The Leftovers Review: “Cairo” (Season 1, Episode 8)

Let’s talk about Jill for a few minutes, as she is also tremendously important. Having matured in a time of global chaos, she’s completely messed up and quietly devastated in her own way. We’ve seen how nonchalant about the possibility of her own death she is in past installments, but in “Cairo,” Jill actively drives away those who might lift her from her slump.

First, of course, there’s Aimee. Aimee, Aimee, Aimee. It’s almost beside the point whether she actually slept with Kevin, isn’t it? In Jill’s mind, her friend crossed a line, and that’s enough to drive a wedge between the two. Throughout the season, Jill has been silently looking for genuine signs of happiness in Mapleton, for an indicator that “some people can be okay” after the Departure. She knows Aimee isn’t, and so when her friend describes herself as “fucking fantastic,” it becomes imperative for Jill to knock her down a few pegs. (In my notes for this episode, I commented on how like a Guilty Remnant member Jill was acting in “Cairo,” though it’s a credit to the writing that I considered that without ever predicting she’d end up on the cult’s doorstep by episode’s end.)

Additionally, at the “family” dinner which opens the episode, she roughly interrogates Nora about the gun in her purse, ruining the mood. Later, she breaks into Nora’s house to locate the weapon, then leaves it in plain view to send a message. Finding the gun is an emotional watershed for Jill; despite Nora’s assurances that she got rid of the gun because she didn’t need it anymore, there it is, hidden away, just in case Nora ever needs to call on its services once more. No one is ever going to be okay, she learns. Jill feels so numb, so brutalized by the Departure, that allowing that numbness to eventually consume her becomes the only real possibility. Some of you may have predicted Jill joining the Guilty Remnant weeks back, but it was the smoke rolling from her lips after her fight with Aimee that cemented the possibility for me.

Laurie also has an interesting journey in “Cairo,” apparently ascending to Patti’s throne. When, as “Cairo” opened, Patti asked Laurie whether she was ready, I had flashbacks to “Gladys,” in which the same question was asked before that GR member was brutally stoned to death. Now that we know that Patti had Laurie’s death planned somewhere down the line, the chilling possibility presents itself that the GR has already set in motion a plan that will change everything in Mapleton. Exactly what they’re doing escapes me, but Patti laid out clothes in that church, and the GR members have started bringing in dead bodies rolled in carpets to don those items. It’s a much more nefarious scheme than taking photographs out of frames, I’ll say that much.

So, where does “Cairo” leave us? Patti is dead, by her own hand but with Kevin bearing the brunt of the responsibility. Jill has chosen to take the white, as you might call it, and Laurie is about to carry out a plan I’m sure next week’s penultimate episode will see some serious fallout from. It’s a supremely engrossing hour of The Leftovers, and one that makes me eager to jump back into Mapleton next week.

I want to hear from you guys, though – what did you think of “Cairo”? Any theories about that poetry, Kevin’s mission or what the GR is up to? There are so many mysteries in this show right now that I’ve just about filled a notebook with assorted ideas about it, and I’ll bet I’m not the only one. And now that the show has been renewed for a second season, at least we now know Lindelof has plenty of time to continue teasing out the answers.