THE LEFTOVERS: HBO's nondenominational post-rapture series

everyone's covered my thoughts abt this ep so well itt, all I have left to say is

U GUYS, THIS SHOW

re: Jill, I loved the scene a few episodes back where it was revealed that she and Michael had been seeing each other for a little while offscreen. So many unimportant would-be preceding scenes, shaved right off.

Just got caught up with ep9. What the faaaaaaaaaaack

Wow

that was p much perfect

yeah loved it. laughed out lout a surprising number of times, particularly at "Because it's STUPID!" and the Verdi starting up again.

so good

I am feeling pretty optimistic about the show's renewal chances but I would be TOTALLY ok with that being the series finale

god that was beautiful & hilarious & heartbreaking & weird & joyous

i just want to cry and think about this show

spoilers obv but when you are ready, def read this breakdown with Reza Azlan abt the finale

http://www.vulture.com/2015/12/the-leftovers-season-two-finale-questions-reza-aslan.html

and remind me I want to talk about John & Kevin as neighbors

god that was beautiful & hilarious & heartbreaking & weird & joyous

i just want to cry and think about this show
--Flamenco Drop (VegemiteGrrl)

this is kinda what I wanna do with the rest of my life tbh

this was amazing.

maybe the best episode of any show i've seen this year.

I jumped on this after the first fifteen mins of the pilot. Worth the effort to try again?

yes

Every single thing I read about this makes it seems like a "John From Cincinnati"-level neo-conceptual mess.

uh, no

never saw JFC but The Leftovers takes is a show that takes wild conceptual gambles and routinely has them pay off.

Just wondering, going by the weird reactions to this last episode, if it were the series finale would you be satisfied?

yeah it works very well as a series finale, but that's because it completes a really satisfying arc for the more-or-less main character. but there's a lot of other characters who could carry the show. hoping next season (being hopeful) focuses more on Nora, personally.

yeah the only real downer for me about the last few episodes was that she took a real backseat, though her emphatic "shut the fuck up!" was a delight.

it is the only thing I've seen that gives equal weight to the faithful, the doubtful and non-believers... allows them
all to exist together, even problematically... but also acknowledges that those states can also be experienced by one person sometimes simultaneously

it's so spiritually rich, layered with symbolism & meaning and as mentioned upthread, a lot of it pays off. it's not just for show

yeah i like how it takes faith as a serious thing, but as an everyday thing, too. really glad they allowed matt the priest to soften from a driven prig -- like oh great, another snarling preacher character -- to something more admirable over two seasons. and poor janel maloney! what a thankless acting job.

ecclestone said in an interview that Matt is his favorite character he's played

look, i still harbor huge fears that if this thing goes on it will just fall apart under its own weight because l i n d e l o f. but for now i'm really impressed that all the interlocking stories, the flashbacks, the layers, are just so well fitted together

xp oh nice :)

is there some danger this won't get renewed?

are we left to imagine that the three disappeared girls were seduced into the GR via some kind of self-radicalization process on the internet, a la ISIS?

yeah the show takes place in a kind of heightened reality but it's using that idea to simply clarify the stakes of everyday life. like, with people's varied reactions and responses to the departure i often think "yeah, people do cope (or not) that way" and it's often tremendously cathartic to recognize that.

there's a great deal of danger it wont be renewed. praying there's some exec at hbo in lindelof's corner.

are we left to imagine that the three disappeared girls were seduced into the GR via some kind of self-radicalization process on the internet, a la ISIS?

this is what i thought. teenagery discovery of adult hypocrisy finds ready outlet.

i'd love for it to be renewed but if not it was a fine series finale

re: the girls, it seems like Megan poached them pretty directly.

re: renewal - no talks yet; the ratings weren't good but it also aired against The Walking Dead this season. I personally think it'll be back but we might have to wait till early '17

never thought i'd get anything out of someone singing simon and garfunkel. i had something in my eye.

