Like everyone else I’ve seen two episodes of HBO’s The Leftovers, and like everyone else I’m just about done with it. There’s something very, very wrong with the idea of people in a small leafy community acting strange and surly and curiously off-balance because a sudden cataclysmic event has proven beyond a doubt that an absolute cosmic authority rules over all creation. After living with uncertainty all their lives about whether or not there might be some kind of scheme or purpose to existence (i.e., probably not), here is a group of people who suddenly know there’s absolutely a plan or a design of some kind, like something out of the Old Testament only scarier and creepier, and that there’s some kind of all-knowing, all-seeing judgment system that resulted in 2% of the world’s population rising up and into the white light…and this is how they respond? I don’t know how I’d react or how West Hollywood or Beverly Hills would react as a community, but I’m 95%…make that 97% certain that the vast majority in my realm would do more than just slouch around and act strange and surly and shoot packs of feral dogs with high-powered rifles and optionally join a spiritual order that requires no talking and smoking a lot of cigarettes. I’m profoundly disappointed with the imaginings of co-creators Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta. My interest in their series has dropped precipitously over the last two weeks. Little Justin Theroux and that morose expression on his unshaven face…silent, stone-faced Amy Brenneman, Liv Tyler being told to chop down a perfectly healthy tree…the dog-shooting guy…you can have ’em. I’ll probably watch this lame-ass series for the next couple of Sundays out of boredom but I’m definitely not into it and I’m just looking around for an excuse to watch something else.