‘Parks and Recreation’ series finale: Is Leslie Knope President in 2035? Show boss explains

For the most part, almost everything that took place during the “Parks and Recreation” series finale Tuesday night was tied together in a neat little bow. The show did not want to dangle a bunch of threads in front of you. Instead, they wanted to give you happy moments, and reminders that there were many reasons why you love these characters. Ultimately, they wanted to reward you for your years of watching.

Now that we’ve said this, there is still one major question that remains unanswered after this episode: Is Leslie Knope President of the United States in 2035? The whole speech about a “new challenge” was a clue, as was moving forward even further to the future to Garry’s funeral, where she and Ben were accompanied by a man who may have been Secret Service.

As executive producer Mike Schur tells The Hollywood Reporter, this was one part of the finale that he wanted to keep ambiguous:

“We don’t say explicitly. We were being so explicit in showing a lot of different actual things that happen to the actual people that there was room to a little ambiguity. So we manufactured that scene in such a way so that you don’t know — and we’re never going to say. I have my own theory about what it means but I would like to leave it up to people who are invested in those characters to make up their own minds. That guy doesn’t address either of them by name; he doesn’t give them an honorarium; we never say that that guy is in the secret service. He doesn’t necessarily have to be in the secret service. It was deliberately left ambiguous because I thought it would be cool if people could fill in their own blanks.”

Personally, we want to think that she made it there, mostly because this would mean that she really managed everything she wanted and then some. It’s a comedy! There’s no reason to feel anything else.

What did you think about the finale? Let us know.