I watched the first 4 eps of S1 and then dropped out. Can I start fresh on S2?

fuck yeah that was beautiful

i spied Prince's 'I would die 4 u' on that wheel but I knew that was too good to be true

I went back and freeze-framed, here's what I could spot:

Homeward Bound
I Would Die 4 U
Like a Prayer
Livin' on a Prayer
Don't Stop Believin'
Angel of the Morning
All My Ex's Live In Texas (<--looooool)

oh, and Bohemian Rhapsody.

haha

bet that was a lively day in the writer's room.

"I watched the first 4 eps of S1 and then dropped out. Can I start fresh on S2?"

no. I mean you could but you should watch all of season 1. S2 was better but S1 was very good also.

I think Reza Aslan had a lot to do with the richness of the spirituality subtext that makes S2 so rewarding.

per a lindelof interview, the initial idea was for KG to sing "like a prayer" but madonna wouldn't grant them the rights

i saw it on the spinning wheel.

From the avclub:

Nobody is watching The Leftovers. Like, seriously nobody is watching it. “International Assassin” was beaten in its time slot by an episode of Law And Order: SVU. Not a first-run episode, not a sweeps-month crossover with Chicago [Insert Municipal Service], just a regular old repeat on USA, perhaps an episode where Olivia and Munch have to pose as a married couple to infiltrate a dog-fighting ring or some shit. Premium cable networks don’t excel at concealing their enthusiasm for a show, and HBO has never been bashful about handing out additional seasons to a show if they believe in it. Hell, the fact that The Leftovers got a second season is evidence of the latitude the network will grant to shows and storytellers they’re invested in. But HBO has yet to breathe a word about The Leftovers season three, even as the second season has earned a deeply passionate, if tiny following. This could very well be the end of the series, and if “I Live Here Now” is the series finale, it’s a really odd note to end on, and another deeply polarizing, spiritually playful series finale for Damon Lindelof to add to his resume.

Anyway, I haven't seen a minute of it, partly because everything I read about it makes it sound like a combination of spiritual, silly and surreal, a combo I have a hard time wrapping my head around. Like, this one had a purgatory karaoke bar or something?

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/07/arts/television/damon-lindelof-on-the-leftovers-finale-the-shows-future-and-his-afterlife-obsession.html?_r=0

Will there be a season three of “The Leftovers”?

At the moment I do not know. We’re starting to have preliminary conversations with HBO. I think that I’m a pragmatic individual. I understand that television is a business first and foremost, and the ratings — I don’t want to use the phrase “apocryphally bad.” But let’s just use that phrase.

HBO’s response to the creative of the show has been overwhelmingly positive and they’ve been immensely supportive in letting us do some pretty wacky stuff. I think that I definitely want there to be more show, and hopefully we’ll have some clarity as to whether or not that’s going to happen in the coming weeks, before the new year.

him not knowing what "apocryphally" means is lessening the blow tbh

lol i was just reading the primaries thread and mention of 'cozzen larry' is reminding me of mark linn-baker showing up in this for real.

http://i.imgur.com/HGY2UTD.jpg

maybe not the best idea

Nora yelling "Fix this, Jesus!" and trashing the cd player followed by an immediate tremor was some well-timed levity.

The neighbor John's arc from being this angry guy who we only knew had gone to jail and was so edgy he seemed he could flare up violently at any moment -- and did at anyone he could justify targeting -- makes the neighborly wave from the porch at the end so much more genuine than the same one he did at the beginning of the season. The character always seemed at cross purposes -- trying so hard to keep his family together and denying the spiritual element his father-in-law and townspeople are so into but still seeming broken. All of it being real at the end, with his daughter having ditched out, the town's sanctity broken, and someone who he killed coming back was a good ending.

also lol @ lindelof using cool words he doesn't really understand, that pretty much sums up his plotting direction

ha, or the transcriber really fucked him over? i mean, surely he meant "apocalyptically"? thank god i dont have to give interviews...

it's funny, i find lindelof really disarming in interviews. but then i didnt watch Lost and dont really have any baggage with him other than Prometheus, which i am on record here as vigorously defending. but this season is the best thing he's done, where all that rube goldberg plotting and his own temperamental self-criticism and uncertainty actually works as a resource and not a limitation.

"best thing he's done" = assuming that, since i havent seen Lost.