"Feel Her Love" (The Last of Us S2E5)

[00:00:00] Hmm? Ah! Huh. It's the girl! You remember me? Yeah, you remember me. What do you want? Where's Abby? I don't know. Yes, you do. You shoot me, the sound will have every soldier come running. You'll still be dead.

[00:00:28] Tell me where she is and maybe I let you go. Could've killed you. Maybe you should've. Or maybe you should've stayed the fuck out of Jackson. Nora. We're all. We're shabby.

[00:01:13] Hey Zedheads, welcome to the podcast. I'm Jason. And I'm Eric. And this is The Cast of Us, Episode 643. And in this episode, we're covering The Last of Us, Season 2, Episode 5, Feel Her Love! Yeah, baby. You wrote it like that, so I was gonna go ahead and deliver it like that. Nice job.

[00:01:37] I saw that title and I thought it would be even more about the Seraphites, but we got a pretty good dose, I guess. We got a pretty good dose of Seraphite action in this, I'd say, for sure. Yeah, not quite maybe what you were thinking. Maybe you were thinking we'd get more of a backstory, maybe some... Yeah, yeah. But not just as people to be afraid of, but pretty damn cool.

[00:02:05] I feel more afraid, quite honestly. I know. Me too. Even more afraid than in the game in some ways. But we'll talk about that in the game talk section. Let's get into the episode. Would you like to read the plot summary? Absolutely. On the road to the hospital, Ellie and Dina come across Seraphite corpses beneath a chilling mural that reads, again, Feel Her Love.

[00:02:30] Ellie questions whether Dina should continue with her, but Dina stands firm in her loyalty. In a warehouse ambush, the two are rescued by Jesse, who come to Seattle with Tommy to find them. Pursued by WLL forces, the trio flees into a park where they witness Seraphites brutally disemboweling a soldier. Dina is shot with an arrow, and Jesse carries her to safety while Ellie distracts the attackers.

[00:02:55] Ellie reaches the hospital alone and corners Nora, chasing her into a basement thick with cordyceps spores. Nora, infected and cornered, realizes Ellie is the immune girl Joel saved. Ellie confirms she knows what Joel did and, desperate for Abby's location, beats Nora for answers. Try to put an upbeat spin on that. Yeah. So, man.

[00:03:25] When do you think about this one? I enjoyed the majority of it. I'm going to go ahead and say, I still have a quibble or two. Hmm. It's pretty much the same one that I had before to a lesser degree. Hmm. But overall, especially two set pieces in particular, I thought were just absolutely phenomenal. The everything to what to do with the Seraphites in the park was just badass. Mm-hmm.

[00:03:54] And that hospital chase scene with Nora. Wow. So good. Loved it. Yeah. Yeah. I really, I think I liked all of it. I don't have any huge quibbles that I can think of maybe as we go through my notes, but I guess the only thing that's standing out to me is last season felt a lot more like, you know, this show has some zombies or zombie-like things in it, but we're prestige TV.

[00:04:22] So we can go three episodes without any of them. And we're just so great that you'll still want to watch. And now they're like, nah, let's just put them in all the time. And even like, I think there was an interview with Craig Mason where he said something like, yeah, the feedback we got was they wanted more infected. And I'm like, oh, of course, are you surprised by that? Yeah. What surprises me is that they went ahead and did it.

[00:04:48] And I'm glad because they are doing such a great job at creating scenes with a lot of tension. That's just so well done. It's so good. There is no part of any complaint I have that has to do with the infected. Yeah. Like at all. Sure. Those scenes of the stalkers. First, the one. And just the one was creepy looking all Gollum-like with his eyes, just, oh, you know, shining back. That's bad enough.

[00:05:16] And then when you see like, you know, the trio, the band all there and you're like, ah, they got different lengths of the, the cordyceps, you know, forming off of their head. And like, just the design of those is so, so good. And I just, oh, that was so fantastic. Very creepy. Very well done. Um, and they're good at, um, they know what our expectations are and they play with them.

[00:05:42] So, or at least for me in that scene, when Ellie's like, okay, I've dealt with one of these before. We'll both run different ways, whichever one it follows. Yeah. You'll, you know, the other person come around and sneak. And I'm thinking, well, there's going to be like three or four of them. And then she turns around and there's like 12. Like, oh, I don't think any plan is going to work. Right. That plan got shelved. Then it was just pretty much just you getting that metal box. Okay.

[00:06:12] A little weird that they're strong enough to peel back, um, the metal mesh in that cage. That was like, whoa, whoa. They got super strength all of a sudden, but all right. You know, it was cool though. It was cool. It was cool. I can't take that away from like, oh shit. Oh shit. That was, that was some, and it did look like Ellie was going to get, uh, truly, you know, I think there was a, oh, I want to say there's a line in somewhere in season one where they say something like this, she's immune, but you can still see her. She'll get ripped apart.

