THE LEFTOVERS: HBO's nondenominational post-rapture series

this thing with kevin wanting free of his family obligations, then regretting it, then getting the second chance he wanted it, only to start regretting it almost immediately... this isn't gonna be the central thing of the whole show, right? like, that's gonna turn out to be a really superficial reading of it, right?

wtf how has meg suddenly become the cult leader

why did she rape tommy

the GR had a total non-violence policy under patti, and now...??

does tommy have a mystical power or not?? laurie says it's a bullshit story they made up??

also: the researcher calling nora and telling her she's possessed by a demon?!?

i appreciated patti's snarky comments about how this 'magical negro' stuff was borderline racist

"Tell your mom Meg says 'Hello.'"

Liv Tyler did some great work on this show.

One the greatest, scariest moments of the whole series.

http://www.serialfreaks.it/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/71407-meg-2-1024x576.jpg

(I didn't totally understand why either--because she can?--which was part of why it was so scary.)

I really thought she was gonna light him on fire

that was the implication

she’s just so malicious in a way writers try to plot out but it seldom succeeds on screen

she's really good in it. the guy who plays tommy is good too and lovely looking.

I like all the young actors and characters a lot, which is v rare for a TV drama

she’s just so malicious in a way writers try to plot out but it seldom succeeds on screen

the casting is a big part of this I think. because it's her and we have certain associations, we instinctively want to believe she's headed for a redemption arc, something tidier. but nope.

I had no preconceptions!

idk what I’d seen Liv Tyler in other than misty forgotten memories of Armageddon. She could be the best person in the world, no clue

I think for most people she's still the saintly elf whatsername in the Lord of the Rings movies.

I'm probably in the slim minority but there's some partition in my brain between actors doing roles in standard movie fare and actors playing some character with a storied past in a series genre film

the difference between an actor in a role and playing a part, I guess

i want to rewatch in time with justine

I watched several episodes while sober and the show was not any less confusing. I just started s3!

What was the point of the fake bomb threat?

Why has meh turned straight up evil?

How did those 3 girls get roped into this?

Why does meg talk but no one else does?

Virgil was Erika’s dad but did something to john - did I miss Virgil telling Kevin or is it still unknown what he did?

I’m really confused about the family angle - there is no family / family is everything

Meg not meh

there is no family / family is everything

no attachments vs attachments to things that might hurt you (ie, die or leave).

the family angle is one of the central themes in the whole series. there's a conflict that the main characters (and really everyone who survived the departure) grapple with: in this world, anyone could disappear off the face of the earth in any second, so why risk the pain that would come with the attachment?

of course, our world is like that too, but it's not quite as explicit as it is in a world where millions of people disappeared at once for no reason.

s2e6 nora x erika maybe the pinnacle of television

I get that, I suppose I just find it really hard to relate to

Xp

omg mark linen-baker I’m dying

There are some really amazing scenes in this show

Erika and Nora on the trampoline

ha, that was one of my least favorite sequences in the series. the wrong side of cutesy

I’m a third of the way into s3 e7 and SHIT IS FINALLY GETTING REAL

Now it makes sense why he was always trying to kill himself in his sleep!!!!!!

Omg the penis biometrics!!!!!!

erica& norah on the trampoline was all-time gr8

That’s why they didn’t care about the dude going overboard!!!!

Oh god the baby cancer question makes sense!!!!!

My head is exploding right now

I can’t even deal with this

I don’t even know if I totally love this or totally hate this

I’m two thirds in and I’m pausing to explain the entire show to my husband bc I need to process this with someone

ok i'm finished

i can't believe how much this show paid off - i think i was so traumatized by LOST i couldnt comprehend this actually answering pretty much all the questions. i'm sure there are some gaping holes and maybe i'll be pissed off about stuff later, by right now i'm feeling incredibly satisfied.

good work keeping this to 3 short seasons and not dragging it out A++

Glad you enjoyed it, I was getting a bit concerned there. Explaining the plot must have been....something

ahhh I was secretly terrified I might have led you astray. so glad it came together.

it really feels like a journey/full experience - there is a v beautiful wholeness/completeness to the end of the series that you dont often get in tv. not that ends are tied up neatly but just that things now move on. or something. idk

i went back and read this whole thread today and now i feel pretty dumb for feeling like my mind was melting when it's revealed no one disappeared, there was just some sort of split - it barely rates a mention by anyone in this thread!

i've been ruminating on this show since i finished it last night - i barely slept. i never rewatch anything bc there's always so much new stuff out, but i think i def want to rewatch this whole thing and drag my husband into it (even tho i spoilered the whole thing last night).

i don't think i really gave enough thought to the whole premise - what it would be like to live in a normal world where suddenly this massive, inexplicable, civilization-changing event happens - until season 3, and now i'm thinking about it a lot, mostly bc i was too consumed with all the weird stuff that seemed like non-sequiturs to me. i've always been really horrified by the idea of some kind of apocalyptic event (i mean, i guess everyone is, but it's a particular fear of mine). i watched Mad Max and Quiet Earth (a new zealand film) at way too young an age, and have always been disturbed by the idea. Hard Sun could've been great if it'd explored this more deeply - it's sort of the opposite, bc the apocalypse hasn't happened but the knowledge is out that it's going to.

i'm thinking about all the unanswered stuff, but i still def feel like the finale gave enough closure, enough answers, to make me feel like the writers knew what they were doing from the get-go.

this was one of the most compelling, interesting, creative and well-crafted shows i've ever watched, even though i felt like i was dying of frustration through most of it - the payoff was worth all my agonizing!!

well, to people on both sides, there was a disappearance! everyone with firsthand knowledge of the other side is such an unreliable narrator that I think it’s worth considering that the world where nearly everyone disappeared is a fiction within the narrative. and the machine to go there was completely fake

idk, the question about killing a baby to save cancer + kevin having to kill an innocent civilian in order to start WWII seemed to signal it was real

i can't remember - does nora tell kevin about that question?

Idk there were enough signals that Nora’s story could be a myth that was helping her cope, and Kevin’s acceptance of it was a sign of love. I really feel like every theme that was hinted at in Lost was explored fully here to the point where I can barely separate these two shows. The main theme being that there is a world/universe going about its business and there happened to spring up this species of overthinking animals who will endlessly wrongly violently try to interpret that business.

completely otm, Leftovers is 100% a less constrained extension of Lindelof's Lost-era concerns.

i love nora's house in the end so much because its that great fantasy fiction house where everything is perfectly rustic but also really clean. i really wanted to live there.

also it was nice to see that liv tyler was finally an adult in this instead of that perpetually ethereal child-woman that it feels like she was for decades. people age slower now.

i had to think that nora's story at the end was just a story she made up because you would think she would want to tell people that there was a way for everyone to come back otherwise....

ALSO: i don't think a single person on here mentioned one of the best characters:

https://uproxx.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/leftovers-brett-butler.jpg

anyway, we just finished this last night.

still catching up on HBO shows after being HBO-less for years. might watch Deadwood next. haven't seen Game of Thrones either. and did want to watch True Detective but now there is some sorta horrible internet backlash or something? i thought everyone loved it. or maybe they did and now they don't.

also might re-watch Sopranos. never saw last season. i've been watching Boardwalk Empire on my own. enjoying that.

also yeah sheesh nora. how is she not famous? so good. i hope that doesn't end up being the best part of her life. though it might be. kinda hard to top.