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Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Shimrra Jamaane posted:

Total shot in the dark: the twist is that the 2% are actually the ones really still on Earth and everyone else got beamed away to purgatory. Now give me money major network executives.
Well the show starts 3 years after the event, I think, so it would be pretty obvious if it was 140 million people missing or only 140 million people present.

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Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

DivisionPost posted:

Oh my God ALREADY IT'S HAPPENING

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The TV IV > THE LEFTOVERS: We've found our new True Detective thread

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
Well, count me into the "I liked it" crowd. Didn't particularly care too much for the daughter being a moody teen but I can see why her life is super hosed up (more below) but the party scene was kinda weird, but it kinda got back on track when she met those two dudes with the Prius and buried the dog.

Barlow posted:

I agree with a lot of other that I found the show boring overall. It's interesting to contemplate what religious life in the United States would look like after a rapture like event, I'd guess that the country might turn theocratic, but it just seems like the show is just focusing on two little cults. There really wasn't even enough of the plotline with the son and the black prophet character for me to really get any kind of clear sense of what that was about, or really even get invested in it at all. I may try one more episode and hope it gets better but I have to say it did a bad job of hooking me.

Cool Cherry Cream posted:

I expected to see a third child in the family photo, whose disappearance would've been the cause of the mom going geno. You'd figure your immediate family surviving a mass extinction/disappearance would draw you closer to them and not withdraw completely, but I guess not. So I'm interested in that back story. I could've used some more exposition about what the cults believe in. Smoking = enlightenment? The black guy is magic? The show is intriguing, but I like having Answers (though if the disappearance is never explained that's ok/not what the show is about) and I get the feeling the show will annoy me.

Yeah, I don't think the show is going to go big on explaining things, they're just gonna toss us into the middle of it. Even Lindelof said himself he isn't sure how, if the show will even warrant going past 1 season if there isn't good material; he's not gonna chug at the mystery machine to keep people watching.

But to answer your questions, it was pretty obvious the black prophet is probably some sort of charlatan who thinks he can commune with all the people who disappeared. The congressman clearly was looking "unburdened" after the visit. I'm guessing all the girls there are the guy's personal harem or something. It's just a straight up cult, probably. He thinks that after 3 years the grace period for mourning is over and it's their turn to shine.

Also it was pretty obvious that the wife that turned to the Guilty Remnant was driven away by her husband. I'm not entirely sure exactly what the GR are doing as of now except to remind people the departed are gone and never coming back; not sure how their silence or weird stalking is about.

And the show pretty much explained why his wife left him from the bar scene, and the other quick flashbacks that establish it. Kevin Garvey (the cop) was cheating on his wife, and the woman she was loving got not-raptured away, which is why he freaked the gently caress out/people sort of know that in this smaller town. The son tried to kill himself (jumping off a roof) to possibly join the departed or something (despite his family still all being there; maybe friends I guess). I'm guessing the daughter was too young, father was hosed up/freaking out, mother left because she wanted to be vindictive or whatever, so yeah, I'm not surprised his daughter is moody.

It's all there guys. I'm sure the fake commission in the start of the episode was also just intentionally trolling people as well.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Leb posted:

So, yeah, they've said they're not interested in exploring the central mystery of the show but rather the impact that mystery has on the people who are left behind. Fine, good. Where I run into some trouble, however, is when the pilot goes and introduces some increasingly fantastical elements that seem to be adding additional layers of mystery on top of the original mystery; all the while, we're being told by the show's creators, from the outset, that we shouldn't be focusing on these mysteries and that these mysteries will never be resolved.
What was in the pilot that seemed fantastical to you, exactly?

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

bryn987 posted:

Considering Lindelofs track record, I have no problem with not explaining the event. However, if they keep adding to that mystery without explaining it, then I will be pissed. They've already started doing this by making some of the people that disappeared seem unworthy of a rapture so we will see.
I don't think so, that's just more of a point everyone seems to make because of how non-specific the Departure was; anyone was fair game, so people see probably see it as "well, it wasn't the Christian rapture because I knew that guy was a piece of poo poo."