[00:06:42] Yeah. You know, she could still get ripped apart. And, and this almost gave me that, uh, genuine dawn of the dead sense of like, oh my God, they're going to rip her apart. Yeah. They were going at her. So Jesse arriving, which, uh, was very cool. Um, yeah. Yeah. Did she, I'm like, man, she's getting bitten every episode. Do you think she got bitten there? Yeah, probably. Seemed like it. At least one or two bites. Yeah.

[00:07:12] Yeah. She's going to have a lot of scars at the end of all this. I know. Not just the emotional ones. Yeah. She's going to bite marks all over her. It's like, what kind of club were you a part of? Uh, yeah, she, oh God, this is gonna be the worst one. Uh, she thought she was going to fight club. Instead, she went to my club. Oh God. I know. Bye. I'm done. Thank you everyone.

[00:07:38] No, I, I, my notes here are, since it was kind of a straightforward linear progression of an episode, I thought we would just go through it. No, it's really a little by little. So I want to start with the intro where this woman who is Hanrahan, who is the same woman that we saw Isaac being introduced to the, when he blew up all those guys in the Fedra truck. What was that name again? Hanrahan. Hanrahan. Yeah.

[00:08:07] So she's in the hospital. Uh, she arrives there with all these soldiers standing guard in front of this, uh, the sealed stairwell to the basement, which we find out why later. And that's the same one that Isaac first made contact with 11 years earlier. And so I guess Isaac rose up the ranks above her since then, but she's interrogating this soldier who's Sergeant Elise park.

[00:08:31] At first I kind of wondered if this was going to be the Sarah fight guru or something. Well, because I didn't know if it was a flashback or not. Yeah. Yeah. But then, um, Hanrahan says there was a shooting near the borderline between us and the scars treaty might be broken. Isaac is dealing with that now. And I was thinking, Oh, she's thinking the treaty might be broken, but we've already seen a bunch of dead Sarah fights that we thought the wolves killed.

[00:08:58] And also all those WLF people strung up with their guts hanging out. So I'm like, this treaty has already been broken, but then I'm like, Oh, I guess maybe that's how the treaty was broken. Maybe the WLF broke it by killing this, these people who were retreating. And then the Sarah fights retaliated by hanging these soldiers. Um, yeah. And I think that, I think we are not, I don't think we're not supposed to know. We're not supposed to know. Yeah. I think that's kind of the point. Yeah.

[00:09:24] And I think Isaac said that in the last episode, it doesn't matter who broke the truce when he's, you know, torturing the guy. Yeah. We broke the truth. You broke the truth, blah, blah, blah. He says something to that effect, you know? Right. Um, and I feel like it kind of does matter, but, um, it just reminds me of all these, we, these days, we see a lot of ceasefires get broken, like between Israel and Palestine, between Russia and Ukraine. There's a ceasefire.

[00:09:52] I think right now between India and Pakistan, cause fighting has broken out recently and they just can't seem to honor the ceasefires, you know? Oh, gotta love that human nature. Yeah. So the, anyway, the Sergeant says the soldiers were clearing this hospital and they went down to the basement and that this basement is where they brought the first cordyceps patients back in Oh three.

[00:10:21] So it's been like festering there for 26 years and that they found cordyceps on the wall down there and started coughing. And cause so we know it's like these spores. And so the Sergeant at their own request sealed all the soldiers down there, including her son who we see later. Poor Leon.

[00:10:38] So yeah, pretty messed up that I, I, I absolutely loved this little opening thing and, and getting this idea, them standing there at the basement and listening. And we can hear these noises in there, you know, Oh yeah. Right. When they're standing there at the basement door, they're all standing there listening and you can hear something going on in there.

[00:11:03] So as you get this level of just this sense of like, Oh God, you know, you're going to go deeper into this basement and it's going to get worse and worse. Um, and we get to see that, you know, and I think they did a really great way of having that elevator drop when Nora was running into it. And just that sense of desperation that she's in having this, uh, you know, crazy kid, I'm jumping the gun here, but, uh, no, no, it's okay. Yeah. I mean that elevator drop, even that was cool.

[00:11:31] They just really go all out with the details and I don't know how they filmed that. It probably involved some CG or something cause she wasn't wearing any padding or anything, you know, but, um, it looked very good. And like she could have broken some bones maybe, or maybe not. If she got lucky. I, I just, I loved that entire check. Yeah. I'm jumping the gun.

[00:11:56] We'll talk about that chase later, but, um, since we want to just kind of go through this, but yeah, what a great, uh, so good. All right. Let's go to the next part. So Ellie and Dina, they're kind of getting set. Oh, wait, hold on, hold on. One thing I want to, I wanted to point before we leave this. Yeah. One, one thing I really took away from this was that, uh, the hammerhead, what's her name? Hamahan. Um, yeah. Henry hand hammer hand. Uh, it's not it. I know. Um, she makes a point of letting, uh, Sergeant Park.

