viewer’s perspective, The Comeback did what it does best, quelling my nerves in mere minutes and ushering me into its best season yet.

Valerie Cherish’s Blissful Ignorance Sets The Comeback Season 3’s Tone

Valerie Cherish, who by the time The Comeback season 3 begins is pushing 60 and struggling to find her lane, has always been the heart and soul of the series. While there have been other moral centers of Valerie’s universe, storied TV director James Burrows for one, her presence has always been what makes the show work. The Comeback season 3 is no different, despite Valerie’s past successes seemingly giving her an interesting slate of opportunities since viewers saw her last.

While Valerie chose love during The Comeback season 2 premiere, when we meet her again in a quick 2023 flashback, she’s managed to wrap herself up in something entirely different. After blowing off the hard work of Chicago: The Musical on Broadway and trying to disguise it as a choice in support of the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes of the moment, Valerie learns the hard way that it’s tough to keep up with the times when they change so much quicker than they used to.

As Valerie moves through the season, there are many moments where Kudrow is able to play her in the same ignorant-yet-intense style she always has, but the changes in Valerie are what makes this season great. Valerie, who has always felt in charge of her own life without actually having that power, comes to a point where she has no choice but to stand her ground. This convergence is fascinating to watch, and seeing the choices Valerie (and Kurdrow) makes is endlessly entertaining.

The Comeback Season 3 Has Learned From Past Season’s Limitations

As a mockumentary-style series, The Comeback has gone through several iterations of what it looks and feels like. The first season, flanked by a shaky camera and a “raw footage” notice ahead of every episode to remind you it hadn’t been edited, was a style that worked for its time. As The Comeback aged, it made way for improvements. A slightly more hybrid model of season 2 was more palatable, getting the found footage messaging across without constant reminders.

The Comeback season 2’s finale opted to allow Valerie out of her cage, so to speak. Forging ahead without her cameras or her crew, Valerie was alone for one of the first times in the show’s history, and the series switched to a single-cam setup rather than a multi-cam. The shift was so impactful and so resonant, bringing the story full-circle in a way that still feels like an achievement. Thankfully, The Comeback season 3 learned from the show’s choices through the years.

While the series still plays with found footage in a fun way, Valerie’s antics couldn’t entirely lend themselves to a reality TV or social media heavy model. Instead, Kudrow and co-creator Michael Patrick King opt to switch between the found footage format and a single-camera structure, which allows viewers to move seamlessly through Valerie’s world and vantage point. By not limiting itself to the mockumentary style, each episode of The Comeback functions as a more fully-formed product.

A Heightened Return To Form Makes The Comeback A Near-Perfect Satire

The stakes have never been higher for Valerie, we learn quickly as The Comeback season 3 gets underway. The show’s ability to move Valerie from point to point in a loose, free-flowing way is a gift, especially as the series continues to tackle big topics. From Valerie’s decisions surrounding an offer to work with AI from a delightfully vacant executive played by Andrew Scott to her directions for her new social media manager, Patience (Ella Stiller with the perfect Gen-Z stare), to film her using brands she likes for the chance at a “collab,” the series knows exactly what it’s doing.

The best thing about The Comeback, and what has always been the best thing about The Comeback, is that it doesn’t ask its viewers to help with the directions. Instead, it takes its audience on the ride of a lifetime, asking only for presence and laughter in return. Kudrow, in her element throughout this season, is a tour de force in her final outing as the beloved star, reminding us that at the end of the day, Valerie Cherish has never really needed a comeback: she’s been here all along.

The first episode of The Comeback season 3 premieres on HBO & HBO Max on Sunday, March 22 at 10 p.m. EDT, followed by weekly episode releases through May 10.