Haunting the Memory: Moments of Return in Television Drama

Abstract

‘Everything. Everyone. Everywhere. Ends’ was the tag line for the fifth and final season of the critically acclaimed series Six Feet Under (HBO, 2001–5) — a dark comic drama centred on the lives of the Fisher family and their family-run funeral home in Los Angeles. In the final episode (‘Everyone’s Waiting’, season 5, episode 12), following the death of her oldest brother Nate (Peter Krause), the youngest sibling Claire (Lauren Ambrose) leaves the family and Los Angeles. With no job lined up but an ambition to become a photographer, she pulls away from the family home and drives into an uncertain future. What follows is a remarkable six-minute sequence, framed by the track ‘Breathe’by the female singer-songwriter Sia, in which Claire literally drives into that future. The sequence intercuts shots of Claire driving, the back projection speeded up to heighten the ‘fantastical’ feel of the scene, with a montage of the weddings, celebrations, deaths and funerals in the remaining lives of the Fisher family — a six-minute sequence which spans 80 years.1 Here the future is foretold but its possibilities are asserted by the long road disappearing into the horizon, where the series ends and where we leave Claire driving.