[00:12:27] No, like, nope. Don't tell anybody about this. Nobody can know. So what happens later, even with Nora or anybody else, nobody has any idea what's down there. So she never put out a warning. She's not telling people, Hey, stay away from that. So she's keeping it a secret, which reminded me of a lot in season one where, um, Melanie Lensky's character, uh, basically made everybody keep it a secret that the, the bloaters and the tunnels were rising up and creating that.

[00:12:58] You know? So I felt like it kind of gave me a very similar parallel to those, to that situation with, uh, the bloater underneath Pittsburgh and, uh, or whatever town. I think that was Pittsburgh. And currently her hammerhead saying, no, don't tell anybody about what's going on. It went airborne. Are you sure?

[00:13:46] Are you sure? It's going to freak everyone out. Cause she said that right after she said, this hospital is an important resource, but, um, yeah, that's a mistake. You should always keep everyone informed about shit like this. At least, you know, a little warning label up on something. Hey, danger. Shit's gone airborne. You know? Yeah. Um, I mean, I, just to kind of, yeah, look at the other side of it, I guess they want to try to get a handle on it first and know exactly what to say, you know? Yeah.

[00:14:16] And how, how to deal with it before they spread the information about, Oh, danger, you know, keep, keep rumors and check and yeah. I guess. Still a mistake. Uh, so Ellie and Dina, they're getting set. Ellie wants to help Dina plan. Uh, but you need to know about triangulation about that. And I'm just, I'm just thinking, um, I, I like the way they compliment each other. Ellie and Dina, they're having Dina be more cerebral and a better thinker and a planner.

[00:14:44] And Ellie's more about passion and drive and being skilled in combat and focused under pressure. It's cool. I, as much as I like that, and here's my quibble, my main quibble. I feel like they almost went out of their way to like, nah, you dumb to Ellie, you know? Yeah. Literally calling her out kind of for being stupid. And it, it, it wasn't just once with Dina. It was twice with Dina.

[00:15:08] And then Jesse even makes a crack about, well, I'm sure it was certainly a new, it wasn't you, you know, that there's a part of me. I was just kind of like, ah, dicks. What the, I don't know. There's, there's something about it that rubbed me a little bit the wrong. Now I know in there, they're all young. They're all young. Also in that explanation, she makes it, you know, Dina makes a joke about what she's like allergic to school or whatever it was. Like, that's not, not her thing, you know? Yeah. Um, and I get it. It is, you're right. That it is cool that they compliment each other.

[00:15:38] Definitely an Ernie and Bert thing going on. But, but, um, for some reason I was just kind of like, oh, you're doing, you're doing, you're doing Ellie a little. Yeah. Oh, I don't know. Yeah. You're doing Ellie a little dirty though. You know, by, by, it just made me think of a Dylan G from severance when he's like, what he dumb talking about his Audi. So I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, I liked Ernie the best. Oh, me too. I've always liked. Of course. I guess who didn't.

[00:16:08] Right. Um, Bert's a little too uptight. He's the Felix Unger of the group. That's right. Exactly. Well, I, I think kind of, it kind of bugged me too, but, um, I also kind of liked it just because Ellie's I'll go ahead and say Ellie's that's not a thing with Ellie in the game. She's completely capable, but, um, in the show.

[00:16:36] So she just has way more of a purpose here in the show. Dina has more of a purpose. That's one part of it that I like. And also just that Ellie, uh, you know, we've seen that she's restless and like didn't do well in federal school. And I think it's cool sometimes to have a character who isn't good at school, but especially in the apocalypse, they're fucking bad-ass.

[00:17:04] It's like Daryl Dixon kind of, you know, like in this environment, their skills are super valuable. And it just can like remind all of us that school isn't always everything for everyone. And if you're not, if you do struggle in school, then it doesn't necessarily mean the end for you, especially if there's an apocalypse, you might be great. No, I don't know. I, I, no, I, I totally hear what you're saying. And I, okay. I think my issue with it, here we go.

[00:17:30] What is maybe in, and a little bit talking down to her and kind of a little expositioning in the way that did it. You know, I was last week I was saying, eh, we were getting a little too much telling that show. And I feel we got that a little bit with the Ellie Dina thing, especially when you, well, have you heard about the Amish? Well, they did this and I'm kind of like, okay. Uh, you know what filter I'm looking at this through is there's so much criticism in certain quarters about Ellie and about Bella.

[00:17:59] And, you know, they'll take any opportunity to dis on those show version versus the game. And they'll be like, see, look, even in the show, she's dumb. Like, it's just not as good as the game. And so I guess I'm trying to be like, oh, they're showing that different skills are valuable and. Absolutely. Well, no, and, and I'll tell you what, I'm, I'm, I'm trying to be super self-conscious of making sure I'm not just too in love with everything. Sure. Yeah.

