Critical opinion remained divided about "Carnivàle" in the years after the show's cancellation. Alessandra Stanley of the Australian newspaper "The Age" remembers "Carnivàle" as a "smart, ambitious series that move unusual characters around an unfamiliar setting imaginatively and even with grace, but that never quite quit the surly bonds of serial drama." "Variety"s Brian Lowry remembers the show as "largely a macabre fantasy" that eventually suffered from "its own bleakness and eccentricities". "The A.V. Club" dwelled on "Carnivàle"s cliffhanger ending in a piece on unanswered TV questions and called the show "a fantastically rich series with a frustratingly dense mythology".