Leftovers
Started watching The Leftovers (2014). The creator wrote Lost, and you can notice similarities. I don’t really expect to like this series, but after first episode I can say I liked how it portrayed all these unhinged people.
Guy is literally crying after he takes apart a bread machine and find his bagels inside. Haha, out of context.
Priest needs money desperately, goes to casino (guided by pigeons) and wins three times row betting on red. Gets his cash and prepares to leave. I bet that couple at the table are going to rob him, or he gets in a car crash or something. Yup, I was right. He beat (killed?) the guy too, and got all the cash to the man he owed, but didn’t realize he was late.
Cop questions twins, is not getting anywhere, asks: ”Which one of you is the fucking smart one?“
Jill gives her mother, the GR member a Christmas present. It’s a lighter.
I’m starting to like this series a lot.
Watching more Leftovers. I dislike black-outs, amnesia, and split personality tropes. Making any of those a central trait of a key character, ugh.
I like this Guilty Remnants cult. Sure it’s a bit overdone, but interesting nevertheless. I think the family mother is thinking too highly of herself and will get burned (just now she presumptuously sat on Patti’s chair, who they are not aware has been kidnapped). Megan, the black haired woman who doesn’t really conform seems to me like natural leader type, or that’s how I would write it. I think leaders have the ability to understand what is important and what is just common custom. So they are able to break the custom and do the important things when needed. This is specifically characteristic of a leader, as opposed to merely a smart person.
I hate this trope where it’s ambigious whether a man wants to release or kill his prisoner, by taking a knife and ominously walking to him. Perhaps the worst thing is that predictably the prisoner is always freed, so there’s no point to the tension.
This series could have a character that when noticing people started disappearing, “staged” his own disappearance. I guess that could fit couple of characters already shown, such as Holy Wayne and the dog shooter. Update: This is mentioned in the beginning of second season.
This is the backstory episode, but I still can’t figure out what drove the Garvey family apart because none of them “departed”. Maybe the mother just left on her own? Although she now seems more stable than Kevin, the father. Looks like it’s just marriage problems. Maybe someone will be spiced up with an “oh? I thought you were gone too” comment.
Ah, she lost a baby from the womb, not a bad idea.
I actually like this priest character, which is very rare for me. I think it’s because his belief in himself, and by extension to others, is strong almost to the point of solipsism. Of course he preaches God, but to me he seems like the God. The similarity that pops to mind is Claire from Baccano, probably because that character was literally a solipsist.
“I should’ve realized he was full of shit when he told me I was special” — girl who just realized she is not special.
When I started watching this series, I expected more of departure “rounds” to happen, but looks like this series can manage without such too. But if they are going to use one, then end of the season, where I’m currently at, would be the ideal time. Or start of the second season. Also could be something else supernatural happens.
Finished the first season.
Auction for house, bidding at 1.6M$, Nora shouts 3M, ending the bid. Rejoicing, shouts “we won!”…
I knew it before I saw. An episode ends in a cliffhanger, so of course the next episode jumps to deal with a different set of characters (sometimes different timeline) and completely ignores the questions left hanging.
The mom tries to get her book about being a cult member get published. The interested publisher gushes about how great the contents are but it lacks feeling. Then he explains exactly what parts are good — literally summarizing scenes from the series as footage of it plays for the audience. Then he explains how an editor will be working with the writer to make the book emotional, to “connect” with the audience and answer the questions they want to know, even if it’s strictly not facts.
The mom goes crazy and tries to strangle the publisher. So it was the typical trope about a publisher trying to ruin a good book, but what I thought was notable was how 100% what the publisher said was correct in reality, and even though he did slip some bad things out of his mouth, he was actually quite considerate. What I’m getting at is that both sides were “correct”, but there was still conflict, which is pretty rare because it’s so difficult to pull off. Their viewpoints were so different that they couldn’t understand each other at all, yet I could sympathize with both sides.
Watching more Leftovers. Argh, so much dreaming and hallucination shit.
Finished watching The Leftovers. It had plenty of good stuff, but I guess I still wouldn’t call it great. About the last episode, the explanation Nora gave about what happened to the dissappeared people was kind of interesting. That world had basically split into two realities, one with 98% of the people and the other with 2%. The show was about these 98% people who were all so unhappy because they were “left out” and felt that the 2% were the chosen ones. But Nora says in the other world it’s the reverse: The 2% remaining people think they are the “lucky ones”, and are happy that they still have each other.
One thing that stuck me, as if the show was trying to tell it to me, was that even if supernatural things happen, it still doesn’t mean everything mysterious is supernatural. Basically everyone in the series was crazy, and most were shown to have been merely mentally ill, not psychic, divine or whatnot. I guess that would be a good message to give anyone who is religious. Not to insist that their gods do not exist, but that nearly everything has a reasonable explanation, and when you don’t understand something new, religion is the absolutely last tool you should reach for because you don’t want your madness to hurt other people.