The Leftovers: Nora becomes Sarah?

The last scene of The Leftovers premiere added an unexpected twist to the show.

Of everything that occurred this past week in the premiere of The Leftovers, the last five minutes of the show may have created the most questions.

A grey haired woman is pictured in front of a rickety looking house with miles of green behind her. She spends some time gathering dove’s from the coup and is seen taking messages off of the dove’s legs and throwing them into a bucket (which is already full of them).

She is then seen riding an old bike across the countryside (presumably Australia) to meet another woman working on a community garden. The gardener refers to her as Sarah and asks whether she knows someone by the name of Kevin. It’s at this point we see it’s Nora who has been riding the bike. She responds “no” as a pensive stare takes over her eyes.

WHOA.

I believe we are getting a glimpse into the world after “The Great Flood.” Everything shown is so minimalistic. The expansiveness of the land amplifies that no one is else is around. Nora, ahen, Sarah is much older looking so we don’t really get a great sense of timing. It seems to be in the future, but unfortunately there aren’t any existing benchmarks for how a biblical event ages someone.

Most importantly, does this confirm that Kevin will eventually die? Even so, why would she refuse to acknowledge knowing him and have a different name? At the very least, they’re not together. And if it’s not a flood of epic proportions, something tears apart their family and society as a whole.

Next: The Leftovers season 3 premiere recap

As I’ve mentioned before, Damon Lindelof is no stranger to time travel, having toyed extensively with the physics of time throughout his Lost tenure. Will flash forwards become a mainstay throughout the remaining seven episodes? If so, I’m hopeful they will tie together in a seamless fashion. They definitely create a new and unexpected element in an already supremely philosophical show.