Answers to 10 Burning Questions About 'The Leftovers' We Got From 'The Garveys at their Best"

By Dustin Rowles | The Leftovers | August 24, 2014 |

By Dustin Rowles | The Leftovers | August 24, 2014 |

1. What destroyed Kevin’s kitchen in the pilot episode of The Leftovers?? As we already surmised, it was a deer. Importantly, however, it was a deer among many other deer who went ballistic ahead of the “rapture,” at least one of which destroyed a school. The deer, like the dogs, had a sense about the Sudden Departure.

2. Who is Neil? One of the nagging mysteries is was the identity of Neil. In an earlier episode, Patti sh*t in a bag with “Neil” written on it and left it on a doorstep. Neil we now know is Patti’s abusive husband. We also know that Patti was kind of nuts before the sudden departure. In fact, the departure gave her life the very “greater purpose” that Kevin had been looking for before the sudden departure.

3. What does Laurie have to feel guilty about? Laurie — a therapist — lost her unborn baby to the sudden departure during an ultrasound. (Interestingly, during the episode in which Nora attended a seminar in NYC, a lecture on that very topic— losing unborn babies to the departure — was being advertised in the background).

4. Why did Laurie join the GR? Guilt about losing a baby that she was possibly planning to abort was certainly a huge part of it, but the fact that Patti had a sense — a premonition — about the Sudden Departure probably gave Laurie a sense that Patti knew what was up.

5. Who was Kevin banging when the rapture happened? A rando who ran into the feral deer Kevin was attempting to rescue. “Are you a good man?” she asked Kevin, the same question that Patti asked Kevin last week in “Cairo.”

6. Why did Tom decide to follow Holy Wayne? Daddy issues, obviously. Tom was obsessed with his biological father, and tried to forget about him against the advice of his mother. “Don’t forget about [your Dad],” Laurie tells Tom. “It doesn’t work.”

7. Why is Jill so sullen? Wouldn’t you be? Because the circuit was broken. Because entropy — the tendency of order to become disorder — was FUCKING PROVEN BEFORE HER VERY EYES. At a SCIENCE FAIR. And the circle — and her family — was forever broken.

8. What’s up with the corrupt judge? We’re not entirely sure, but it appears that the corrupt judge was awarded Mapleton Man of the Year the year previous to Kevin, Sr., and that Matt knew he was corrupt.

9. Why did Nora feel so much guilt? Because she was basically praying for a job to get away from her kids, because she was secretly tired of being a stay-at-home mom, because she was frustrated with her kids and her husband on the morning of the sudden departure.

Also, we have a better idea why Nora intentionally knocked over her coffee cup way back in episode two. Because it reminded her of the orange juice that fell to the floor when her daughter was raptured.

10. How did the current mayor of Mapleton win the election? By default, obviously. She had no chance to beat “Buddy,” and the fact that she won suggests only that Buddy must have been taken in the Sudden Departure.

(My full recap of ‘The Garveys at their Best’ will appear on Uproxx tomorrow)