The irony behind the characters' names

I first watched the series after it was out on DVD, so I got to take one episode after another - like one long movie.

Probably the series should be thought of as having three parts. The first five (counting pilot as first) episodes were by Fuller, followed by the rest of S1 and S2, which were done by Godchaux and Masius.

The Mason character seemed to be the least stable in development. He would become what was needed to make the plot move for a particular episode. So in the pilot and often after he seemed to be a tad bit leaning toward the larcenist at times even as he was pretty together despite a weakness for Betty and then Daisy. Later he developed the cornball aspect. But towards the end I thought his best scene was when he gave Daisy the engagement ring (when he thought it was his last day).

Roxy seemed to me the least developed. Tho she seemed to fit well as a cop.

Daisy on the other hand was clearly a favorite for Godchaux and Masius + writing team - probably because she was their creation. They spent on lot of screen time developing her character.

In the episode (1-11) with the painter she started her search for some deeper meaning. At each step of the reap and the after handling the writers used Mason and his handling of the gay couple as a counterpoint to Daisy's abrupt treatment of the painter. The climax was the scene when the painter (under the influence of the PTB?) tells her to her face that 'There's more. But you have to try harder". That starts Daisy on her search for 'more'.

A third major theme that goes all the way back to the first episodes after the pilot is the odd deeply buried one between Rube and George. Like George, Rube became a reaper close by his family. He had contact (like George was attempting) with his family and then (unlike George - probably because the series got truncated at S2) he cut off all contact until very late after George was placed under his care, his long dead concern for his family (by then only his daughter) got reignited by his frequent collisions with George and her ventures to visit and communicate in one form or another with her family.

The first theme is that of George's reaction to her own death (right out of 'The Lovely Bones'). The second is that of the interplay between her and her family's reactions and goings on (also right out of TLB). But unique to DLM is this third one between Rube and George. They each had a huge impact on the other over the two seasons we saw and given their similarities perhaps the PTB were pulling strings for the benefit of both. Rube needed his daughter/George needed a father.

While I would have liked to get the full unlayering of the Rube backstory and find out more of the details about his crime and how it (probably) got him killed, I would very much like to have seen what happened after he became a reaper regarding his family. What interaction he had with them? And what triggered his draconian response to not 'haunt' them at all for several decades? We got to see the end when his run in with George awakened something, but ..... And the way the DLM stories are told - with lots of questions left open - did the PTB deliberately place George with Rube knowing within the range of free will etc the likely effects on both?

One final comment. DLM is very much like a long movie. Lots of series have character development and plot elements extending over an entire season, but few have the most important plot arcs so deeply buried. It makes it hard to attract a large audience, because it's probably tough to drop in on a random episode and follow the main story lines. Maybe I'm wrong about that. I remember posts saying how they tuned in and just got hooked.