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Rarity posted:

I know! Let's have a whole episode about them :downs:
Stupid to say but it might be more interesting, because he was pretty much tattooless when it all went down, then he's all inked up 3 years later.

... I'm sure I'll regret posting this soon enough.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Max posted:

Were we supposed to believe that his wife had been raptured, until the reveal at the end? That's how I read it, unless I missed a very obvious visual clue.
It was pretty obvious he was cheating on his wife, but up until he visits her at the GR homes, they didn't explicitly tell you. They even purposely framed the shot where he smashes the family photo impossible to read. Although it was weird the daughter took the glass out AFTER her father goes to the mother; could've cut inbetween or put before that scene for shock value, I guess.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

catpowerd posted:

The one thing the reaction to this show has taught me is that a lot of lost fans are crazy people.
The True Detective thread is dead, long live The Leftovers thread!

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Tomahawk posted:

The magic dude at the ranch seems to know a fair bit more than everyone else. Grace period is over, etc.

I think you're giving the show too much credit in it setting up "this mystery won't be answered". I didn't get that feeling at all from watching.

Charlatans, how do they work?

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
I feel like we've gone back in time and we're all watching Flashforward instead right now :shrug:

That show and its fans spent waaaaaay too much time on trying to tease to us WHAT HAPPENED when honestly I didn't care.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
The first episode is literally everything is more or less okay three years after the fact but it's the three-year anniversary of the event, people want to celebrate/venerate/move on from it and some people can't, won't, refuse to, try to. That's about it.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

thathonkey posted:

Can someone clear up for me what was the scene of the two people jumping off the roof related to?

The kid with whip marks on his back in the Texas cult gets (and ignores) a call from his dad.. Thats not the police chief's son though right? I assumed the police chief's son was raptured and his voicemail is the only record of his voice or something along those lines (which would also help explain why the mom joined the cult - if it is true that they recruit people who have lost and are trying to move on)
The son is still there. He joined that cult. When he was asked why he dropped out, we can only assume the Departure hit him really hard, despite his immediate family being alright and unaffected by it (in the short-term). But regardless he and someone else (his g/f at the time?) tried to take their lives for some reason or another. Maybe they had lost someone close to them? They wanted to follow? It obviously affected him that much that he's now in a cult more or less.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Slackerish posted:

They're making it very obvious that they don't want to reveal GR's purpose and why people joined them just yet, did you really expect a crystal clear picture of everything in two loving episodes?

I'm hooked. It's not an amazing show but it has promise and I think it could be "great" by the end of the season. I hope that viewers stick around long enough to find out.

That being said: Liv Tyler is awful, the lady who plays Nora isn't great either, the SWAT raid was weird mostly because they were violently beating and shooting at what they knew were underage girls who were shanghai'd into joining a cult? And the "bagel subplot" was sort of dumb.
Liv Tyler is probably the only way we'll see how the GR works, and ummm I don't wanna call her a bad actor but she does not have much, if any range, or possibly any material to work with.

Nora I actually think is interesting. The gun is weird. Don't entirely understand her dropping the coffee since she already paid for it and all that. So she's now the mysterious one of the cast.

The FBI SWAT raid is probably just indicative of past crazy cult poo poo and I wasn't surprised they made them all trigger happy and poo poo. That being said Wayne is a huge loving charlatan without saying it (hugs the sad out of them, really?) and he probably thinks Christine is carrying his prophet of a child or something, which would be the simplest way to make her so "important".

Also the entire throughline of Kevin this episode was everyone questioning his sanity, because his father went crazy. He even asks his dad, "when did it start", followed by his dad going nuts and starting to talk to imaginary people. Even the mayor, the shrink, his subordinates questioned him about it because he went apeshit on a group of dogs and said a dude he didn't know told him to do it and join in. Only when his daughters show up when that guy is at the door is that shown to him that guy is real as day (if not the truck showing up on his driveway), and the bagel is him just confirming he's not crazy; there is an explanation of what happened there and he's still in control (or wants to think that way).

