Book III is so bad!

Agreed. It doesn't even look like the other two series! I hate the use of color filtering during the opening credit slides

I'm afraid I can't fully answer your question since it's been so long since I've seen it, but I remember George and Madeline get together as a couple (predictable final shot of the two of them passionately kissing), I think vowing to rebuild Mont Royal. Charles says his good-byes to George and Madeline and rides off at the end, not sure where he's going though. As for Brett and Billy, well I don't remember seeing Billy at all, but Brett makes a very brief appearance telling George that he's become too obsessed with finding Elkanah Bent. I guess we were supposed to assume she and Billy remained happily married.

Sorry I couldn't give more thorough answers. As for George and Madeline getting together, I'm not sure how the writers thought (in order to make up for Swayze not returning and having to kill off Orry) killing off Constance so that widow and widower could become a couple was somehow the satisfying ending the fans were looking for. Still, the whole George-Madeline thing doesn't really bother me as much as it does most fans.

Brett and Billy move to California after the war and have a large family.

Madeline, after Orry is killed in the beginning of H&H (movie, not book), returns to the burned out ruins of Mont Royal and lives in a shack with former slaves. She starts a school for black children and hires a school teacher (played by Mariette Hartley). She makes enemies and the school is burned down. She and George are attracted to each other even before Constance is murdered (not in the book, it happens over a period of several years). They eventually make plans to marry. George and Charles go hunting for Bent, who has kidnapped Charles' son. They eventually find him and hang him. Charles, who can't settle down with the woman who loves him, finally grows up and realizes she is the right woman for him.

I'm reading Book II right now and I'm only about a third of the way through it. But I read on another IMDB message board that Orry is killed in the second book. It really makes me sad and I think is one reason that I haven't been pushing myself to read the book faster. It's almost like if I don't read about it, Orry won't really die.

Orry dies in the War in Book II. Bent does kill Constance, and George and Madeleine do get together in Book III. So the tv series does follow the book somewhat. But I also hated what Jakes did to Constance in the book.

I watched book 1 and i couldnt wait to get stuck into book 2 i wanted more so i got book 3 and all i can say is i wish i hadn't

The filming look like something from The Sting with black and white photos telling you where you were watching

a lot of the actors had changed again poor Jonathan Frakes he got 3 different wives during the 3 book run and what happen Book one and two he was a wimp in book three he is in Will Riker mode

and the ending sucked big time im off to have my memory removed of this nasty installment

I have read all three books, and the third one is different certainly than the first two. Books: Orry is killed (Shot in the back of the head by a sitting wounded Union soldier he had stopped to help) Mr. Jakes has no qualms about killing his heroes in his books. But Orry Main, the paragon of virtue and all things heroic, I think was terribly shocking in the book, not just to those of you who have seen only the TV series. Now here is the best advice anyone can give you: "Read the book!" That has been BEYOND TRUE for any movie I have ever seen. So many important details, the real intellectual challenge of reading important details for 20+ hours can never be done justice in a 2 hour movie. Not even in a 30-hour mini-series like North & South.

But that's not why I was compelled to write. Here are some answers to some of the questions here. Book 3 in the TV series is a huge disappointment after the big-budget treatment of the first 2 parts. But stick with it, I don't think it's as bad as people think. Yes, it's terrible when you realize Orry is killed, and just as bad when the most beautiful and angelic Constance is killed, but she was killed just like that in the book, too. Also shocking! Bent is the soap-operaesque returning villain that never dies, just as in the books. Billy and Brett move to San Francisco and are never in book 3, which is also sad. Obviously in 3 Jakes wants to move on, partly because of time and history. You are now in the old west with Charles and his adventures. I thought Charles in the first 2 was a really lame choice for actors. The second Charles is much more handsome and studly like the Charles of the book in my opinion. Anyway, I hope that wasn't too much rambling, soap-boxing or long to help. The books are fantastic, some of the best I've ever read, great mix of drama and history. Maybe a little to soap-operaesque, but hey, that turned into one of the great mini-series ever, maybe the best.

I got all of the following in the first 17 minutes of viewing.

The opening credits highlight clips from the original series and the new series, they look off from each other. Narration is annoying for some reason. Acting is horrible from Barber and Casnoff, its like they forgot their characters, to the point they cant do souther accents anymore. Both are much hammier than in previous movies.
Actor driving the carriage was clearly not driving a carriage.
Bent makes mention of "Charlie" Main and what happened between them in Texas, even though we never saw or heard about it before.
Too much soft focus on the females. The Clip of Patrick Swayze as Orry clearly doesnt belong with everything else. The murder scene is cheesy and had too little build up. As was the assault of Ashton on Bent. Its not very clear they are in Charleston. The establishing shots they do have are cheap, single frame photos. George looks odd with much more grey hair than at the end of the last movie, even though its only a couple months later in movie time. His lack of beard looks even stranger. His voice is considerably different even though it was only a few years after the last movie. Constance seems to forget she was Irish, again its only been a couple months since the end of the war and last time she still had a normal Irish accent. Almost all decisions are made in haste and with little supporting motivation, again because they cut too much material.
Charles lost his accent, and about 10 years off his face. I dont mind them finding a different actor, but another southern fella would have done better, particularly one who didnt look like a kid. The girlfriend (Willa) comes off as particularly stilted, not naive as she's supposed to be.
Acting from the rest of the supporting cast is even worse.
The theater players subplot is not at all fleshed out, and what we see is quite boring. The colors in most shots are annoyingly warm, it stands out when the previous movies were more natural or cold. Peter O'Toole playing a drunken fool was already overdone in 1994. The cheap fade-ins are worse than the cheap establishing shots. Mont Royal does not look anything like Mont Royal, it didnt have that crescent drive in front of it, that was further down the road. Bringing cooper back after being missing for two movies (and expecting us to just roll with it) was especially annoying.

Will come back later when I have more complaints.