The Last of Us - HBO *Spoilers* See warning in post #1

pc7

I enjoyed it, I’ve never seen/heard of game and really enjoying it. Wish this weeks episode was a bit longer.

the thing in the basement, is that the fungus trying to break up from under ground?

MrPC feels it’s very walking dead style after today, I suppose any apocalyptic show will be like that as all follow route that people can be the worst.

Pity there are only 9 episodes, seems very short.

facehugger99

Good to put the woke-pandering of episode 3 in the rearview and get back to the post apocalyptic road trip.

Very good episode.

Penn

Probably the weakest episode so far. Not that it was a bad episode, but a lot of it seems to have been setting things up for next week, with the raiders looking for Henry, whatever is happening under the floor of that building etc. But we got some fantastic moments between Joel and Ellie and some great development in their relationship which was definitely needed.

Flaneur OBrien

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209270#Comment_120209270

If I rolled my eyes back any further, I'd look like an infected.

Well done, Edgelord 👏

Damien360

Honestly, putting aside the long term love affair in episode 3, what did it add to the story ? Take out the 2 protagonists and make it different genders and it still makes absolutely no sense.

Zero-Cool

So many bits in ep 4 that mirrored the game and were great and then she new bits that are really adding depth to the story, loving it. Thankfully next ep it's arriving sooner than usual.

Great to see Jeffrey Pierce pop up. He played Tommy in the game.

https://twitter.com/Neil_Druckmann/status/1622460345410543617?t=SZkoudmsjTpXd2AD5qlu2g&s=19

Also, the magazine scene is nearly shot for shot :)

https://twitter.com/chrisdadeviant/status/1622418438558986241?t=QBuwx6Jhni9ofxEwPYzP3Q&s=19

breezy1985

Well the diehards got their porn mag after all 🤣

I enjoyed most of the episode especially the introspective stuff. Not looking forward to the generic raider part of the story.

Greyfox

Really good 4th episode, some really nice dialogue between Joel and Ellie, a nice way to end the episode.

el Fenomeno

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209328#Comment_120209328

The poster HBO released for episode 5 shows what's going on with the crater.

The two who saw it seem to know what it is and what's coming, so I'm sure there will be an explanation scene for us non-gamers.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209639#Comment_120209639

It's a warning for Joel. Bill was a survivalist before the outbreak, and for the first few years was just focused on surviving. By meeting Frank and falling in love with him, Frank was able to teach him that there's more than just surviving. Frank wanted elements of normality; having friends (like Joel & Tess), taking care and pride in their compound (repairing the shops etc), taking pleasure in the little things (strawberries). By the end, Bill learned that living was better than surviving, and knowing Frank was dying meant Bill was able to let himself die too, because he was able to have had a good life.

Joel had a life before the outbreak but it was taken away, and since then he closed himself off emotionally. He didn't let himself get close enough to Tess and shut her out. Joel became more focused on just surviving. Bill's letter serves as a warning/advice for Joel. Bill and Joel were a lot alike, but Bill changed for the better by letting himself live rather than just survive. As an audience, we needed to see Bill & Frank's relationship because Joel would have seen Bill & Frank's relationship over the years. So when Bill's letter is telling Joel to open himself up to Tess and to properly be with her, it hits harder because Bill is telling Joel he should have with Tess what Bill had with Frank, but Joel knows he's now missed his chance, which hits extra hard because it's still only a day or two since Tess died. It also hits hard because we're able to see Joel & Bill never really got on that well, but Bill still thought enough of Joel to leave him words of advice on his final day (with the letter clearly being intended for Joel, not Joel & Tess). Again, we need to see Bill & Frank's relationship so we know what Joel knows about their relationship and of their characters. We need to see that positive, healthy relationships are still possible in this new world even for people like Bill & Joel, and that they can still find a life worth living rather than just surviving.

If Joel & Ellie just turned up at the house after Bill & Frank were dead and we hadn't seen Bill & Frank's relationship, the letter would have had far less impact on us as the audience, or would have required a lot of exposition from Joel explaining who they were to Ellie in order to inform us as the audience but even then wouldn't have had the same impact. The scene would have been more about Joel & Ellie just getting supplies & a car than it would have been about the letter.

The show is about finding something worth living for, with the infected/raiders/post-apocalypse just being the framing around that. We see Bill & Frank's story because it fits the theme of the show and acts as a warning to Joel, as well as part of the impetus which then drives him forward with bringing Ellie with him to the only family/friend he has left; Tommy.

FortuneChip

Weakest episode so far, which isn't too much of a criticism considering what's come before.

Ellie & Joel development was good; the contrast between the puns and the more serious conversations did a good job of showing how they can work together.

Intrigued by the floorboard unveiling, and a nice set-up for the next episode.

Not massively sold on Melanie Lynskey, although I thought her role seemed well written, and her dialogue with the doc was nice and biting.

That is one impressive beard on her main muscle (Tommy's voice actor IRL)

EltonJohn69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209270#Comment_120209270

Both great episodes. Did having a female as the leader of the city in episode 4 not ruin it for you ?

pc7

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209639#Comment_120209639

It gave Joel the purpose and drive to continue and look after Ellie, that's what I took from it.

TheIrishGrover

It was great to see the start so close to the game (Even down to the song). Simply to put a smile on our faces (And it was one of the lighter moments in the game). And the ambush and ramifications were well done: These are/were people with relationships and people who loved them. THAT (Along with the relationship between Joel and Ellie) was one of the factors that made the source stand out (I'll try to stop mentioning the word "Game"). It was not a mindless Call Of Duty type shooter where you killed people by the thousands. Or even Naughty Dog's Uncharted where the bodycount is also huge. Here people had names. People got upset when you killed their friends. At times you can sneak around people instead of running headfirst , guns blazing. And you can hear them talk. And they are talking about food, about sore feet and mundane things.