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
Jill's actress just mostly reminds me of a younger, hot version of Audrey Marie Anderson (who is pushing 40 but still is hot as hell).

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

CODChimera posted:

Does it even matter if you knew someone who disappeared?

A poo poo load of people just instantly vanished all over the world at the same time. Surely that would concern everyone....
Apparently not, if you ask some posters here.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

lifts cats over head posted:

The show implied that he was having sex when the incident occurred but I don't recall whether or not that woman (whether it was his wife or not) vanished. Also I'm pretty sure that the quick cut shot of the guy running around naked was actually his father so the two events are unrelated.
Looking at it again, he was talking about his father going insane, that was obviously an older man running around all crazy. When it flashes to Kevin himself while he's talking to the parking lot lady, he's having sex. He has tattoos. He might've just been loving his wife, because they didn't really make a conscious effort to make her look drastically different from her to really say otherwise.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
LOL I hope someone else independently thought Kevin cheated on his wife during the rapture because I think I kinda started that one. I went back to that scene and it might be Laurie, because they obviously didn't try to make that woman (you can't really see her face) not look like Laurie (different hair colour would've been a ringer). If that wasn't the case then Laurie is the extra hosed up one who presumably ran off to the GR in that case. Or something. Kevin might just be concerned he's going insane because his father did, also presumably before the Departure.

Also no, the flashback thing is interesting because Lost did not have them. They were deliberate flashbacks with arcs and everything. I'm guessing Prometheus did not have any flashbacks. I think it's just intentionally brief and violent for whatever reason or tone they want to set. I don't know if Lost-style flashback would work really well with this show, but I argue it could have. But oh well :shrug:

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Slackerish posted:

What was so confusing about the last 20 minutes? He got hit in the head, had a dream that showed that he was with Nora when their parents died in a fire, implied that he had an affair with Kevin's wife, woke up three days later because he was comatose and saw his church being taken over by the GR.

Do you really need everything spelled out for you detail by detail? That's kind of sad.
Because someone will promptly tell you Damon (rather Demon) Lindelof is the literal antichrist of television and he should go jump off a roof and die or something because the black smoke monster touched them in their private parts during the time Lost was on the air.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

AxeManiac posted:

Just to be clear, is the "I hug you" guy cult different from the white smokers?
No, he's some other charlatan with his crazy underaged asian girl fetish. Maybe he was a redditor back in the day.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Max posted:

It was also nice to see it was integrated into the opening scene. It makes the car crash more than just a spectacle.

Makes me wonder if we'll see any more characterization of the boy screaming for his dad or the mother.
I want the parking lot lady right at the start to keep coming back, that's what. :(

Toshimo posted:

My personal suspicion, given the number of circumstantial clues is this:

1: Judge takes bribes
2: Judge takes a drive
3: Judge gets not-raptured while driving
4: Judge's driverless car t-bones Priest+Wife
5: Priest researches Judge, uncovering bribes
6: Priest publishes paper on Judge
7: As Judge has been not-raptured, Grandpa Police Chief turns over the Judge's house and finds the bribe money, but there's nobody left to prosecute, so he pockets it.
8: Before he gets committed, Grandpa Police Chief buries bribe money and tells Priest.
Don't forget Matt here is super vindictive about that corrupt judge. I liked that scene where he stops to dismantle the street sign that was put there in memory of that judge.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Ersatz posted:

The parallels throughout this episode to Job are obvious.
I think he was being facetious.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
To take it back on track, I'm actually curious what the next episode is about, exactly. Critics seemed to have gotten screeners for 1,2,3 and 5 but not 4. I've heard rumours they had to re-shoot 4. But just rumours, not really sure if that was true. Or perhaps there's something just big enough that needed to be kept back (for some reason or another), except that it's not really addressed in episode 5 anyway (critics were specifically told so).

