andythinkpad
Member
Finally saw it. Shockingly happy ending. Not sure how I feel about it.
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The Leftovers S3 |OT| The End Is Near - Premieres Sunday 4/16, 9pm on HBO
- Thread starter bodyofanamerican
- Start date
OK, but they said it before episode 1 ever aired. And it's in the theme song.
your annoyance is unjustified. it told you what it was before you started watching.
Well now that's up to you, isn't it? There's at least one interpretation were:
Matt lost faith and died. Kevin had a heart attack. Nora had to lie to both Kevin and herself to move past the fact her entire family upped and vanished 20 or so years go. She essentially gave up on truth. No resolution for the Departed. Same thing could happen again at any moment. All the people who got in the transport machine are dead. Etc. Etc.
Fenderputty
Banned
You act like that's a small thing to care about. She's one of billions. She absolutely would have a responsibility
Not that ratings matter as the show is done now, but interestingly the finale got the highest ratings the show has seen since S1.
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/daily-ratings/sunday-cable-ratings-june-4-2017/
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/daily-ratings/sunday-cable-ratings-june-4-2017/
It's kind of natural to expect things that are set up to eventually get paid off, in a story. Clearly, Lindelof doesn't give a fuck about that, but still.
So, yeah, in this case, outside of the show (which might be considered cheating a little bit, but fine, let's go with it), they basically asked the audience to just accept that the Departure, the mysterious event that set everything off, would never get an explanation.
Personally, I don't necessarily have a problem with that, this idea that the show would then be about how people are dealing with a question that just can't be answered.
But then, Lindelof kept adding more mysterious, quite possibly supernatural shit on top of that, which ended up only taking the focus away from the character study the show was supposed to be (*). And naturally, no payoffs there either, because "the show isn't interested in answering those". Well, maybe don't fucking write those in in the first place, then?
Of course, this shouldn't be a shocking turn of events, as it's pretty clear by now it's Lindelof's MO as a writer: hook viewers with random bullshit, you don't even need to pay all that stuff off, just try and sell the idea that the Mystery is what makes it good / interesting (writing made easy!), and they might not even notice how forced and shoddy the human drama is. But it's still as fucking disingenuous and disrespectful of the audience (and all those other people who did work hard on the show, really) as it ever was.
(*) And I'm sorry, but the writing was really shoddy on that front, with convenient, nonsensical villains, and main characters seemingly drawing their motivations from a hat every week.
"Nora now feels like throwing bricks at her neighbors' house."
"Nora was fine with her boyfriend having secretly buried the corpse of a person he kidnapped in a violent altered state of consciousness, but she just leaves without even trying to talk it out when he merely confesses to having hallucinations."
"Matt has yet again switched to another project/crusade altogether and we won't ever mention the previous ones again."
"Tom is now mad at his mother for going ahead with his idea of peddling bullshit to distressed people, blames her for failing to mention that some members of the the cult she used to part of are now after her (because that shouldn't be obvious or anything), and decides to hang out with the cult that just kidnapped and sexually assaulted him because "hey, they may have a point"."
"Laurie is now suddenly suicidal."
Etc.
That would be fine if season 2 didn't exist. I was ok with the departure being unanswered and they said it would go unanswered yet it was the only "mystery" addressed somewhat during the finale. Now what the main issue is for people who dislike the finale, is that all the cool mysterious shit from the second season was abandoned and unaddressed at all during the finale as if it didnt matter.
Honestly I dont even blame lindelof. I'm pretty sure he had more planned considering season 2 opened up the story immensely and introduced tons of cool shit to play with. The first season dealt more with the human side and grief while the second season introduced the strangeness of the world itself and greatly emphasized the mystery. Its a shame because the show deserves a way better ending and the cop out of calling it a love story and wraping it up as such is kinda laughable.
I thought I'd try and elaborate a bit regarding that particular point...
Over in one of those Lost topics, I remember someone argued that when the showrunners said the last season of the show would be about *shit-the-season-ended-up-not-being-about-at-all*, that was misdirection, a red herring, and... well, I personally thought the showrunners simply changed their minds while writing said season (which went about as well you'd expect, especially considering their track record), but never mind that here: I also disagreed that it was a "fair" to mislead the audience like that (for the record, it wasn't even a matter of "well, they actually phrased it in an ambiguous way, and in hindsight, there weren't actually lying": what they said was just flat-out false), in an interview. Red herrings should be in the work itself.
