Winter is Coming
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The Leftovers director shares thoughts on that finale

By Amanda Mullen

AUSTIN, TX - OCTOBER 03: (L - R) David Lindelof, Mimi Leder, Carrie Coon, Tom Perrotta, and Justin Theroux attend HBO's "The Leftovers" Season 2 Premiere during The ATX Television Festival at the Paramount Theatre on October 3, 2015 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images)
AUSTIN, TX - OCTOBER 03: (L - R) David Lindelof, Mimi Leder, Carrie Coon, Tom Perrotta, and Justin Theroux attend HBO's "The Leftovers" Season 2 Premiere during The ATX Television Festival at the Paramount Theatre on October 3, 2015 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images) /
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The series finale of The Leftovers aired back in 2017, but if fans have spent the past two years pondering the events of “The Book of Nora” (and the entire series for that matter), it’d be hard to blame them.

The show seemed to pride itself on raising more questions than it could answer, and in its final episode, it made it clear that it didn’t necessarily want to tie things neatly into a bow. And for a show that’s premise involved two percent of the population disappearing into thin air, it makes sense that certain mysteries would be left unsolved.

That said, Nora’s experience during the series finale is one that left many fans questioning whether she’d imagined the events of the episode. During “The Book of Nora,” Nora finds a way to travel to an alternate reality — which also happens to be where the Departed went. There, she finds closure regarding her lost family, eventually returning to her own reality and reconnecting with Kevin.

The whole thing feels a bit surreal — and given the show could easily be categorized as science-fiction, it’s hard to say whether Nora actually went through all this or if it all happened in her head.

In a recent interview with Collider, director Mimi Leder shared her perspective of what occurred during the finale. Leder served as the director for that episode, as well as for several previous ones over the course of the series.

“I think that people have belief systems, and I think she believes she went through because I think we all need stories to tell ourselves to get through this life,” Leder said. “We tell ourselves stories to survive. So, do I think she went through? No.”

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And knowing how obsessed with finding answers Nora’s character was, Leder’s interpretation makes sense. Nora spends the majority of the series trying to find some greater meaning behind the Departure, and this was her way of doing that — even if it was completely psychological.

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