[00:18:26] That I can still see a little something, little something to criticize about it because I feel I am, I am so susceptible to just being like, yeah, it's all great. I know. I'll be the first one to admit it, man. But, but there are some things where I'm just like, okay, I can see. And I, you know, I hate all those criticisms while I'm online. I read them. It drives me nuts. Like we talked about last week, the, the worst are just the loudest and the, the, you know. Yeah. But there's a lot though. There is a lot. Oh, just too, too much. Absolutely too much. And it's gross.

[00:18:56] And yeah, there's a part of me that just doesn't want to feed into any of that in any way, shape or form. Um, so yeah, it's, it's, it sucks, man. Yeah, it does. But no, I mean, I, I don't know if I've dwelled on this too much on the podcast or not, but I think it bears saying every once in a while that we're honest. And one way, you know, you can trust us is sometimes we complain. Yeah. Yeah. And that, and I think that's fine.

[00:19:26] And also we don't always have to agree and you bring up some of these things and we can have a nice conversation about it. And we don't maybe come to the end with the exact same agreement. That's totally, I am always happy to have my mind changed. Right. Exactly. My opinion tweaked. So. It's a good thing. So, so Ellie goes into the theater while Dina plans and it's so gorgeous. And I just love theaters and I always have, and I worked in a movie theater as a teenager and me too.

[00:19:56] That's one of my favorite jobs ever. And I just love that. It's this big communal space where you watch stories and art unfold and you have a shared emotional experience. And I'm sad that that feels like it's kind of on the wane right now. Yeah. And in a post-apocalyptic world, a theater is like Dina and Ellie said about the warehouse later haunted and empty, but still beautiful. I love seeing the, all the band equipment set up. Yeah.

[00:20:25] Drums. I mean, just the whole thing. It was really, the, the, the ceiling of the, the auditorium was beautiful. Uh, the lighting was incredible. And she appreciated it too. Ellie did. Yeah. And then of course we have Ellie grabbing the guitar. Mm-hmm. And playing. And starts playing Future Days by Pearl Jam. Yeah. If I ever were to lose you. But then stops because she's clearly thinking about Joel and that, that was good timing because then Dina walked in and Ellie's like, you figure it out.

[00:20:55] I think so. And Ellie goes, good. And you just get the sense that she's reminded of her purpose. You know, she had a little nostalgic moment. Yeah. And this is where I felt, um, a sense of, all right, you know, here we go. This, this, uh, seeing, seeing her inner rage start to emerge filled me with an inner joy. Yeah. That is a horrible. That urgency didn't really feel there. Yeah. And something about that, you know, and where we, you know, I'm a sh, I'm a sh.

[00:21:25] I'm assuming people are going to assume that has a Joel connection. Um, yeah. Cause I mean, the lyrics are, if I were ever were to lose you and then she can't bear to go on and now she's ready to go take revenge. So yeah. And, and, and for people wondering, uh, that song, uh, did not come out until I want to say 2011 or 12 in real life. So it was not released in 2003. Uh, people will nitpick that.

[00:21:52] However, my head cannon, this is what I like to believe is that Eddie Vedder lives at Jackson, but he's been there the whole time. And so he's just been playing these things. So Joel's like, you know, Ellie, my good friend, Eddie showed me this song. I think you might like it. That's my head cannon. Yeah. He, he's like, I've been thinking about this one for a while. Yeah. I think you'll like it, Joel. It's awesome.

[00:22:16] Well, one last thing I'll say about that in this, what we talked about, I believe last week or one of the previous weeks, the phenomenal job of lighting, uh, in this episode again. Um, because right as she starts playing that, and then you hear the, you know, she stops herself. We hear this kind of swelling noise. Um, and, and things start to turn a little bit red on her face. Uh, and this seems to be a bit of a, you know, is a bit of a motif that when she's going dark, it's going red.

[00:22:45] It's a, it's a very Sith sort of thing. Right. Uh, and by the end she's gone full Vader. Um, yeah, that's right. I mean, just bathed in red, you know, it's such a, such a thing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't know if she was angry when they did it with the flares last week, but it's just evocative of hell, fear, fear, hatred, anger, blood. It's really effective.

[00:23:12] I think that's, yeah, I think it is very effective. And the moment she turns that power on again, just sorry to jump ahead again, uh, in that hospital basement with Nora, that chunk, and then the red, it's just like, you know, I'm going to go back to this. It's like that scene in rogue one where Vader lights that lightsaber in the hallway. Yeah. You know, you're just like, ah, you know, it's like you're in a, you're in a horror movie and, and, uh, Ellie's the bad guy. Yes. So, so Dina says, I have a plan.

[00:23:42] We're going to go through this long building where the patrols don't seem to go. Uh, there's probably infected there. And she knows that Nora's in the hospital because they talk a lot over the radios and she presumes that means the Seraphites are like the Amish, which is smart. Yeah.

