fair warning: this post is going to have spoilers from "Louie" season 3 so if you are still waiting to watch it, even though the season ended back in december and won't be renewed for at least another year, this is your last chance to save yourself

i am a fan of Louis c.k. but didn't have the correct cable package to watch his show until this last year, so i have not seen any of seasons 1 or 2 yet. but i picked up season 3 in the middle (the "Barney/Never" episode to be exact) and apparently missed at least three shows which have completely changed the season finale for me. the three shows in question are the two where Louie strikes up a romance with Parker Posey (not playing herself (also, that was the source of the Parker Posey post i made a few weeks back ) ) and there was another one where Chloe Sevigny (also not playing herself) helps Louie try to find her because he wants to try to continue their relationship, but doesn't have a way to contact her since their last date ended.

i first saw the season finale without the context of these three shows. in the finale, Louie is depressed from the holidays and makes half-hearted plans to visit his sister (played by Amy Poehler) and her family in Mexico for new year's eve. while en route to the airport, he sees Parker Posey on the bus, they start to have an enthusiastic greeting, and she ends up collapsing from some kind of hemorrhage. we see her getting rushed to the hospital with Louie in tow where she subsequently dies of a mysterious illness.

in my first viewing of the episode, without the context of their relationship, i had to infer that they obviously knew each other but my best guess was that they were supposed to be old friends or neighbors that hadn't seen each other in years. in context, it has only been a few weeks since they last saw each other but their relationship is made more profound (by TV standards...) by the fact that they were almost lovers and the fact that Louie has been looking for her and failing. so now when she dies suddenly in the hospital, there is an actual sense of loss and it explains a bit better why Louie changes his plans and hops on a plane to Beijing rather than spend time with his sister. i also think it makes the show that much better because the characters have actual depth instead of just lines of dialogue like so many other shows.