The Good Times Are Killing Me - The Leftovers

The Leftovers took a detour after episode eight's Plot Twist City to a completely different setting and dynamic between our characters.  And it suffered none for it, having established itself as a show much more character driven than plot driven, and much more about human relationships than mythology.

Having strung five "whoa" episodes in a row coinciding with their renewal, there's a lot to be excited about.

What did we learn today?

• A root cause analysis shows that The Departure was but the tipping point in Kevin and Laurie's marriage, rather than the source of the split
• The Guilty Remnant, or some form of it, pre-dates The Departure, or at least gets going immediately
• Who Neil is and what's in the bag
• Why Nora's paper towels were just so
• Exploding manhole covers are no joke, people.

Kevin's smoking

A microcosm of the dishonesty in their marriage, we know right away we're in flashback when Kevin sneaks a cigarette.  He goes to certain lengths to hide his habit*, stashing a pack under a mailbox**, smoking in the woods***, and using mouthwash (1).

* Which Laurie doesn't care about, per se.  She cares about his lying about it.  Or maybe she's lying about that....
** Which we saw Tommy do something similar in service to Wayne
 *** Fire hazard!

Jill's on to him.  Later in the day he smokes out in the open when at work, though not bothering to cover his tracks (2).  Laurie picks up on it at this point.  By the episodes third act, he is smoking outside his house (3) with friends and family around in a way that his father points out is "asking to get caught."  Kevin's nihilism towards his marriage at that point, exemplified by his decreasing desire to put up the facade of quitting, leads to his fun times with the conference attendee.

"Hey, opposite...is opposite!" *
Several characters are in diametrically opposite positions, compared with where they stand at the end of Episode Eight.

Patti is a broken shell, verbally abused by, we assume, her husband.  Paranoid* and meek, she finishes her story the stern cult leader who doesn't necessarily build her community by charisma but by stoic and firm leadership.

Laurie is a successful therapist of some kind, present in her children's lives.  It kills her to not attend Jill's science fair, and she clearly has a rapport with Tommy.  Giving up the wordly possessions, her practice which she probably built for years and her connection with her children is quite a sacrifice.  I'd have guessed most GR members fit a sterotypical profile of cult members, impressionable, with little to lose.  But Laurie does not fit that mold. 

Grandpa Garvey is large and in charge of the Mapleton police force.  A pillar of the community, he's honored with an award and with a party by his friends and loving family.  Deeper though, he's telling Kevin how he's nothing special and simply meant for this simple life.  FutureGrandpaGarvey has something different to say about that, with NatGeo props.

Tommy invested in school at least to the point that he is still enrolled.  He's close enough with his dad that he can call him to get him out of an arrest, not to mention that his dad will resort to fisticuffs in defense of his son.  Compare this with his going incommunicado from his family while deifying Wayne as some sort of father figure/savior up to the point he rejects him. 

Dogs are cute and sweet and adorable and such a good boy!  Until after The Departure when they're viscous, feral and scary.  Kevin's stance on dogs changes.  At least Kevin Durden's stance on dogs changed. 

One constant though is that deer, crazy as ever, invading your space.  It seems at least three of the people it crossed paths with departed, Nora's daughter, the kid with Downs Syndrome, and Kevin's lady.

*"You're gonna show me my clothes?"
** Is is paranoia if someone actually is out to get you?

Trials and Tribulations
Every. Simpsons. Ever. aired "Hurricane Neddy" on Sunday where Ned Flander's house is destroyed in a storm.  The only home in all of Springfield destroyed in the storm.  This despite his selflessness and general clean living*.  He mentions Job, but Rev. Lovejoy calls him melodramatic.

The Leftovers has brought Job hard and heavy, particularly Episode Three, which focused on Matthew.  There's also a Faustian element to things, or even King Midas, where unintentional consequences reign from what a character believes they want.  Particularly one family where Matthew craves attention and is given leukemia, or Nora seeking accomplishment and freedom, and being relieved of her family.

