Hopping around time in a non-linear storytelling fashion (on 'Lost') allows you to bring back characters who are dead and, in some cases, buried. Now that time travel is the story itself, it opens up even more doors. So when an actor reads that they're getting killed off on the show, they're basically, like, 'Okay, but should I still bother to show up next week?'

I've always felt that really good prequels should be original movies.

I think 'The Lord of the Rings' trilogy has a very satisfying ending, and there's not really that deep of a mythological construct.

I stand by the Lost finale. It's the story that we wanted to tell, and we told it. No excuses. No apologies. I look back on it as fondly as I look back on the process of writing the whole show. And while I'll always care what you think, I can't be a slave to it anymore. Here's why: I did it for me. I liked it. I was good at it. And I was really … I was alive.

The best jokes on The Leftovers are the ones that make you feel a little sick to your stomach.

I can't live my life under the sort of "I cannot fail" philosophy, because then every time I do fail, which feels more inevitable than me being perfect all the time, it's going to be soul crushing. And more importantly, I'll never take any risks.

I'm not glass-half-full, glass-half-empty; I'm like, "There's a glass?"