How to Write a Series Finale

I haven't even watched The Leftovers (I want to, but I've heard it's pretty bleak, and when faced with the menu of all HBO shows, I usually can't help toggling over to John Oliver's tile), so I didn't expect to gobble up this article about the final episode of the show so happily. Boris Kachka usually writes book reviews for New York, and this piece isn't so much about TV or even one show as it is about writing.

He writes, "For this story, I spoke with everyone who was in the writers’ room about the construction of the script; flew to Australia for a tense and emotional final week of shooting; and sat in with [Damon] Lindelof as he built his final cut, reshaping his creation virtually frame by frame."

It's the best thing I've ever read about the strange, sometimes strained, sometimes exhilarating process of figuring out what happens in the fabricated lives of made-up people, and the very real feelings that those made-up people will have in response. About the missing two percent of the population--the premise to the whole show--Kachka describes how even the writers were grappling with what had happened. "There was another thread of the story to resolve, too, the question of the 2 percent. Where had they gone, and would their loved ones — and the audience — ever get to find out? Whether there was an answer, avoiding the question entirely might have suggested it didn’t really matter — and to the characters, at least, it really does."

To the characters it really does! Even though I know how it ends now, I'm totally going to watch The Leftovers.

I wish there was a behind-the-scenes article like this for Mad Men. A behind-the-scenes BOOK.