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
Well when he was in the casino the bill sorter obviously went through the numbers 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42. Coincidence? I THINK NOT

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
The real dolls were actually referenced in episode 3, where Matt's maid/nurse is watching TV and there is a commercial for it. I just realized that.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Tomahawk posted:

Considering the ATF has been appended to deal with cults and what was supposed to be a murder investigation just resulted in a quickly burned body (along with what appeared to be many other cult bodies) and what happened at Wayne's compound, I'm gonna guess the phone call was real.
Yeah I don't think there's anything to take from that scene other than the ATF (now ATFEC) is basically the government's response to having so many goddamn cults pop up. There was a news report of it at the start of the episode before Kevin turns the TV down, where it seemed like any other news report of another run of the mill ATFEC raid on generic rapture cult #4832. And basically the thing that cults just pop up left and right in response and most of those people are no longer basically classified as real people anymore.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Dirk Pitt posted:

I was very pleased with that episode. Just weird enough.

Edit: Look's like next week's episode is a character focused episode on Nora. :getin:
Nora seems pretty awesome, hopefully it's just her being as big of a dick to people and getting away with it. Actually, I like her when she's across from Kevin, she seems to liven up a bunch.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Wallet posted:

I'm pretty sure all of the stuff going on with the guy hunting wild dogs is supposed to be illuminating Garvey's predicament with the GR. The prevailing sentiment is that they've gone rabid and should be put down, but that's hard to swallow when your wife is one of them.

I could be way off base, but every episode after the first has in some way advanced that conflict, so I suspect it's the centerpiece of this season's plot.
I'm curious to see where Tommy/Wayne's cult are going. Because it's pretty obvious the Mapleton GR Chapter is pretty indicative of "cult should be put down" sentiment (dog guy, ATFEC/the government, the general public) versus people who still think these cultists are still people (Kevin, Matt, etc) who can be brought back. Obviously the spread of cults seems to have ballooned so much (in the wider sense) in the past three years that it's hard for anyone to give a poo poo about a cult or the people in them anymore as anything but a nuisance.

Obviously Wayne is just another charlatan who thinks his underage Asian wife is giving birth to some prophet, but to the rest of the world he's probably just another cult leader who thinks he's worth something. Since they have only planned for the one season I'm certain they'll go somewhere with it rather than tease it out for another season, but that story there seems a little aimless, since last I checked it seems pretty well set that Tommy is gonna stay on their path and he isn't in Mapleton or near anyone that could even possibly pull him out of it (except himself for a while last episode).

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
Wow, Carrie Coon is only 33? She kinda looks a bit older on the show for some reason but I think she's still pretty drat hot.

Sober fucked around with this message at 07:03 on Aug 4, 2014

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Paradoxish posted:

This would be my take, except this show keeps toying with random, ambiguously supernatural elements. The issue with the question on the departure form is the best example from this episode. The show actively dismisses the idea that she's influencing the respondents in some way by making it clear that she's getting 100% positive responses with no variation, and then drives the point home at the end of the episode. I doubt that's something that'll ever be addressed, just like Wayne, but the writers are pretty clearly trying to create mysteries that are open to supernatural explanations.
It would be interesting to see exactly if Nora is assigned people who needs the form filled out or she works in Mapleton. But I suppose it doesn't matter because the whole thesis of that part of her was supposed to say that was she kinda giving off that vibe unintentionally because of her view of the world in the wake of the departure of her entire family.


^^^ e: f;b

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Acinonyx posted:

I was very curious about her comment that Garvey doesn't recall anything about their conversation over his dog bite.

