we’re so fucking cooked bro [SPOILERS] this is genuinely one of the few episodes that’s given me a genuine physical reaction. it’s one thing for an episode to get me to cry, which isn’t that difficult, but it’s another thing for an episode to make my body unsettled. to make my muscles tense up. for an entire fifty minutes. death works overtime. it comes randomly and sporadically. it strikes frequently, and you are always vulnerable. you can follow trends to see who it’s more likely to victimize, the old with their weak bodies and the poor in their dangerous environments. but in the end it’s indiscriminate. you are vulnerable and i am vulnerable. your friends are vulnerable. your family is vulnerable. this horrifying idea is one our brain purposefully blocks out. an article by the guardian, sourced at the bottom of this review, states “…the brain shields us from existential fear by categorizing death as an unfortunate event that only befalls other people.” in the same article, scientist yair dor-ziderman says our brain has a primal mechanism to view situations of our own death as unreliable. our brain purposefully blocks out thoughts of death, of ourselves and of those we know. but that doesn’t make it any less real. that doesn’t mean we are any less vulnerable. many episodes of this show tackle this idea, but this is the only one to fully commit itself to it. we don’t think of these horrifying ideas because we are not meant to. but your mother can die today. your father can die tomorrow. they are no less vulnerable than lisa, or the other three people david and rico and arthur must prepare for a funeral. you are no less vulnerable than them. this episode puts you directly into nate’s shoes, takes you through the hours after lisa’s disappearance, and once the credits roll, leaves you breathless to confront death. acting as a force of coercion, this episode ignores our most primal and deep-seated urges and makes us acknowledge this unspeakable idea. it’s disturbing and horrifying, and as much as i want to, i can’t look away. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/oct/19/doubting-death-how-our-brains-shield-us-from-mortal-truth