And it's the same thing for The Leftovers: I believe the idea that the Departure would / could never be explained should have been conveyed by the work itself.
And the thing is, I think it could have been... but there again, they fucked up by adding those other supernatural elements.
I already mentioned how I thought they dropped the ball by never acknowledging the obvious implications of the Departure affecting some people and the clothes they were wearing, but not all the other stuff they were in contact with, which hints at an intelligent cause (that really should have been a talking point for those people), but aside from that, I think the writers did a fairly good job (at first, at least) establishing that the event completely flew in the face of science, and that, even years later, nobody had any clue as to what happened, how it happened, nor why those people in particular vanished. For that last point in particular, we were shown that agencies were still looking for some kind of pattern, anything, to absolutely no avail.
That being clearly established, I think the audience would have soon realized that yes, there was this one big Question Mark there, but no hope whatsoever to ever get answers. Had the supernatural stuff ended there, anyway.
While I guess introducing mystics and other strange cults was still fair (after all, you'd expect a lot of people to go there after such an event), the writers should have been extremely careful... but they went ahead and added more strange phenomenons, and even hinted that some of those weirdos might actually be onto something, that they might have some actual insight into all that. They drew links between Kevin Sr. and the Dog Man who both talked to mysterious disembodied voices, showed, in that flashback to the day of the Departure, some weird old ladies who acted like they knew what was going to happen, had Kevin Sr. (again) appear in Kevin's Purgatory Hotel and later confirmed that he did experience that on his end as well, etc...
As a writer, you can't seriously argue that those might all have been mere coincidences. You've opened Pandora's Box, at that point. You've hinted that there might actually be some way to learn more. And you can't even fall back on that one interview either, since the Departure no longer is the only mystery in town.
In short, you've fucked up. And you don't get to blame your audience for expecting some kind of payoff on that front.
TheLostBigBoss
Banned
How could you possibly say that Kevin being immortal during the series had no payoff for character development or helped with the character study when it was one of the core themes with not only Kevin, but Nora as well?
When people ask "why was Kevin immortal, anyway?", the answer they expect really, really isn't "so we could have this scene where he has an epiphany about his relationship with Nora". That doesn't even begin to address the weirdness of his condition.
They said before episode 1 that they would keep adding mysterious over 3 seasons, and never answer anything, and that in season 2 they would add a cheeky song that would make me realize I shouldn't want answers? Okay.
Yeah, before S1E1 he said it wouldn't answer the departure. Except it did, if you believe L.
And any show has "mysterious". That's called plot. Most of the plots were shown to be bullshit beliefs that weren't real or true. Even the bouts of "other world" by Kevin were shown to just be his imagination. Likely dying mind. We don't know why he never fully died, that's one of the only mysteries left without any plausible answer
(I'm really wasting my time listing examples, aren't I?)
Most shows don't have the main character become Jesus and never explain why. Not really sure why you're hitting me with the finger quotes when you know exactly what types of supernatural mysterious this show has, which go completely answered, that other shows either don't have, or if they do, they actually answer them. So, no, not every show has "mysterious".
Like I said, I never bought into this narrative that we shouldn't expect to know the answers to all the questions they keep posing, you obviously bought into it, heavenly I might add, so I'm not sure what else there is to say on the matter.
[edit]
Lindelof said the afterlife wasn't his imagination, so we can stop sweeping everything under the rug with, "it's not real" or "it's all in his head".
your list isn't a list of mysteries. those are just motivations. time also passes in the show.
I did that because you said mysterious and not mysteries.
He wasn't Jesus. That was shown. He was wrong. They all were. Which was a great way to rip on religions.
They weren't wrong about him being immortal, and being able to go to the afterlife, which is why they thought he was their Jesus-like figure. All things that were never explained, like, at all.