[00:23:59] And then as they go through the city to get to this building, I just may, I like, Oh, remember to appreciate how awesome it is that they have decay and overgrowth everywhere, especially in a big city like Seattle. It's just, it puts the show on another level. And I mean, you know, I love the walking dead.

[00:24:24] And since we podcasted about the last of us last Lucy and I have been going through all of the walking dead over again, and I have an even deeper appreciation of it, but boy, do the visuals in this show just bury the walking. You know, they've got, they've got, uh, HBO money. That's, that's different, man. That's different, you know, AMC versus HBO. I know. Yeah. And it just puts it on another level.

[00:24:50] And I mean, you really want the story to rise to the level of the money and effort they put into all this. And I think it totally does. You know, it's, it's, I would say the story for me is just as good as stories in the walking dead. I know people don't like it when I compare, but anyway, just trying to appreciate the visuals and all the details. To add to that, to add to the HBO money aspect of this, um, they over filmed some things.

[00:25:16] They actually created some complete sets that they filmed that had did not appear in the show at all. Um, and I didn't watch the back matter this time. I haven't watched the back matter either. I've never actually haven't watched a single one. This is something I saw online, but apparently this is not a spoiler cause it already happened or it did. It didn't happen in day one, uh, in the game. This is not a game sport, but they, they came upon a gate that says fuck Fedra that they have to figure out how to get around. They built that gate.

[00:25:45] It's all there. And they didn't use it. And they, they, no, they didn't use it. And they did the whole gate. I mean, they filmed that whole scene, right? It landed on the, you know, maybe it'll be a deleted scene extra somewhere or something, but, but they spent the money to do it. And it's like, holy crap. Yeah. Yeah. And then, uh, Dina's, there's a lot of Dina reassuring Ellie that she wants to be there.

[00:26:11] They see the art of the, uh, painting on a wall of the Seraphite leader with feel her love. Feel her love. Like a biblical figure. And then. This is the first time we see her face kind of an image. Yeah. Yeah. I think so. And below it in graffiti, feel this bitch. And I've thought that comma is really important because to me, it read feel this bitch, but it's feel this bitch. Wait, hold on. Did they, was there a comma there? There was a comma. Yeah. Oh, that's good to know.

[00:26:42] Okay. So the WLF. Kudos. Yeah. They care about grammar. Well done. And so there's this pile of, of dead Seraphites below and it is really gruesome. And it, I mean, the visuals of what you see here really matches Dina and Ellie's emotional reactions. Cause it's very disturbing. They're all just bludgeon to death.

[00:27:08] And, and last week I had commented that it felt so much scarier and weirder to see that, uh, feel her love, you know, spelled out in blood. Yeah. And this time we get the kind of the opposite where the feel her love is a nice picture, a nice mural with the wolf responding in blood feel this bitch. Yeah. With all those dead people just almost, uh, what's the word I'm looking for? Not positioned, but yeah, positioned, uh, posed in such a way. Okay.

[00:27:35] And, and they spent a little time, you know, showing you, yeah, these are men, these are young girls. Mm-hmm . These are women. It's not, these aren't just, you know, warrior. You've got some young people as well and all this kind of stuff. So, uh. Yeah. Seems to be kind of indiscriminate. Yeah.

[00:27:54] And I mean, I'm sure that the wolves killed them somewhere nearby maybe, and then threw them under this mural just to make that point. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's what I was saying is pose. This was a, this was a message, another message. They sent a message, you know, in the, in the TV station. Mm-hmm . And that, that there are, like you said, women, children, men, uh, and that someone could do that.

[00:28:22] You'd think like, if I had seen this when I was growing up, I'd think there's no way this could happen in the real world. And now I think it is happening in the real world.

[00:28:34] And it's all about just this stuff we're talking about, about tribalism and us and them mentality, uh, just feeling so victimized or righteous in your position that you can dehumanize other people and do stuff like this to them because they don't seem like human beings to you, you know? There, there are so many things that we just could never even conceive of there being another way.

[00:29:03] Like, you know, life was just the way that things were laws were laws and, and people behaved because these were our institutions and these were the things and not, and I never realized how thin that really is. How it's just an agreed upon thing that if you wanted to say, but I don't want to do that. Wow. There's nothing stopping. So yeah, I, I, if anything, you know, last year.

[00:29:27] 10 years or so, it's been a hell of a lesson and realizing the true, true fragility of civilization and a show like this, a show like the walking dead. I mean, just any of the, you know, going back to night at living dead, you know, going back to old stories, just that the God, we, we take so much for granted, uh, in believing what is just always going to be the case. And it's so easy to see things.