Possibly minor spoiler

Spoiler Warning

(And sometimes about some guy and girl bogeymen going around killing people - The ... source STILL has a high enough bodycount... But it counts)

But, having said that about the start, while I loved the callbacks, I do love the additions.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209270#Comment_120209270

Took us a while but we got there, FFS.

Great when they're this blunt, makes ignoring that much easier

Dial Hard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120210496#Comment_120210496

Nah, the first w-word nonsense was only 4 pages in, before the show had even aired. I honestly think the word should be banned from the thread.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120210458#Comment_120210458

I agree with everything you said but I have to drop this...

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag_AFraxj-4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loN6KlaKTng

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120210510#Comment_120210510

My favourite part of the episode was the ending, with that great shot of when Joel woke up.

walkonby

The glib Walking Dead comparisons are getting tedious at this stage. It’s like some people have no other frame of reference for the entire zombie genre.

El Gato De Negocios

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120209270#Comment_120209270

Woke pandering? Jesus almighty thats some steaming pile of shyte right there. Bill as a character in the game was gay. Does seeing two male actors kiss make you uncomfortable or something? Says more about you tbh.

Binged the first 4 episodes last yesterday and last night. Cracking television imo. Episode 3 was pick of the bunch for me so far, a really thoughtful, brilliantly acted piece. The development of Joel and Ellies relationship is being handled really well. It would have been all too easy to steam straight into the "replacement daughter" trope but the show has ignored that completely and is building it up slowly, as it would naturally occur in such a situation. Joel has been through and lost so much over the previous two decades so he's not suddenly going to turn into super dad.

Casting has been spot on so far, Ramsey and Pascal share a really nice chemistry but you'd expect that from two top actors.

On several recommendations, watched ep 1 last night. I must have missed something, it was barely holding my interest. Not likely to watch another.

Now I have to tell my friends their taste in TV is sucky :(

breezy1985

Would I be right in thinking some of the action scenes are straight from the game.

That crawl through the hole to move the table blocking the door felt very gamey.

Also that raider woman fells like she Karened her way into the top job.

Sad Professor

Good episode though felt very much like a bridging episode and seemed a bit short. I agree that it's not clear how Lynskey's character is maintaining authority over all those people, but I assume there's more to come with her character next week so this may still be explained.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120210907#Comment_120210907

The ambush and car crash are from the game, but things like the crawl through the hole and moving the table etc aren't really directly from the game. In the game, Ellie very rarely gets in actual danger and she's controlled by the computer, not the player. Whereas in the show for realism, they had to introduce that to get Ellie out of harms way but in a way that kept Joel in danger because he couldn't follow her through.

I wouldn't get too hung up on things like that. They'll use ideas from the game for the set up of action sequences, but will tailor them as needs be to make more sense in a TV show.

one armed dwarf

wrt the 'woke pandering' (lmao), my take away is that people like Joel have become very risk averse and closed off, and the point of the episode 3 story is that Bill is that same type of person. What's more, he was that type of person before there was even a pandemic. So it's more of a signal to Joel that this is not the path to living a fulfilling life, you have to take risks and risk the pain of losing someone (which they spell out in dialogue btw, they could not make it more clear). For Bill, that risk-aversion also seemed to extend to not acknowledging his sexuality for such a long time.

In general I see the theme of the HBO show as trying to establish a metaphorical link between the fungal mycelium and the connections we have with each other. The infected are like a perversion of those ties, and in episode 2 the scene with Tess was like the ultimate violation of the romantic embrace. It's love as a horror concept, which is what haunts a person like Joel. The series is more about this than it is even about taking Ellie to the fireflies, which is obviously the 'mission' he's on but not what the whole thing is about.

The raider woman isn't even in the game, I think. She's a HBO invention. That said I wasn't completely bought in there either, needs more screen time maybe but first impression is that the episode 4 story with the raiders seems a bit weird

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120210979#Comment_120210979

I wouldn't find it a problem just certain scenes or backgrounds look like they are the kinda thing you would find in a game.

There was a shot of Ellie at the end of the first episode that looked like a game menu screen or something. And there was a window scene that actually is from the games menu screen.

ULMarc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120211046#Comment_120211046

Yeah, I don't think it's by accident. They seem to do a lot of nods to the game's style. There was a scene in this episode where Joel is lifting Ellie up to a window which is on a wall that is either painted yellow or illuminated by a yellow light, I can't quite recall which. And it's very reminiscent of how the game guides you with the colour yellow. It just seems like a bit of fun.

It's pleasing to see how they adapt some story telling points from the game to the show. I get why they did the episode 3 the way they did. A lot of Joel and Ellie's story can be him says to her, her says to him. So making the plot points more distinct in their own right is welcome.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120211046#Comment_120211046

Yeah that's fair enough. They're definitely taking inspiration from the game with a lot of the scenes, partially because of how cinematic the game is to begin with, but then also inversely as a throwback to the game. It can probably feel a bit like a chicken-egg situation; is this from the game or just made to look like it might be from the game?

But I think they've put enough effort into making sure it's familiar to people who played the game, but changed where it needs to be to make sense for the TV show. So something like giving Ellie a place to hide away while Joel fights off the hunters makes sense for the show, whereas in the game she would have just been running around or crouching off to the side while most of the hunters just ignore her.

The most "gameplay" type of thing from that episode for me was Joel helping Ellie through the vent and then her opening the door for him.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120210763#Comment_120210763

They probably don't. But those references are going to happen, and they're not always invalid either.

pc7

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120211772#Comment_120211772

Exactly, in both it’s nearly other people and those trying to run things that are worse than the actual threat.