No other show in the world could have such an insane turn of events, never actually explained, and people just go "eh, it doesn't matter". Every show should have Iris DeMent's Let The Mystery Be so when you wonder, "why did this character betray this other character? None of this was set up", people can go, "let the mystery be".
No other show in the world could have such an insane turn of events, never actually explained, and people just go "eh, it doesn't matter". Every show should have Iris DeMent's Let The Mystery Be so when you wonder, "why did this character betray this other character? None of this was set up", people can go, "let the mystery be".
Yeah, they were. It was all in his mind. He didn't actually go there. This was the entire point of episode 3x07
digitalrelic
Banned
Bullshit. He was poisoned, buried, shot, suffocated, and drowned several times. The dude died and came back from the dead a bunch of times. Nora even mentioned it in the final episode.
I love the show and I loved the finale but it is definitely a big issue for me that they didn't explain why he was fucking invincible.
So it was all in his mind that he ingested poison, was buried, and woke up hours later? Or was shot and then woke up? Or was drowned, left out in a church floor for hours, and then woke up? He just IMAGINED dying 3 times?
And for a show that tells us "let the mystery be", you sure are certain about this one thing that no one can actually answer, if it's in his head or the afterlife, because the show never actually told us outright, even though all signs point towards it being real.
Unless you can just imagine stuff while being dead, I dunno, maybe that's part of the mystery. Or communicate with your father through a TV or talk to people you've never met, and know info only told to them, because of reasons, I guess?
[edit]
Also, what Lindelof had to say about the afterlife.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=239208231&postcount=1657
So, unless he nuked a part of his brain, which makes no sense at all, he really was going to the afterlife. But I guess a section of the brain that everyone goes to when you're immortal could be another mystery.
Kevin isn't invincible. His constant trips to the "afterlife" and back took a huge toll on his heart.
Speaking of which, has it been already discussed how Kevin is diagnosed with a heart condition sometime after his international assassin counterpart dies after the key to ending the world is extracted from his heart?
He didn't actually say that. He said it was something between Kevin's imagination and the afterlife. He also talked about Senior being in dreamtime when he communicates with Kevin at the hotel, which leads me to believe that that's also where Kevin is, and not the literal afterlife.
Speaking of which, has it been already discussed how Kevin is diagnosed with a heart condition sometime after his international assassin counterpart dies after the key to ending the world is extracted from his heart?
Einchy said:
He didn't actually say that. He said it was something between Kevin's imagination and the afterlife. He also talked about Senior being in dreamtime when he communicates with Kevin at the hotel, which leads me to believe that that's also where Kevin is, and not the literal afterlife.
digitalrelic
Banned
He's no longer invincible because he nuked his personal afterlife in 03x07. He was invincible through season 2 & 3.
Read what I just edited in my post.
He was immortal, he nuked the afterlife, which made him mortal.
[edit]
Which makes the notion that it was all in his head even more ridiculous. Being immortal was a state of mind for him?
I mean, Kevin killed, by literally cutting its heart out, the part of him that was born to run. And in doing so, he also gave up the ability to come back from the "dead" anymore. So I think him developing a heart problem afterwards is fitting. The next time Kevin dies is the last time, and he knows that and is at peace with it.
I take Kevin's trips to the other side to be a kind of limbo. It isn't "in his head", but nor is it the afterlife. It's a unique space and time where one transitions between being alive and dead, and Kevin managed to claw his way back three times. He won't get that chance again. Next time he dies, he bypasses limbo/purgatory and goes straight to dead.
I take Kevin's trips to the other side to be a kind of limbo. It isn't "in his head", but nor is it the afterlife. It's a unique space and time where one transitions between being alive and dead, and Kevin managed to claw his way back three times. He won't get that chance again. Next time he dies, he bypasses limbo/purgatory and goes straight to dead.
Can we agree that confirms Kevin's experience was a supernatural one?
BenjaminBirdie
Banned
So far I've watched Nora's monologue every day since it aired. Probably won't change any time soon.
It's so phenomenal.
It's so phenomenal.
Well, what are we calling the afterlife? Because I would call that the afterlife, anywhere you go to after dying, I say is an afterlife. I mean, I don't think he was in heaven, but he was in a place after his life ended.