[00:29:56] Uh, just, uh, I want to throw out a title of an amazing book. I read way back when in the nineties, uh, things fall, fall apart by Chinua Achebe. Um, and it is just about the, the falling apart of a particular civilization and a culture, uh, with the introduction of something destabilizing. And, um, yeah, it's sorry. Woo. Now we've gone down a different route here.

[00:30:21] Well, like if you, you look at, you know, places around the world, I mean, I think there's a heavy parallel with this show and the middle East, the situation between Israel and Palestine. I, I, the more and more I just feel like, cause I'd forgotten that, uh, Neil Druckmann is actually Israeli. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, so I'm sure he has all that in mind.

[00:30:46] And so, you know, there, this kind of violence is, I don't know if it's exactly like this, but maybe. I know he has spoken about, um, that there is a, I'm not a hundred percent sure. And I'm so not eager to dip my toe into this particular waters. Um, but where in the last of us to the Sarah fights and the WLF are a bit of an analog to Israel and the Palestine. It seems like it. Right.

[00:31:15] And I, and I think that was very much. And, and yeah, I think so. I'm not. And there's so much hate between those two groups, at least, you know, who knows? I can't speak intelligently about the details of it, but I know that people are dying and that there's been fighting for decades and that children and women are dying. And so I, I think this pulls a lot from that.

[00:31:42] And you're talking about when you're talking about how we take things for granted and it slips away here, uh, it already has slipped away worse, way worse than a lot of places. And so, yeah, I think, man, what we have here is fragile. And this polarity that we have in our country, if we let it fester like that, if we keep seeing the other side as inhuman, then it could lead to this. It could, it could lead to this. It. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:32:13] No, it's, it's sadly it is, you know, I, I don't, I don't, I don't, I have no clue what the future holds, but it's not going in the direction I think is a positive one. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And I think, yeah, I mean, I think people, some people are like, dude, you're supposed to be talking about a show and I'm going to get back to it right now.

[00:32:35] But I'll just say that to me, when you have a show like this, it's kind of the point to make you think about life. Yeah. And it, and it should, I mean, look, these, this is also, I mean, we're going to go into like with starship troopers, right? I, this is one of my favorite examples of people missing the point of certain things and, and, and even how a filmmaker can tweak the original point of something.

[00:33:01] Uh, Heinlein's version of starship troopers kind of is a more pro fascism sort of book, whereas Verhoeven takes it and makes it a very anti-fascism thing. Mm-hmm . And it's hilarious how many people on both ends of that spectrum are like, this speaks to me.

[00:33:15] Um, it's, it's just amazing to, you know, that, uh, how we all come getting into this with our different perspectives and how we view things and how we can see something on one way on our side or on their side. They see something in another way, or even the fact that it's side and it all like the point of the last of us all ends up just becoming this horrible fucking cycle of violence that just keeps going.

[00:33:44] Hatred keeps feeding on it and good God. I, yeah. I, but what, I mean, what I love about this show is a lot of times, and I, like I said, I love the walking dead. Um, of course you guys know that, but there's so many times in the walking dead where it seems to lead people to thinking, uh, I wish that the heroes would just kill more and not, you know, trust anyone.

[00:34:13] And it doesn't always do that, but sometimes I've noticed that that's what people argue for when they're watching that show. And maybe people are arguing for that too, with this show. I don't know. That's why, that's why I love that we have these feedback episodes, because if I'm making you think of anything, send it in and we'll respond to it. But in my experience, or at least personally, I feel like this show does the opposite. It makes you think, oh my God, stop. Stop.

[00:34:39] Since the game of the last of us two came out, one of the biggest complaints people had from the get go of, of all the, the, the ones who had all the complaints was, oh my God, how could Joel just tell these people his name like that? Why isn't he always on guard? He would never be so stupid as to actually just say his name to these strangers. And I'm like, my God, what horrible cynical world are you living in? Where you think this person should be like terrified of every single person.

[00:35:08] I mean, it's just the whole, this, this, this feeding of into it. That's just like, what are you so angry about with all? It's so weird to me. But it turns out they were right. In this case, they were right. Sure. Overall. Overall though. All right. So seeing all this carnage, Ellie feels bad about having dragged Dean into it. It's like, oh, should I take you back? I don't know.

[00:35:33] And then Dean tells the story of the first person she killed at eight, this raider that had just killed her mom and sister and just sort of trying to connect with Ellie. Like, hey, if that guy had gotten away, I would be going after him. And then I loved when she said, whatever reason Joel gave these people to do what they did, he didn't deserve that. And I think, what if I hadn't snuck out? What if my mom and sister were beaten to death in front of me? What if that motherfucker had made me watch as he did it?

[00:36:02] Would it make a difference in my family? I hadn't hurt his people first. No. No. And I'm like, as much as I'm trying to preach nonviolence, I totally agree with that part of it. And she distilled in that what exactly what we all kind of debated. We've all been debating since Joel did what he did, right? About, oh, well, is he justified? Is he not? You know, Abby, is it justified? Is it not? Well, she kind of boils this down. It's like, I don't, who gives a shit what he did before?

