Granted The OA is not for everyone, but I thought it was one of the best and imaginative things I'd seen on TV in recent years. I loved that it made me go "wtf is going on?" It truly was an escape from reality. It was bizarre, but it had its audience.
Season one I loved–it was novel and very original, unraveled the plot over time, had character development & an amazing ending that tied it all up in a bow. It was a clear and beautiful beginning-middle-end arc.
My complaint is that adding another season doesn't enhance a begging-middle-end story arc that's already done, especially when it clearly was tacked on and not part of the original story.
What I'd prefer? Give the creator a blank slate and let them make another amazing story, rather than saying "this Ducati is great–keep adding wheels!"
I had a different take. It didn't feel tacked on to me, but rather that season 1 was like a benign initiation phase, a dip-a-toe-in-the-crazy kinda deal. By season 2, they felt confident that the audience was now ready for the real deal and they upped the ante. Unfortunately not everyone followed. From what I understood, it was a 5 part story planned over 5 seasons.
wtf was the octopus about. This was a bunch of spooky concepts all mashed together without any clear theme. What was the main theme or central concept of season 2? Season 1 was clearly about the movements & what they did, whether they're supernatural or what. Season 2 was like "Silicon valley! Rhizomes! Time travel! Talking sea creatures!" just sort of a throw everything at the wall approach. Anyway it didn't work for me especially with how fantastic and cohesive the season 1 story was.
Check out the notes here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_OA#Production which make clear that the season 1 story was a cohesive, beginning to end story that the creators refined over a series of years (and it shows). Then "hey lets add a season 2."
I assume this concept is in the TV industry as well but there's a saying in the music industry about a band having their entire life to write their first album and then a year to write their second.
Anything from Zal Batmanglij is out of this world. You should check his early films. I've watched "Another Earth" back in the day for instance and while maybe right now, there is more popular stuff that followed, it was very different back when it appeared.
I guess it was before things like "Melancholia" and "Interstellar".
FYI Another Earth is directed by Tim Cahill not Zal. From what I can tell Brit Marling is the main common thread between that movie, The OA, The Sound of Her Voice.
These three I've seen personally are all good and have a lot of overlapping themes and premises, like mysterious charismatic figures in a slightly off kilter, ambiguously fantastical world convincing people to believe and follow them and their reality.
It's almost comforting to know that The OA is a third or fourth shot at that kind of premise by Brit and her collaborators. Maybe that's why it felt so beautiful and out of nowhere and perfectly formed.
