in a blogpost
Limetown is a podcast about the fictional town “Limetown,” headed by reporter Lia Haddock who explores the mystery behind why all 300+ members of the town mysteriously disappeared in 2004 with no trace of anyone left in the town. I will be critiquing the entire first season of Limetown so here is a spoiler warning. Neither the second season, the TV show, or the prequel book will be referenced nor taken into account in this review as I have not nor will I read/watch/listen to them. (Epic warning my opinions are not positive) With that over with, let’s begin with…
Episode one, What We Know does a great job of giving a rundown of the premise of the podcast while introducing everything the listener needs to know. It does a great job of getting you invested in the story and has a great ending to the episode that gives interest in continuing the series. I have no real gripes on this episode. Episode two, Winona does a good job of building suspense and mystery, but it has a few issues that will become apparent in later episodes. I do like Winona’s name, which means firstborn daughter, this is a nice nod to how Winona is the first survivor we meet and her daughter as well. One thing that I feel takes away from the episode and future survivor episodes is the whole thing where they can only answer certain questions. It feels like a gimmick that doesn’t make a lot of sense in the story at all, nor is it ever explained. Winona also is not very interesting as a character to me. I also don’t know why she is the only one who has memory issues or why she is the only crazy one we meet, it is never explained why she is like this at all. After we meet her the only connection she has with the story after this is her daughter, who is only mentioned afterward in the final episode. She doesn’t feel like a real person to me, she feels like a robot programmed to only tell Lia some things and nothing else with very little relevance to the story. The whole of her seeing the 2 people drawing the same thing also makes little sense to me, as it is never explained. The implants had some effect clearly but their relation is never shown. Wouldn’t Winona have been able to just hear them if she had an implant? And how did she escape as well as hide away from the public? The ending of season one is already convoluted and explains very little while just waving away several inconsistencies, but if they just hid everyone away in 72 hours how did Winona get out if she escaped before the panic if she was mentally ill and had memory issues? Wouldn’t she have just gotten caught or found? These are among many inconsistencies that I have issues with that break the immersion for me. There is only so far suspension of disbelief can go before it actively harms the story. The ending makes little sense to me either, the guy is never explained and his body disappearing doesn’t make sense either. It’s another “mystery” that is never explained. If he was part of the group that is “after” the Limetown survivors and that same group is the group that took Lia then why did they not just grab her now instead of at the very end? This makes no logical sense. Minisode 2.5 is interesting and I do like it a lot, but I wish more and more like this was done. I will go more in-depth later.
Episode 3, Napoleon is where Limetown begins to decline. First of all, the name Napoleon is a nice nod to George Orwells Animal Farm, it is my favorite allusion in the series, though it somewhat doesn’t make sense as the only similarity between these 2 pieces of media is a pig(the pig in Limetown doesn’t even talk). I wish the whole concept with the pigs was explored more, it’s very suddenly introduced in this episode and then never referenced afterward. The format of this episode is interesting with Lia explaining that Warren was already dead and that’s why she was using his name, but why does she use the other survivor’s real names after this? Max and Deidre aren’t confirmed dead, especially Deidre, so why use their real names? Winona used a different name but none of the others? It doesn’t make much sense. The ending of this episode was not good at all either. It was trying to be scary but was just kinda cringe and made me laugh more than anything. The whole thing with her parents possibly knowing about the whole Limetown thing is also something that is brought up once and then never referenced or expanded on again.
Episodes 4 and 5 both have very similar issues so I will be talking about both simultaneously. These episodes embody my biggest gripe with the series. Every episode with a survivor feels like a lore dump being read off by a robot. The characters have very little time to introduce themselves as interesting characters before spending 70-80% of the episode talking about and explaining a bunch of stuff relating to Limetown. Show don’t tell is the golden rule of storytelling, and Limetown fails pretty hard with this. I will explain more in the end. Both Deidre and Max have some character to them, with a connection being present, but not enough is done to make either character feel real. The lore dumping is bad here too. It’s constant exposition with nothing else to it with characters that resemble real people but still feel like robots reading off a script. Episode 4.5 is easily the best instance of worldbuilding that Limetown tries to do, but it still leaves so much to be desired.
Episode 6, Cost-Benefit Analysis, is my least favorite episode for many reasons and sucks as the ending to this series. First of all, the “live stream” feels fake, it doesn’t add anything to the story and its inclusion doesn’t make sense. It’s hardly referenced at all and has no real impact either. Lenore is also just a bad character, embodying all the previous issues from the other survivors but at their worst. The “answers” she gives make no sense at all either. Lenore explaining how all residue and proof of people being gone takes so much away from the mystery. It makes no real sense how they removed every single possible thing in less than 3 days while getting all of the survivors with the implants out of Limetown and killing and disposing of the others. This was the most interesting part of the mystery behind Limetown, and it’s all waved away as them being “good at their jobs”, it feels incredibly lazy as an explanation for one of the biggest parts of the mystery. It even says in the episode itself that it was “practically impossible” and an “incomprehensible task.” The writers clearly knew how silly of a concept it was yet still made that the reason. The ending to the episode is lackluster as well, it’s stupid how nobody in the entire world would know where Lia is or see what is happening in a public setting where many people watch and listen to the podcast. Suspension of disbelief can only go so far until it actively harms the story. 6.5 does nothing but hint at a second season and thus I have nothing to say about it.
The concept of Limetown as a whole is great, and I wish I could get invested in the series, it’s a series that is full of potential that falls flat due to the limitations of the medium it is presented in combined with the plethora of plot holes and unrealistic events in the story. I think this series would have been much more engaging if it were a book, the lack of stuff between each episode hurts the series so much. Characters feel bland as they don’t have time to grow, as most just disappear after an episode or only have a few lines. None of the characters outside of Lia get any chance to let the listener get invested in or care about them as they disappear when their episode is done. Lia is also not the most intriguing character, with no time given to get invested in the journey of the main character of the podcast as we just jump from survivor to survivor. The lack of world-building makes it hard to get invested in the story, some of the minisodes (3.5 and 4.5) are good but aren’t enough to build anything. The idea of a podcast is interesting in concept but in practice, it limits the story a lot. Limetown has lots of potential but is limited by the format it is presented in in combination with the many smaller issues.