The final season (third) of The Leftovers ended this past Sunday.
I did not watch any of it until the finale was about to air, so I could blitz-watch these eight episodes versus having to stretch it over two months. But it is also breaking my heart.
All three seasons of this show have been excellent, it has not had any missteps IMO. Each season finale is unexpected, yet afterwards totally makes sense so that you wonder why you didn't actually see things coming. Directing, writing, and acting is top-notch, great production quality as well. It is a show that deserved much more attention, but I know the fan base is very devoted. Each season was arguably better than the last, even though before the season would air, you had no idea where it would be going.
I just watched s3e6 (which means two episodes to go after this), and I am having trouble not rushing ahead to finish it, while at the same time dreading it because it will be over. The hour of TV I just watched (as episode 6) is perhaps one of the finest I have ever seen in my entire life, and (on a more low-key scale) on par with "Ozymandias" from Breaking Bad or the end of Six Feet Under -- which actually is a fitting comparison, as it is kind of the ending of a lot of different threads, the culmination of a lot of character arcs. I cried pretty much non-stop through the last quarter of the episode. Devastatingly good, without having to be "emotionally ugly" in the process, since the arcs are a bit different from BB. These were not characters in a story -- these were "real people" to me.
Lindleof was the showrunner for all three episodes; basically a staff writer on the committee would write the episode, then he'd do some rework to make it all mesh perfectly and give it final vision -- and so he has a paired writing credit on every episode. After seeing the totality of this series, I completely forgive him for the missteps of LOST as well as the debacle of Prometheus (which wasn't all his fault anyway). If people doubted his ability, they need to watch this series... it might be the finest thing he will ever work on.
It looks like Vulture has the final two episode rated at 4/5 and 5/5. I'm happy with that since BB's last two episodes went the same way.
It's just really interesting to me what makes a good show (and what makes a sporadic one). I mean, what I am seeing, based on "Great" series, is that (1) it needs to have a long-term consistent showrunner that steers the vision through to completion, and (2) a talented cast who lives/breathes their characters, and (3) solid writing and production quality. There are shows like GoT and TWD that are still "popular" but their quality tends to be sporadic not even just from episode to episode but even within an episode. I suspect the vision is not entirely clear all the time, or that maybe more control is given to the individual writers and directors rather than really having a consistency throughout the series. That was Gilligan for BB, Ball for Six Feet Under, and Lindelof here -- they all stayed for the entire run.
Anyway, I just had to say something. If you are into this "tone" of a show -- realistic with a touch of fantastical elements, in-depth character studies and relationships ,and something that is not entirely predictable / by rote -- then you might want to check this show out.
Justin Theroux
Ann Dowd
Amy Brenneman
Scott Glenn
Christopher Eccleston
Liv Tyler
Carrie Coon
... and others.
EDIT: Done. The penultimate episode, not sure how I feel, although it stuck the landing and led directly into the finale. The finale was... quieter than expected, and more personal. Kind of a microcosm of the larger themes of the series. There's even an explanation of what happened, but the narrative doesn't get hung up on it -- it is focused on the important things that need to be resolved.
Maybe in part, having answers is less important than learning how to live without them. It's a really big thing, a life lesson I have found. That after all the drama and pain and highs and lows are said and done, and things happen that we do or don't understand... the next day is still a day we have to live. So do we know how to do that? Or can we figure out how?