[00:36:30] What you did now is horrible and you're going to get punished for that. And so, you know, um, basically it seems like Dina is giving Ellie a justification for her obsession. Yeah. Um, and saying like, no, no, no, it's cool. It's okay that you are maniacally one-tracked mind right now where you, you just want revenge and vengeance. Cause Hey, I'd want it too, if I didn't already get the chance and I got it and it was rad. It's kind of what she said.

[00:36:57] So I get it and I'm with you, but she does say, I'll go back if you want and I'll keep going if you want. There's no right answer. So I feel like that's her. Yeah. That's some part of, at least of an acknowledgement that maybe what they're doing isn't the right thing, but fuck it. We're just going to do it anyway, if you want to. Yeah. And, and, and Ellie definitely made it clear. Like it wasn't like, oh, we're going to go back now. It was just, no, you can go back. Yeah. You go back. Yeah. That was definitely very clear. Yeah.

[00:37:23] And Dina's like, no, cause she's on, she's pretty much on the same page, at least so far. Um, Dina thinks there couldn't be a horde in this warehouse that they have to go through because the WLF is nearby and hordes wouldn't ignore that. I think it was also cause it was so quiet. Uh, yeah, that too. Yeah. But they're both forgetting about the quote unquote smart when that Ellie encountered before. And I think, man, the WLF avoids this place for a reason. Yeah.

[00:37:50] So, um, they were being pretty optimistic and I was like, maybe Dina's not that smart. That was funny when they were talking about the building that they're not attaining attention to it. Like, oh, what could it be? And I'm just like, dude, if they're avoiding that, there must be a reason. Think about it. Yeah. But it's dramatic license. I know. I know. But it was just kind of funny. Yeah. So then Dina kind of pulled a hand solo and she told Ellie, you're a little crazy. And that's one of the reasons I love you. You love me? Well, I, oh, I know.

[00:38:20] Not going to lie. I, I, I rolled. I actually, I said, when she said, uh, that's what I love about you. I actually turned, I turned to everyone like, you love me. And then Ellie said it and I had to, I was like, oh God, come on. I know would have been better if it was a Han Solo. Yeah. Yeah. You're right. Yeah. This is, I'm not trying to bring the part of the story. That's, that's not as good as I wished it was there. They're, they're, they're cute. Romance is cute.

[00:38:49] It is adorable. It just has its moments. It does have its moment. It just feels, uh, sometimes a little like, uh, not the best timing. Just, yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. That's it. The rhythms aren't quite there or something. Cause really in moments of my life where I've maybe been filled with rage or, or that kind of thing, the last thing I am is in a mood to be kind of cutesy. Um, it just, it just feels like a bit of a little forced or inorganic or something.

[00:39:18] And now we can all be arguing and, and, and I'm sure we all will that, Hey, Ellie is, does a great job of putting up her mask. And this is just a mask. All of this is just a mask and she's hiding the true rage that's beginning to come out, uh, that we started to see after playing a future days. And then we got to really see kind of come out with the Nora sort of thing. Um, so maybe she's just playing, uh, Anakin to Padme and putting on a good face. You love me. I'm going to slice a pear.

[00:39:47] So yeah, I keep bringing in star Wars to everything. I don't know why rose colored glasses. A hundred percent. Yes, it is. Um, I'm trying. So Dina tells Ellie not to use guns except as a last resort. And if it's more than they can handle to run. And she kind of goes in detail about that and then goes, so tell me again, what's the plan? And Ellie goes, knives or run. And that reminded me of in season one, when Joel said rule one, you don't bring up tests ever.

[00:40:17] Matter of fact, we can just keep our histories to ourselves. Rule two. You don't tell anyone about your condition. They see that bite mark. They won't think it through. They'll just shoot you. Rule three. You do what I say when I say it, we clear. And Ellie's all yes. And he goes, repeat it. And she goes, what you say goes. Yeah. He goes, okay, fine. Yeah. She definitely needs some, uh, ground rules. You know, that's, it seems to be a bit of an issue for, you know, again, going into

[00:40:45] the very, you know, coming right out and saying, you know, oh, do you think I'm just going to go and shoot my gun off? It's like, yes, yes, I do think you're very on the nose. And the thing is, I was thinking like, okay, we're getting a lot of signals that this is just a reckless person. Ellie is. And yeah, because if she wasn't, we wouldn't be getting this story. So they literally, after the Amish conversation, like she's like saying, we're reckless. And then what did they say? What do you want to do? Let's go be reckless. You know, she actually said it. Let's go be reckless.

