Seattle weather: not a troll
 

I have been watching the Netflix series "The Killing", set in Seattle. It is adapted from a Danish series and is dark, dark, dark.

In the film, it pours in Seattle all the time, really pours, hard enough for raindrops to bounce. Now I once spent a week in Seattle and never saw Mt. Ranier, but it didn't pour, pour, pour either. Most of the places I have been that get lots of rain -- London, Boston -- get it frequently but gently. This is like Florida afternoon thunderstorms.

So does it really rain like that or is this just a metaphor for and a way to emphasize the moral corruption in the film? Not that any of you in Seattle are morally corrupt!

No. But we've had a lot of rain this past winter. Facts about average rainfall are available here: http://www.weatherbase.com

HTtY

Like most movies and TV shows ostensibly set in Seattle (and pretty much everything showing on the CW and SyFy networks) <i>The Killing</i> was filmed in Vancouver and environs.

That kind of heavy rain is quite rare in Seattle; as you say our rain is far more drippy and misty. We get heavy showers sometimes, but lightning and thunder - even a little - makes the evening news headlines.

Many large US cities receive more precipitation annually than Seattle, including New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Miami, Dallas, Houston...

Funny you should mention a troll. On January 4 I was in Seattle and I saw the troll underneath the Aurora bridge.
The temperature was in the mid 40's without a drop of rain.
I also visited the world HQ of geocaching which is in that Fremont neighborhood.
By the time I got back to Sisters Oregon that night, the temperature was in the single digits.

It isn't that we get so much rain, but more that it rains so much of the time. On average, depending on what part of Seattle you live in, Seattle gets abut 40 inches of rain each year. As noted by others, that's not so different from many major cities. What is different is that the rain is spread out over about 10 months - slow drizzle much of the time. For about two months each summer, we have no rain.

The other issue is the dark. Seattle is pretty far north, and in the winter the sun sets about 4 pm and it rises about 8 am, so it is dark much of the time in the winter. In the summer, it stays light until 10 pm.

Real downpours are rare in Seattle, but they do happen. We had quite a downpour yesterday, with wind and rain - half an hour later it was sunny. Weather patterns are quite localized, and i may have rain when a friend half a mile away has none. The many hills and the water are factors that make the weather so localized.

Mostly it's the genre. I haven't seen the killing, but Danish stuff is often Scandinavian noir, and I'm familiar with that. I think they hire people who do nothing but lurk in case of bad weather. It's always got that atmosphere in any setting. It could be a remote island or a city- it's the same sort of thing. Weather that makes you not wonder why so many people are meeting their grisly end- just curious as to why more aren't suicides.

We do get rain like that, though, and it's fun to watch because it's rare. It's a spring or fall phenomenon.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are all those great photographs in the tourist shops- you know, no clouds and a perfect view of rainier? Yeah, that's not a realistic representation either.

Thanks, everybody. You confirmed my suspicions.

I lived in Boston for many years. It gets more rain than London and is windier thanChicago. It is also dark early in the winter (though not like Glasgow, where it is dark until 9 and after 3). Seattle gets a bum rap.

I too am a big fan of Scandinavian noir and its English-language derivatives like The Killing and The Tunnel (public official cut in half, eviscerated, and left in the center of the Anglo-French border in the Channel Tunnel).

I thought they might have a scene under the troll bridge, but maybe another time. I recognized a lot of scenery in the aerial views -- my SIL lived in Ballard -- but it is useful to know that much of the program was filmed in Vancouver. Here in the East, they use Toronto as Everywhere.

When they filmed Spenser for Hire in Boston some years ago -- the novels are set in Boston -- characters would run into a bukiding in the Back Bay and come out in Cambridge.

Maybe someday I'll go back and get to see Mt. Ranier.

Ahh the Hollywood making the rain special effects team tend to get a little heavy handed. More rain = more money.

<i>Maybe someday I'll go back and get to see Mt. Ranier.</i>

Use the webcams in the meantime -

https://www.nps.gov/mora/learn/photo...ia/webcams.htm
https://www.spaceneedle.com/webcam/

"Seattle gets a bum rap."

Ackislander, please don't tell people that! Seattle already has too many people and the real estate market is simply crazy.

The Boston real estate market is crazier than yours.

I wish everyone who wears a wool cap and flannel shirt in the summer would get on the Great Northern or Milwaukee Road (that's for Tom) and head west.

But it is not they who are driving the market.

It is old people like me who sold the family home in the 'burbs and want to be somewhere interesting and young doctors and lawyers who can afford $2,500,000 for a two bedroom condo, even if it is in a somewhat boring or slightly scary area. Boston has a ton of universities, and no one wants to leave. It has a ton of famous hospitals and white shoe law firms, so most of the sales are for cash. If you need a mortgage, you probably can't afford to buy.

<i>It is old people like me who sold the family home in the 'burbs and want to be somewhere interesting and young doctors and lawyers who can afford $2,500,000 for a two bedroom condo, even if it is in a somewhat boring or slightly scary area. Boston has a ton of universities, and no one wants to leave. It has a ton of famous hospitals and white shoe law firms, so most of the sales are for cash. If you need a mortgage, you probably can't afford to buy.</i>

Substitute "Amazombies" for "doctors and lawyers" and you've described Seattle to a tee. Universities and hospitals, check. Law firms, check, but add biotech, aerospace and software. Boston's average house price grew by 5% last year, Seattle's by 9%.

For years the sports networks covering U of W football games would open with a gaggle of commentators huddled under a huge umbrella while water dripped of it...then the camera would back off to show a sunny day with some joker playing a hose on the umbrella.

There are so many ways to see the real Seattle that I am amazed to see people buy into the idea that it rains all the time.

/www.spaceneedle.com/webcam/

I can't wait to hear the bootless cries of those who drink this kool aid and move to Seattle in anticipation of sunny weather year round, lol. Saying that it doesn't rain in Seattle *all* the time is like saying it's not boiling hot in Phoenix *every* day--both are true, and neither are relevant.

While watching The Killing I also wondered about all that rain. If it wasn't pouring it was a shower but it seemed rarely the sun was shining.

Have never been and shows like that don't encourage visitors, which the locals probably prefer, haha.

Karen

When we watched "The Killing," my wife said, "They could have just filmed this in black and white."

BTW, median home prices are about the same in Boston and Seattle, depending on whose data you use.

Sorry I was on vacation in Mexico to get away from the rain (just kidding) and missed this one.

<So does it really rain like that or is this just a metaphor for and a way to emphasize the moral corruption in the film?>

YES metaphor NO it does not pour monsoon style hardly ever here.

Suze, back home in Seattle