It is better, and yeah for anybody who read the series the ending was especially awful. It's been awhile but I feel like they packed at least one book into the last 2-3 episodes of the last season. The book series still has a weird 30 year jump, but you stay there awhile at least.
For the first few seasons of the show I thought they did a good job, even though (or maybe because?) the show departs from the books in a lot of ways. But they tried to cram way too much into the last season and just made it seem like jibberish.
The book ending ("and then they gave up") put me off so much that I never bothered finishing the TV series. Given that, any thoughts on how I might find the TV series ending?