* "I even kept kosher to be on the safe side"


Next Week (Two weeks actually) and Some Jibberish
"The Prodigal Son Returns"  Is it Tommy?  Is is Kevin, to Pops?  Is it Laurie's baby?

I theorize that it's Tommy (given the "prodigal" part), with nothing left on the road and no one to turn to, he comes home.  Tommy (younger son/sinners) would be accepted back by Kevin (as the father/God does) despite what he did (spent his inheritance/sinned).  It makes you wonder if the Departed are that toll that God is leveraging against mankind, rather than send his son again to die for the sins of man, he exacts the toll, a tax practically, of 2 percent.  Which means tithes can't really justify 10 percent anymore.

Maybe the Departed return?  But that wouldn't fit with the parable, as they would be returned by God/the father rather than returning to him.  Also, where would they return from?  Hell?  At least that's where Kevin's friend said she was going...right before she Departed.

Cornering the Market - The Leftovers

Is it strange that I wondered about the business model for Nora's salesman-friend's business?  They are catering to a very specific population.  If 6 billion people are on Earth and 2 percent vanished then that's 120,000,000 possible sales.  But if your product costs $40,000 then only a small portion of the vanished's families can afford your product.

The company would have to branch out into other ways of making people want to bury their loved one's likeness.  Like if they are a regular missing person.  But then you have a whole different problem about convincing them to close the book on the missing person.  Burn victims?  People killed in natural disasters or plane crashes?  War heroes who dont come home?

I suppose this company could plan to make a lot of sales its first few years but they have to plan for it leveling off.  One thing they could do is try to get families who are spread out across the country to have multiple memorials.  Of course, buying a plane ticket is much cheaper than one of these dolls.

Basically, the partners in this business better get together and figure out how they can use this technology for something else or they are simply going to run out of customers.

Hmmmm.....

The Leftovers - Halftime

At the halfway point of The Leftovers, we're trying to decide what this show is about. Or I am.  Frankly, I have not written about the show because I have not known what to write beyond a basic summary of things that happened, and that is a waste of everyone's time.  At the halfway point though, it's a little easier to take stock of the series as a whole, even if we don't know what it is getting it yet.

Judging by what's been written about the show to this point, it appears I'm not alone.  A time like this really makes me miss the thoughtful and well moderated boards at Television Without Pity. In light of TV Club's summer collapse, Vox has probably done the best job so far on the series, particularly on its "Gladys" post. 

One thing is clear, the show is not interested in exploring the past or the Why? of the disappearance and the selection of the disappeared.  It is focused almost entirely on the lives these people now lead in a post 10/14 world and how sudden loss affects them even three years later.  After all, the show is called The Leftovers.  It is not called The Unexplained Event or The People Who Suddenly Vanished. 

The time spent in Mapleton has been the most rewarding for me as a viewer.  Whether that be with the priest, the chief, the cult or the Jill.  The show's nuclear family has been torn apart by the vanishing, yet none of those family members themselves vanished.  It shows the far reaching effects of the event and how the suddenness and the lack of closure have not permitted people to return to their lives.  And while not in Mapleton, the overturned truck spilling dead bodies grieving fmilies purchased to bury serve as another device to show the lack of closure on the event. 

Since the first episode, the show has become increasingly oblique.  It often makes passing references to people or events that have not been explained and make me wonder if I missed something in a previous episode.  I wonder if I am to recall what Laurie said to Patty before everything changed, or if that is an off screen event.  Should I know who Neil is?  On the other end of that are seemingly basic questions that do not receive an answer.  Were those actually Kevin's shirts he got from the cleaners?  If not, why can't he find them?  Did the GR sneak into his house and take them?  I thought, based on last week's B&E and their progressing to painting things white, like newspaper boxes, that they had stolen people's clothes and perhaps were replacing them with their own white garb. 

