Spy series coming to an end

BURBANK, Calif. (AP) -- "Alias" is coming in from the cold.
"I think we have done these characters justice and to do any more would be pushing it," says series star Jennifer Garner, who plays double-agent Sydney Bristow, perhaps TV's most gorgeous female spy since Diana Rigg played Emma Peel on the '60s British series "The Avengers."
After five seasons, the ABC series that revitalized the espionage genre with a visually dazzling combination of glamor, angst and trickery concludes Monday with a pair of episodes (9 p.m. EDT).
The brainchild of J.J. Abrams (who has since created ABC's hit drama "Lost" and directed "Mission: Impossible III"), "Alias" leaves behind a loyal, cultlike group of fans who understood the minutia of the double-dealing plot twists.
Yet mainstream viewers were often left scratching their heads over the spies' constantly shifting alliances between good and evil, not to mention their occasional faked deaths.
Show runner and executive producer Jeff Pinkner says it's "always been a family drama" and has "always played with the question of whether or not Sydney Bristow had a choice in what she was doing in her life ... fate versus free will."
The role made Garner an A-list star and her private life media fodder. Supermarket tabs tracked her divorce from "Felicity's" Scott Foley, her dating of "Alias" co-star Michael Vartan, her marriage last year to film star Ben Affleck and the November birth of their daughter, Violet.
"This show will always be the backdrop to me growing up and I did it with these people. They've seen me struggle through stuff, figure stuff out, struggle through it again," said Garner, now 34. "They have been enormously kind to me the entire time and have done nothing but facilitate my growth, and been very patient."
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