I mean, we can play with semantics all day, and the whole notion is a little foggy to begin with, but I guess for me I liken it to someone who has undergone serious physical trauma and is no longer lucid or conscious. Like, say after a major car crash. Some die and some survive. For me, where Kevin goes after the poison/gunshot/drowning is to those precarious touch-and-go moments before a person either succumbs to their wounds or pulls through, and Kevin pulled through three times.
I don't think it's playing semantics when it's either it's not real or it is, and I think that when he dies, and his "soul" goes to a place, the one we've seen a few times now, it's what comes after a life, so I could it the afterlife, you can call it whatever you want, but I think this place is clearly not just in his head since he gets info that shouldn't be available to him there.
More so when this place getting nuked makes him mortal again.
More so when this place getting nuked makes him mortal again.
Yeah, I just use afterlife for clarity's/simplicity's sake.
If there's a heaven in The Leftovers, it's probably not the place, and that place is probably just Kevin's but he can also connect to other people...probably? Like, I'm sure the rules of how this place aren't clear to even the people who made it, but yeah, at least we can agree it's a "real" place, whatever name it may have for the creator's of the show.
David Incorporated Esq.
Member
Way more than three times. And way more than touch-and-go.
Way more than three? He was poisoned, he was shot, and he was drowned....what am I missing? Unless you're presuming he died of asphyxiation every time he put the plastic bag on? The only other one I could think of is the cinder block suicide attempt, but the earthquake saved him there.
bodyofanamerican
Member
Yeah, it was only the 3. In an interview, Theroux referred to the plastic bag as Kevin "edging death".
So he was getting close, but not fully going under.
BTW, one of the most hilarious visuals of the show was Kevin's suicide attempt. Like, Virgil tells him he tried it in an episode, but then a couple episodes later the narrative wraps back around to Evie and the girls leaving, and they see Kevin, they make eye contact, and we SEE Kevin proceed to jump into the lake. My girlfriend and I were in stitches over that - this show had some amazing comedic moments.
David Incorporated Esq.
Member
He was drowned several times. Or maybe I misread it. Four times, then.
This is not some sort of "gosh he sure was lucky" sort of thing. No.
I feel like a lot of what he's experiencing is still brought about by his own mind. Like it's specific to him and informed by his thoughts. Not imagining it specifically but the space is unique to him.
FantasticMrFoxdie
Mumber
i thought the same at first but the ending to this series takes that to a whole new level
"You know, Kevin, we really are The Leftovers."
-Nora
There's an interview with Damon where he discusses the drop from 10 to 8 episodes, and what was dropped by losing 2 episodes - we'd have gotten a Murphy-centric episode in Texas (which would have slotted in as Episode 4) and a Tommy/Jill episode. I'd have loved to have seen those episodes, but, in the context of the season, dropping those 2 episodes was probably the right decision. Tommy and Jill really had no bearing on final season, and the Murphy men were active participants in Kevin's story line.
I missed Jill in the final season. Just that one video and that was it. Kinda surprising.
If you don't believe Nora's monologue then you believe Nora abandoned her dying brother and cut all relationship ties (the ties which precisely would have been what made her change her mind and abort the travel) and secluded herself away for no reason and out of the blue, despite her desire to reunite with Kevin (the desire which people here argue lead Nora to make-up this story XX years later -- why not find Kevin 5 minutes after she aborted the travel...?).
Out of the many interpretations you can come up with for this episode, choosing that Nora is lying is to choose to see the 'The Leftovers' in its weakest, poorest and worst creative light.
Out of the many interpretations you can come up with for this episode, choosing that Nora is lying is to choose to see the 'The Leftovers' in its weakest, poorest and worst creative light.
blame space
Banned
you know at the end of movies where they wrap up the story with text on the screen, explaining shit? i feel like that's what some of you want.
"it turns out Kevin was immortal because he really was a direct descendant of Jesus Christ, and he was blessed by God himself. After Australia, Kevin waged a thousand year war against satanic robots from Mars, with Nora fighting by his side.
They were victorious. The end"
"it turns out Kevin was immortal because he really was a direct descendant of Jesus Christ, and he was blessed by God himself. After Australia, Kevin waged a thousand year war against satanic robots from Mars, with Nora fighting by his side.
