Not everyone has the stomach to become a fan of the new HBO series The Leftovers. Entertainment Weekly’s Melissa Maerz is one of them. After watching the “Gladys” episode where a woman (Gladys, played by Marceline Hugot) gets brutally stoned to death, people like Maerz are passing on The Leftovers.
HBO’s gigantically successful and violent series Game of Thrones isn’t repulsing viewers like The Leftovers is. Maybe it’s the large ensemble cast without a single protagonist (like The Leftovers‘ Kevin Garvey played by Justin Theroux) that makes the violence more acceptable. And viewers love the look of GoT. Beauty may forgive the violence, too. In fact, Game of Thrones is nominated for 19 Emmys this year, including Art Direction and Cinematography. Of course, not everyone immediately loved Game of Thrones, either. TV critic Matt Brennan of Indiewire quit watching the fantasy epic two times before he “learned to love it.”
