I believe so - they do have rain forests there....

When we visited Seattle, they sold t-shirts that said, "People in Seattle don't tan...they rust!"

The sun does come out sometimes in Seattle, but more than half of the time it's overcast and drizzly when not raining, and cloudy for half the remaining days. It's in the rain shadow of the Olympic mountains -- on the lee side of the Puget Sound barrier islands there's only half as much rain even though they're on the water. The average annual rainfall for Seattle is about the same as the record for a single year in Los Angeles.

That is, the raininess was emphasized in the series for artistic purposes, but is not unrealistic.

There's a line from a song by Seattle musician Bryan Bowers ("the mountain" is Mt. Ranier (Tacoma)):

Out on the road we tell all the turkeys, yes, it's always raining and the sun never shines, but all the natives know, when the mountain lifts her skirts, the view from home will flat out melt your mind.

https://www.google.com/search?q=view+of+mt+rainier+from+seattle&site=webhp&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=rHwIVcDONseuogTwlYGQBw&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=617

I started watching The Killing on the recommendation of some friends who told me about it when we were talking about rain. They said they laughed at EVERY scene because it was raining in them all. I checked it out to see; yep, they were right, just as you said. I think it's actually filmed in BC. (And I love the show, too!) I wish more people thought it rained ALL the time because then they'd stop moving here. :-)

There is rainforest out on the coast where it rains about 12 feet per year (!), but Seattle has less rain than almost all major cities on or near the east coast, including NY, Boston and Philadelphia. I suspect we have more drizzly days instead of raining buckets like some places. You can usually tell a native (or you used to when fewer people were moving in) because they'd never carry an umbrella, or use one. The drizzle just isn't that bad.

Islay,

I've only visited and don't know Brittany's annual weather patterns. I spent several years in a neighboring country to your north and east, beyond Normandy, and in moving there, I was told to expect "Seattle-like" weather. Meaning - damp, cool, overcast, drizzly. That's exactly how it was.

Here's a quote from Wikipedia about Seattle - "In an average year, at least 0.01 inches (0.25 mm) of precipitation
falls on 150 days, more than nearly all U.S. cities east of the Rocky
Mountains.[72] It is cloudy 201 days out of the year and partly cloudy 93 days." That leaves about 60 days a year for blue skies, not very much.

Seattle is a fun and picturesque city in a beautiful area (the Puget Sound area is like a giant San Francisco with more hills, more islands, and more coastline) and a great place to be if you're a rhododendron. But many find it to be too dreary and gray for too much of the year.

Thank you all. I did wonder if the rain had been exaggerated to add to the dark theme of the series!

I bicycled through Washington, north from Seattle to Port Angeles, then west and south to the coast, and the Columbia River. I was so dissapointed in the rain... none in the rain forest! In fact, it was the sunniest day of our whole time in Washington. Personally I prefer the Oklahoma Tornado threat to the gloominess of W. Our out and out cloudy dreary days are WAY outnumbered by sunny days.

I've always found Seattle to be a depressing city, not just because of the rain but also because of the dreary buildings - way too much red brick, which is my least favorite building material. I only went there because I had friends to visit who had moved there temporarily from Vancouver, or I was on my way to visit Vancouver, which is one of my favorite cities, despite the rain. People in Seattle were not friendly to me - possibly because my fashion sense scared them. I did notice people crossing the street temporarily to avoid walking directly past me and then crossing the street back after I had passed. They seemed not to like visitors and also liked to complain that people wanted to move there (a concept I could not grasp) - this from people who had moved there themselves. I found the people there as dull as the weather, whereas the people I met in Vancouver were friendly, warm, and much more interesting and cosmopolitan. I visited Seattle between 1976 and 1982, and so it must be a nicer place now, especially with the new and more sophisticated people moving there. In 1976, Boeing had just laid off a lot of workers, and so Seattle had very high unemployment at that time. Kevin went there for work last year to meet with people from Amazon and thought it was a nice place to visit and brought back a salmon and some King Crab legs.

It rains more in Houston than in Seattle, but I have also traveled along the Pacific Coast of the Olympic Peninsula, and it never stopped raining while I was there, and that was in August, which is one of the driest months. From my experience, sunny days are rare in Seattle, and overcast skies seem to be quite common, even in the summer. I've spent a lot more time in Vancouver, and I did notice that it could be quite sunny in November, while July could be completely overcast. If two days went by without rain, my friends in Vancouver would water their lawns.

Overcast days in Summer used to be the norm in Southern California too. :)

I live on the Olympic peninsula and in the rain shadow of the Olympic Mountains and we get about 18 - 20 inches of rain per year. We seem to be getting more sunny days, maybe that is because of global warming. I find people here very friendly.
publickman - I find your generalization of people in Seattle being unfriendly and dull very offensive.

Yes, pillog, coastal California (where I was born and raised and have lived most of my life) does have morning coastal low clouds/overcast for some weeks at the beginning of the summer - some call it June Gloom. San Francisco and Monterey can have low clouds, aka fog, haha. Drive a few miles inland or over a hill away from the beach and the sun will be shining. This area also has the best weather in the US, hands down.

I spent 3 months in the Seattle area in the 70s and I also found the people to be surprisingly quiet and unfriendly at that time. I chalked it up to the dreary weather. The US has had a lot of immigration and internal migration in the years since, nowhere today is like it was 30 years ago, and for most places, that's a good thing. I've gone to Seattle periodically over the years, and was last there a few years ago. The weather hasn't changed, of course, but the people seem a bit more outward looking and friendly now, more so than I experienced on my first extended visit.

I always laugh at shows that are supposedly set in the Midwest and they always show sunny summer days and folks are never wearing jackets or even winter coats.

We love Seattle! And I say that even though my mother's family all lives there, most of whom we try to avoid [smile] if possible. It's one of my fav places to visit, we've done 13 or 14 visits. But preferably we do it in August or September, when it's reliably sunny.

In late 2010 when my DH first retired, we did a 6-week driving tour of the PNW and had a fabulous time. Convinced some close friends to fly up and meet us for 9 days to show them around. We had a blast together and they were sorry to leave -- in fact, they just told us they want to go back for another Seattle visit with us.

They said they have never looked the same way at the Berkeley CA REI Co-op store, since seeing the amazing REI flagship store. The four of us stayed in Capitol Hill which was the perfect location. We kept the car parked at the B&B and used public transportation. We were really sad to hear Olivar closed up last year -- that restaurant had such phenomenal food, we canceled our next night's dinner reservation elsewhere and went back to Olivar for a repeat. His passionfruit souffle was soooo delectable, with a rich fruity aroma as they carried it through the dining room (which has those beautiful Russian-style murals).

A lot of gray skies in Seattle, but a great city nonetheless.

Talking about the reality or lack thereof in TV urban settings, it always makes us laugh when we watch "Haven" on SyFy. Great show, but you'd think Maine has nothing but sunny, short-sleeve weather all year long! I think in 5 yrs we've seen 2 cloudy days and one cold day total on that show, LOL.

I have been lucky. Those few times I was in Seattle, it was very sunny.

Seattle had been nominated as the most livable city in the USA.

Great football team.

dcarch

I love Seattle - if I won a lottery, I would be on the first flight to Seattle. Lock my house or not would depend on the size of the lottery.

In my mind, Seattle is the most wonderful city, rain or shine. I have been to many gorgeous places in the world, but Seattle is the only place I feel completely right. I love the city, the surroundings, mountains, seas and rainforest. I enjoy the scenery, people, cultures, food, plants, sounds, sights, smells and everything of the place.

I have lost count as how many trips I have made to Seattle. It reminds me now that I had better book my next trip there.