Animal imagery, prominently featured in the pilot, has taken a back seat.  I expect it may stay there long enough to forget about it, only to reappear in the finale.  Biblical imagery has taken center stage, particularly in the last two episodes featuring the Christmas story of Wayne's baby and then a New Testament-ish stoning and possibly martyrdom parable.  I wonder if the first two episodes have a decidedly Old Testament bend.  Could it be that the event should raise give people on Earth awareness and consciousness as the tree did for Adam and Steve?  That is probably a stretch, which is why I haven't seen that posited yet. 

Questions

1. Why and how did these people disappear?
1. Not likely to be explained
2. Why did these particular people disappear?
1. Not likely to be explained
3. Where is Mapleton?
1. Upstate New York
4. Was Mapleton especially hard hit?  
1. It does not appear so, the GR is a national organization and the citizens appear to be affected just as much by the residual results of the disappearance as the disappearance itself (intact families torn apart, a car accident due to the driver disappearing)
5. It seems like they are missing more than 2 percent based on the reactions.
1. Hmmm.  Unsure
6. It would also help explain the next question
7. Why is the cult in Mapleton, and not elsewhere?
1. It is elsewhere, Past Me.
8. Why does the cult choose smoking as a reminder?
1. Mortality?
9. What is the cult's end game? 
1. Perhaps to constantly remind people of the disappearance
10. Who is Wayne and why does he merit all this money, security and reverence?
1. Wayne is a magical child molester charlatan who claims to have some sort of healing powers
11. What did Wayne do for the congressman?
1. Made his pain go away
12. Why does Wayne want the girl protected? 
1. She has his baby
13. What is the grace period?
1. Probably a figurative term.  Past Me is an idiot.
14. What else has the cult done to piss off the town, besides stalk and be creepy?
1. Buy up people's properties.  Break in their houses.  Take stuff.
15. Why did Liv  Tyler change her mind?
1. Unknown.
16. What does the dream with the pig in the hood of the car mean?
1. ????
17. Why did those people jump off the building in the son's flashback?
1. Not explained yet.  
18. What has happened with the dogs?
1. Did they go stray and then adapt to survive?
19. Who is the guy shooting dogs and what does he know about them?
1. I think he gave a name but I cant remember it.  At least we know he is not a ghost.
20. What is the symbolism with the deer and why does that image seem so familiar to me?
1. Is it Hannibal I'm thinking of?
2. Probably an episode 10 thing, but too oblique for me to discern.
21. Why did the deer tear up the Garvey kitchen?
1. ????
22. And how did Kevin know to suspect the deer? 
1. ????

New questions

• How and when will Nora's gun fire?
• How has Wayne convinced people to do his bidding?

"Pilot" - The Leftovers - 1x01

After three consecutive monster episodes from Game of Thrones, and an incredible Mad Men finale, some time between the spring finales and summer premiers was more than welcome.  This spring had some excellent television, and not the least of which was Fargo, a ten part anthology format series.  The only reason I didn't write about Fargo was because a third show on top of Game of Thrones and Mad Men would've simply been too much.

A few weeks ago I alluded to HBO's The Leftovers, coming to us from Lost co-showrunner Damon Lindelof.  We saw these intense trailers and it certainly looked better than the other drama happening this summer.   

I'm unclear if this is a one and done season, or if this is story is going to extend to an unknown number of seasons.  I've seen it written up both as being picked up for a "first" season and being a ten part adaptation of Tom Perrotta's novel.  Personally, I am rooting for the latter.  Fargo and True Detective will likely battle it out in the Internets for best show of the year in 2014.  While the anthology/mini-series format is not inherently better than a regular season to season run,  I'd like to see us spared the angst of viewers and the grief directed toward Lindelof a long term story would inevitably bring about when it doesn't perfectly align with viewers expectations of what should happen and when.  HBO tends to renew series shortly after the season premiere, so maybe we will get some news soon.

