I’ve wondered since the start of this thing what was in it for Liv Tyler. Sure, she had some memorable moments in season one, mostly as a foil to Laurie and her own misguided journey into the Guilty Remnant. You could say that Laurie’s biggest sin (figuring out what that might be is a big part of surviving a post Departure world) is re-creating Megan as the monster of vengeance she’s become. Laurie really should have identified with the suffering, nearly disassociated victim looking for help, and offered therapy rather than silent endurance tests and mind games about lighters. When things got too dangerous for Laurie and begin to threaten the lives of those she loved, she bailed, but it was much too late for Meg by that point.
Now we learn why. I mean, why shouldn’t our penultimate episode this season be an all-Meg extravaganza? We haven’t seen her for weeks, since she showed up to rape Tommy (“because I wanted to get you pregnant” she non-explains at one point in their twisted involvement this week) and douse him in gasoline but not kill him. We find out also that his hugs are meaningless, that Laurie is desperate for any means of dissolving the Remnant, that Tommy is still sadly looking for love (just like the dog he witnesses some horrible person abandon in a city park where he’s been sleeping), and that more people have Meg’s number than she may realize (thanks to Father Matt, the truthteller extraordinaire as always).
Just what number is that? The easy explanation is that she’s a spoiled princess who’s always gotten her way, who then lost her mother (perfect high caliber cameo from Betty Buckley) on 10/13, the day before the Sudden Departure. So, as she’s told frankly this week, nobody gave a crap about her personal tragedy in the face of the world-wide calamity the following day, and she’s been pouting ever since.
Her grief and confusion ruined her engagement, it made her vulnerable to the Remnant when they sensed a weakness, and it led her down a path to violence, rape and torture. Because while Ten Fourteen caused fear, panic, guilt, family abandonment, despair, depression, rage, paranoia, and a host of other kinds of turmoil for the Leftovers, it basically just drove the unstable Meg batshit insane. Now she takes actions too provocative even for the remnant, including an unforgivable mind game played on a bus full of school children.
It also led her to Jarden, before any of the rest of our cast got there.
And of course it’s all justifiable, if you really believe what the Remnant believe, why should any action have consequence? But what’s next? Mass suicide? Wonton murder? One senses, for Meg any of those results would be acceptable. She’s our Angel of Death, and she’s got a big event planned for her return to Jarden in next week’s finale. Tyler is reveling in the role, a seductive siren with perhaps a blindness to her own deepest motivations. And a sexy bitterness so deep it allows her to toy with everyone around her like playthings.
If only Tolkien had written an evil female elf for his saga, we might have met someone very different from lovely Arwen. I hope Disney is watching, if they’re looking to do a live action Snow White anytime soon, she’d be great … for the evil Queen. That mirror won’t know what hit it.
The question for next week is what happens when an Angel of Death confronts the perpetual Whipping Boy that Tommy has become? Chris Zylka’s performance has been consistently strong, as he’s captured the sense not just of loss and despair since his college roommates killed themselves, but also a kind of macho impotence in coping with this broken world. His pathetic vulnerability to his rapist is almost the most disturbing part of this episode. No, the school bus thing is still worse.