International Assassin 2: Electric Boogaloo
When the third season of The Leftovers was announced, it was immediately safe to assume that we’d be getting another “International Assassin” — something similar to the seminal Season 2 episode that saw Kevin visit an afterlife/alternate world and follow the Yellow Brick Road to infanticide. It’s almost objectively the best ever episode of the show, and Season 3 has largely been expanding its various elements to full episodes in an attempt to maintain the crowdpleasing standard that was set by that fabulous hour of lunacy.
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So far (and, it’s now safe to say, overwhelmingly), I’ve found the third season to be inferior to the second: there’s been some spectacular performing and writing every week, but overall I feel than Damon Lindelof and co. have been a little too eager to please, and that there’s been less conviction — and, hence, distinct personality — in much of the storytelling. “The Most Powerful Man In The World (And His Identical Twin Brother)” — which like “International Assassin” is titled after Kevin’s current job in Sidewaysland — followed the pattern of the series so far: it’s nowhere near as exciting, crazy or unforgettable as its Season 2 counterpart; the same can be said of this year’s Nora, Matt and Laurie-centric hours. But Lindelof and co-writer Nick Cuse certainly tried their hardest to surprise us, and this episode can’t be flawed for its inventive use of existing characters: Kevin as US President is not something I foresaw (I adored the Senator Patty Levin element of “International Assassin”), but it provided some brilliant entertainment. Similarly, witnessing the re-re-return of the sensational Ann Dowd (who I’ve decided is the physical embodiment of American fury), whose Patty is now Defence Secretary in the Kevin-led Guilty Remnant government, thrilled me to no end. Meg, Dean, Evie — it was nice to see you too.
Perhaps the greatest moment of this episode came at the very, very beginning: the sly use of Season 1’s Max Richter-composer opening music (a dour theme that almost nobody missed in Seasons 2 and 3); yet another dig at the initial critics of The Leftovers who were won over by these latter seasons. I love Season 1; I’ve rewatched it recently — it contains probably half of my favourite Leftovers episodes. It’s nice that, even as the show blows up big in its final few weeks and Kevin becomes the goddamn President (!), there’s room to both acknowledge the roots of the programme (Richter’s music, which has been seriously absent for much of Season 3) and wink knowingly at the audience. The Leftovers, in which Justin Theroux has to scan his penis to enter a nuclear bunker and cuts open the heart of his identical twin (between this, Logan, Twin Peaks and Fargo, cloning actors in becoming 2017’s defining cinematic gimmick), is nothing if not knowing. Let’s see how they try and fuck with us next week, on the final episode ever of TV’s most consistently unpredictable show.