They were victorious. The end"
....or maybe she felt like she no longer had a place in the world - her family gone (twice), her relationship with Kevin seemingly irreparably broken, her still being unable after 7 years to truly put the Departure behind her and allow herself to open up to someone - lacked the constitution for suicide, and as such took the easy way out by going into exile. That's what people do. They get scared, they cope is strange ways, they take the easy way out, and they disappoint. Over and over again.
Whether she was telling the truth or not, both options make complete sense and are true to her character. Nora lies, most often to herself (see: chaining herself to Kevin in bed and thinking it is a normal, sustainable thing), and runs when she is scared (see: her reaction to Kevin's confession of seeing visions of Patty). So in that context, her telling a lie? Completely in line with her character. Nora also would do anything to see her kids again (see: her making a cross country trip to see Lily for a brief moment), and is skeptical to a fault (see: her reaction to all of the crazy, unexplainable stuff that happen to Kevin which Matt turned into a bible), and as such the potential of death was worth the risk for her to see if the machine truly works. So in that context, her telling the truth? Completely in line with her character.
That's why the ending is brilliant - it works 100% no matter whether she is telling the truth or not, and even moreso because it doesn't matter if she is telling the truth or not, as she's found a way to move past her loss and Kevin has found a way to stop running, and now they can finally be together and be good for each other.
I disagree. It's not the lying that is out of Nora's character. It's what it means if she is indeed lying: abandoning her brother when he needs her the most. Not even attending his funeral. It flies in the face of the bonding we've seen the two share the past 2 episodes. It's pretending she's switching off any feelings for the people she knows (your example with Lily is perfect to illustrate how unlike Nora it would have been if she had cut all ties). We see it further with Nora being the only one to remember Erika and paying her a visit. Heck, even in her so-called 'exile' she has weekly phone calls with Laurie..
Tell me: if Nora's story is indeed a lie, why did she back-out of the experiment? Why would she call off her only chance to be with her kids? What made her 'stay', what is highlighted by this decision that is in line with her then secluding herself?
Why didn't Nora try to reunite with Kevin (like she said she wanted to) all this time? You say Nora 'found a way to move past her loss' but too bad we don't see how or what because we time-skipped so far ahead. Or you're saying that at that moment where she's making up the story for Kevin, that's when she found the way. Either way, it's silly. Nothing would have stopped Nora to get back together with Kevin soon after she aborted her 'trip'. If Nora's lying, nothing they showed this finale elucidated to the viewer why she secluded herself for this along or what triggers her now pursuing a life with Kevin.
I could also argue that it would be against Nora's character to appropriate the Departure and its appendices to her own benefit (that's what she's going up against the entire show and why she works at the Departure division) but you could respond saying it's shows how great the gesture she's making towards Kevin and her desire to be together that's she's making up the story to explain why she disappeared from his life.
And i would have actually appreciated it if it didn't rely on very silly, uncharacteristic and un-motivated courses of action by Nora. Which are: aborting the experiment only to abandon her dying brother and all other connections, to seclude herself despite wanting to be with Kevin and do nothing about it for XX years to only 'come around' when he finds her. None of this jives.
--
I also wanted to comment about Lindelof's handling of Laurie. Plain admittance of incompetency and frankly of not giving a shit for his creative work.
He and his team planned, wrote, directed, shot, cut, composed and edited Laurie's episode with the full creative intent and desire to communicate her killing herself but he then decides to 'un-do' this after watching the complete episode? What in the flying fuck.
Like, i will be the first (and was) to say trying to arm-strong Laurie's character into suicide again was crap and out of the blue and so forth. But dude. First, you thought this was the right choice and the right execution so stick to than vision of what should be carefully planned season and arcs and progression. And second, changed your mind? Re-write. You can't just leave this episode still written and edited (that lazy flashback) in the manner it was originally to convey Laurie taking her life but then pop the character back in the next episode as the solution. That's adding insult to injury. The same insult to injury he did with writing-off the crap GR portion of the show but not giving the due attention in-fiction to how it was done.
And to think of all the posters who argued in favor of this resolution and that it was 'earned' and so forth.