My own expectations are not that this will reach Fargo or True Detecive level, but that it will be placed in that tier of good-but-not-quite-great series with Boardwalk Empire, Sons of Anarchy and Homeland*. One big question about the series will be how much it the mythology plays a part in the show, versus the character's relationships with one another in response to the big event.  It's possible the 'Why?' plays a very minor part on the show compared to each characters reaction and their new view and status of life.  For all the mythologizing that Lost did, they still carried forward a great repertoire of characters and, for the most part, did not sacrifice their development for the sake of mythology

* The top tier includes Game of Thrones, Justified, Mad Men and Breaking Bad, which I'll continue to include until we reach the one year mark of the series ending.  True Detective and Fargo gain special guest and probationary status in this tier.

Episode One
Friends-esque title: "The One Where People Disappear and No Clues Exist Three Years Later as to Why So They Commemorate Heroes Day for the Lost Which Causes a Kerfuffle with the Local Cult"

The episode takes measures to show that those who disappeared are not necessarily better or worse than those who were left behind, which makes it all the more puzzling.  One was a child abuser.  One was simply a jerk.

We'll get more into the nitty gritty of the themes of the show and the dynamics between the characters, but per usual, it's tough to do that with any substance after just 75 minutes.  So we'll take a page from the True Detective posts and pose some questions that will hopefully be answered this season.

Questions

1. Why and how did these people disappear?
2. Why did these particular people disappear?
3. Where is Mapleton?
4. Was Mapleton especially hard hit?  
5. It seems like they are missing more than 2 percent based on the reactions.
6. It would also help explain the next question
7. Why is the cult in Mapleton, and not elsewhere?
8. Why does the cult choose smoking as a reminder?
9. What is the cult's end game?
10. Who is Wayne and why does he merit all this money, security and reverence?
11. What did Wayne do for the congressman?
12. Why does Wayne want the girl protected?
13. What is the grace period?
14. What else has the cult done to piss off the town, besides stalk and be creepy?
15. Why did Liv  Tyler change her mind?
16. What does the dream with the pig in the hood of the car mean?
17. Why did those people jump off the building in the son's flashback?
18. What has happened with the dogs?
19. Who is the guy shooting dogs and what does he know about them?
20. What is the symbolism with the deer and why does that image seem so familiar to me?
1. Is it Hannibal I'm thinking of?
21. Why did the deer tear up the Garvey kitchen?
22. And how did Kevin know to suspect the deer?

Leftovers - haha

• Director Peter Berg gets a cameo at the gate of Wayne's compound
• Did you say Peter Berg?  Does that explain the high school kids played by those looking like they check the 25-30 box?
• One more on FNL - Buddy Garrity!
• The party looked like something the local news reports on as "the new dangerous thing kids are doing...and why you should be worried"
• The app does not appear to be real.  But should not take long before someone creates such an app.
• Pilots often take a big twist...an ostensibly main character is killed, someone is revealed to be not who they seem, blah blah blah.  That Kevin's wife was not taken and is in fact a cult member was pretty well telegraphed and only gets a 4 or 5/10.  
• The more interesting thing is that the Garvey family has been completely upended despite none of its four members having been taken. 
• Pilots also carry a heavy burden of exposition that can rarely be avoided.  So I don't like to give grief for a necessary evil.  I appreciated Kevin and the mayor's exchange, with her "Don't you think I already know this?" response to Kevin's expository rambling.
• The term "maintain the peace" is used more than once, and while not completely foreign to us, it is a phrase not often heard.
• The show opens with the protagonist witnessing the apparent needless murder of a dog, then ends with him emptying his clip into a whole pack of them.  We have different feelings at each point, though it is essentially the same act.
• Spent the whole episode thinking, "Wow, she sure does look a lot like Liv Tyler"
• Jill has a whole American Beauty thing going on.
• No one stands or recites the pledge, but....prayer in school?  It's a Post-10/14 World.