THE LEFTOVERS: HBO's nondenominational post-rapture series

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.

First season True Detective good. Second season bad.

Nora was really good as the requisite Marge Gunderson character in the most recent season of Fargo, too.

Yeah, Carrie Coon has been getting more parts, including inexplicably voicing like three lines for a computer animated Marvel movie character(hope she got paid good)

maria wasn't feeling deadwood after the first episode. she liked the first episode of true detective though.

deadwood made me nostalgic for hell on wheels! i loved that show. sometimes i felt like the only one who did. someone else must have watched it. it was on for awhile. hell on wheels also had a very satisfying last season!

the preacher in the leftovers kinda reminded me of the swede on hell on wheels a little. especially the way they both would get aggro and nutso. though the swede obviously a psychopath.

http://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/the-leftovers-nora-hulking-out.gif

deadwood made me nostalgic for hell on wheels

never thought a sentence about Deadwood would make me sad

I'd really love to see a stage production with CC

Started rewatching tonight, probably just the first season. Eerie parallels with what's going on now.

Enjoyed the first season so much, I'll carry on--and hope that I'm as moved by the final episode this time as everyone else was.

E9 in the first season, the episode where they flash back to life before the Departure--which occupies the last five minutes--is, I think, one of the greatest single episodes of TV I've ever seen. The way they casually introduce Patti as one of Laurie's patients, or Doris as the dog breeder, the way Jill is a goofy outgoing kid so different from her later moroseness, the hints throughout (either Patti's verbal warnings or weird things like the passing car that asks Kevin if he's ready) that something's about to happen, the Jody Reynolds song that begins the episode as Kevin's jogging, and the ending with Laurie looking over at the ultrasound (and the way they wisely don't even cut to the image), it's all so good.

I watched this show in its entirety for the first time a couple of months ago and loved it. one of my favourites

i love it so much, maybe i will do a quarantine rewatch

thinking the same tbh

I’m considering watching this after reading rave reaviews but is it all dark/sad or are there some lighter touches ?
We might not want to get into too heavy stuff at the moment...

just started watching this. the stoning scene in season 1 is one of the most visceral things I've ever seen on TV

The first few episodes and other parts of the first season are pretty dark (and in some parts, edgy in a slightly cruel and silly way). But the show gets funnier and warmer as the seasons go on, and there are some Lost-like mysteries to keep you distracted (with much better resolutions). All three seasons are terrific in different ways. The stoning mentioned above is the (pretty horrible) cutoff point, and after that, nasty things still happen occasionally, but without the sadism. Not sure if that sounds like a good writeup, but this was prob my favourite show of the past 5+ years alongside Better Call Saul & Halt and Catch Fire.

The first season, for the most part, is very somber. Kevin has a line midway, something he texts to his daughter, that's maybe the funniest line in all three seasons, but that's about it. Lots of humour is S2, courtesy Patti. I don't remember S3 as well, although Matt has an episode-ending line on a cruise ship that was great.

And of course Meg has a horrifyingly funny line to Tommy (S2, I think) that is one of the show's greatest.

Holy Wayne or whatever his name is was funny in s1

Scott Glenn, too...maybe more humour than I first indicated.

I was a iffy on the Holy Wayne subplot both times I watched. I understand its importance symbolically (at least the questions it raises), but I was always impatient whenever they cut back to that story. In my COVID analogy, Holy Wayne is hydroxychloroquine.

Couldn't handle Holy Wayne because I couldn't get his Peep Show character out of my mind.

re: funny lines, s1 also has Carrie Coon's "oh, fuck your daughter!"

season 1 is a step below 2 and 3, doesn't really kick into high gear until the nora episode.

still the best show ever, tho

That’s what made holy Wayne so funny is that they cast Johnson from peep show and he played it in almost exactly the same way

yeah i haven't watched s1 in a while, but i remember the atmosphere being oppressively sad. there were also a lot of moments in the first season when a character tearfully recited a bible verse while max richter's score did the heavy lifting. s2 and s3 reached another level because they kept the intense feeling, but left the sanctimony behind.

holy wayne felt like he was transported in from another show, but not necessarily in a bad way

the show was more absurd than funny, with a bunch patently ridiculous situations played straight

Hum OK we'll give it a try, I guess.
Thanks all !

definitely watch

The seriousness of S1 bothered me too the first time, but the second time it didn't at all, probably because I viewed it through the prism of right now. One thing I really loved--the first time was different; hard to recall, but I think I felt more frustrated--was the litany of MacGuffins, which I won't detail here in deference to AIXTC. I remember how, first time, with every one them I thought, "Ah, that must be the key."

yeah my only advice for watching S1 is dont try to figure it out - just float along with it down the river

I think this show does everything Lost probably wanted to do, but succeeded

agree

i remember being struck by the nihilism of season 1 and frequently asking myself "why am i watching this?" and yet continuing to watch because it was such powerful, well-made television. in seasons 2 & 3, the series really found its voice and its humanity. i'm sure i've said this elsewhere in this thread, but my favorite tv series ever, period.

first season was p average. hoping it kicks up a gear in the next

Oh it does

Season 1 is brutally depressing. Can’t imagine watching it right now.

I'm predicting that S1 gives a good picture of where the world will be in another 18 months: divided into people who are still vigilantly following every bit of COVID news (the town's "Heroes Day," more or less), those who are bored and want to move on (Kevin), and weird outliers who push back hard (far from perfect, but I felt like there was an analogy between the Guilty Remnants and all these protesters).

Yeah we nearly didn't carry on after season 1 - good premise and lots of great ideas and performances floating around, but it's so oppressively miserable. Season 2, right from the revamped credits, is such a breath of fresh air! Still at heart a weighty, serious story, but painted in tones of irony and black absurdism rather than stifling angst. 2 & 3 really are excellent, and you could maaaybe get away with skipping 1 (my memory might be being too harsh to it through).

Another good gag in the first series is to do with the disappearing celebs which has a great payoff in s2

idk why but the mention of the s2 credits reminded me of that

odd tonal shift in season 2