My favorite moment in the episode was the GR hose down. He got worked up thinking that she was too fragile to put up with the GR bullshit and there she was with a hose. He was right, that was awesome. I still can't wrap my head around their cult. There doesn't seem to be anything compelling about mute chain smokers and they are such aggressive assholes that I have a hard time feeling sympathy for them about the poor treatment the town heaps on them.
This is exactly why Nora is the best.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Ashrik posted:

I'm going to guess that, like Wayne and his hugs, the grandfather's voices, etc, they will never be 100% explicit in telling us that "this poo poo right here is real".
I dunno, I don't really feel like there's anything supernatural to attach to any of that. Wayne is a cult leader, and predicting his death is pretty drat obvious given all the poo poo going down. And Kevin Sr. hearing voices was probably always a problem, it's just that in a time where people get non-Raptured into the ether with no possible explanation and his son thinks its happening to him, at least one of them is bound to attach their mental instability to thinking they are communing with the departed.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

Rupert Buttermilk posted:

I keep wondering what it must've been like to have disappeared. Also, was Nora's husband the journalist dude from House of Cards?
There was a quick flash in Nora's episode and he was literally there for a second giving a high-five or something.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

tadashi posted:

He's credited as "voice" in the Nora-centric episode, too, but I don't recall hearing him speak?
I thought they named her husband in earlier episodes. I can only assume he did have a speaking part in the flashback but it got edited out later on.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

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Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

HUGE SPACEKABLOOIE posted:

I'd totally watch a TV show built around Dog Sniper.
As long as he is trying to countersnipe a dog who is in fact a sniper.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.

DangerZoneDelux posted:

That was a good episode. That episode revealed a common theme about a few of the disappearances. The people/fetus weren't wanted or were being wished away, Nora getting annoyed at her family, the baby rapture abortion, the crying baby in the car annoying the mother, pretty cool episode

edit: Of course I am slow and may have missed that theme during the episodes prior

Tomahawk posted:

Who was wishing away the cast of Perfect Strangers? Who?
The Departure was random, I'm still guessing, it's just that in the spotlight are the characters we've seen for the last 8 episodes and how they were before it all. Of course all the ones who seemed so hosed up is because they felt so guilty because they feel like they got what they wished for just moments before. As if it were some cosmic prank being played on them.

Oh and Kevin is hosed up because he was balls deep in that woman. He probably didn't want to wish her away. He just snapped. He's just lying to himself.

Besides if that were the case then nearly everyone would've been raptured off like nobody's business.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
Kevin felt like he was not in control of his life, that was the message I got. Literally everyone just shits on him in this episode (and mostly in the present anyway) no matter what he does. Father and the department laugh him out for wanting to save the deer, everyone has this perception he's mooching off Laurie (who I assume was making most of the money), Laurie doesn't like how he handles Tom (since Tom is not Kevin's actual biological son). Oh and his father literally just shits on him during his birthday party (and at great heights) and basically tells his son be stay mediocre because he's probably a trophy husband to Laurie, who he thinks is making all the decisions in the household.

Then he bumps into that woman (I thought she was Indian, not Middle Eastern, but whatever) and seemingly finally gets what he wants (well, the deer in exchange for her basically offering herself to him) and she gets departured away mid-gently caress. It's like someone is punishing him for trying to assert himself.

Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
I don't think Christine found Wayne in any bit. She just got overwhelmed by the whole truth of the situation and bailed, leaving a baby she didn't want.

Pretty sure the ATFEC just found Wayne, shot him, he escaped and they eventually found him in that lovely diner restroom. I find it absolutely hilarious in his dying moments that he hopes he isn't a fraud and "grants" Kevin a wish. Obviously it would've happened anyway but that's just something else to make Kevin go crazy over.

And I don't think any of the ATFEC agent's questions about Wayne and Russia mean jack poo poo, they're probably just shotgunning everything with questions and hoping something sticks.

Kinda glad Nora probably isn't leaving, but the letter she wrote was really good anyway. Definitely surprised to see where it goes for season 2.

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Sober
Nov 19, 2011

First touch: Life.
Second touch: Dead again. Forever.
Nora was gonna cut and run, but the baby and Kevin/Jill/the dog showing up probably made her change her mind. Hopefully (but probably not) for good.

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