[00:41:16] Yeah. And that's what they're doing. She is. Yes. At least Dina is acknowledging the fact that this might be a bad idea. I feel like there's some acknowledgement there. Yeah. She's still helping out. She's apparently, you know, knows how to triangulate and orienteer and do all the, all the things. Can't wait to see what else she's capable of doing, but we'll find out. And I've been there, especially as, as a kid, like we used to go up to this place called

[00:41:44] rainbow pools and jump off 60 foot cliffs in the water. And yeah, we were like, this is probably a bad idea. Oh yeah. I used to do that Sequoia national park as a kid too. Yeah. Uh, what about, okay. We're now we're at the warehouse. What did you think of this whole sequence? Oh man. Talked about it a little bit. Yeah. I know we talked about it a little bit. I did. And I enjoyed the little thing of like, you know, Dina was going to go check in the door and then it's like, well, I'm the one that can get, uh, can't get infected. Maybe I should check.

[00:42:12] And Dina made one of her faces that I love, which was the, yeah, okay. You're right face. Uh, and she does. And, uh, I thought it was creepy. I thought it was wonderfully tinged with genuine horror, uh, about not knowing where the stalkers were, not knowing where they were going to show up or how they were going to show up and, and feeling the two of them just at, you know, at that point you had mentioned when she looks up and suddenly

[00:42:38] there's a dozen of them where it's like, oh crap, whatever plan we had is no longer in effect because. Yeah. We're screwed. We're surrounded and just the runs. I, I, it played out and the whole splitting up and going into that cage. I thought that was just really well done. A piece of horror that I thoroughly appreciated. Yeah. Yeah. Just the look of it, the, when they're walking down that industrial hallway, there's also a

[00:43:07] green tinge to a lot of the last of us and it just looks so good with their flashlights. And then, um, I guess there's like scanner flashlight or scanner lights coming from the WLF. Yeah. And so those are sort of illuminate as they pass through illuminating all the infected. So this is a case like, um, in so many other, let's say zombie series or movies or these kinds

[00:43:35] of things, um, they want to make sure you see all the prosthetics. They want to make sure you see the, the zombies doing their thing. And, and it's, you get the hero zombies, right. And all that. And this one, we only get these, uh, glimpses of any of them at any one time. There's almost no focus on a single one of them. And it just, to me, it lent the air of, you don't know where they are. You don't know where they're coming from. They can just appear at any moment.

[00:44:01] And when they do appear, uh, they're just rabid, you know, just, just, they really want you and we've seen bloaters, you know, these are different than that. We've seen the clickers. These are different than that. Uh, even the runners, which was a little more like this, but it was just, I really just hit, hit the nail on the head. I thought just, it landed, it landed it really well.

[00:44:23] And both of these, uh, young folks in, in Ellie and Dina are, uh, actors are amazing with their screams and the, and the, the sense of terror. Um, yes, they nail it. Love that so much. Agreed. And I, I also loved how, like before they knew there was a whole bunch of them, Ellie came up with this plan to flank it and run separate ways and whichever one it follows the other one come around to get it.

[00:44:51] And then it ended up being kind of what they had done to them because they're trying to sneak around, but really all these other ones snuck around them. Yeah. And they're talking about how they're smarter, you know, so how these ones are smarter than the other infected. So I just like that. Yeah. And then I guess, then we got Jesse. Yeah. That's right. Was it Captain Wyoming? Captain Wyoming. I think that was his name that Dina gave him. Saved the day. Yeah. That was cool.

[00:45:19] That was very, did you figure out who it was? It would have to be either Tommy or Jesse had to be there. Actually, I thought it was one of the WLF at first. That was my first thought. I don't know why just coming in there to handle the situation. Yeah. I mean, that would have made sense because they did, Dina, they did make a point of saying, don't go firing off your gun. Because if you do, you're going to have all the WLF on us. That's probably why.

[00:45:48] Because like I said, they set up our expectations for that. Absolutely. Wanted us to think it was a bad guy. Absolutely. I mean, yeah, I only knew it was Jesse because well, we're spoiled, but it was a great way to introduce him. I thought I liked the kind of the blurry thing with Ellie going a little bit blurry, like, oh, what's going on? I'm being attacked. Suddenly we're being saved. You know, I enjoy that, you know, the visual cue for I'm confused.

[00:46:16] And then you see Jesse with his arms and you're like, oh, we're all safe now in Jesse's arms. And then I'm watching that, especially the second time. And I realized, you know, Ellie could be singing Rick Springfield's Jesse's Girl to him. Don't you know, I wish that I had Jesse's girl. And she does now, you know, so. Yeah. Kind of a bummer for. They didn't really address that. They didn't. Well, we're not there yet. I mean, I think they're in a bit of a situation. Bit of a pickle.

[00:46:46] And I don't think Jesse has any clue at this point that, you know, he's going to be a dad. Yeah. I mean, at least one of them. Yeah. Two dads. Well, then they are being chased by the WLF. They run into the park. Then the WLF comes right up to the border. Whoa, stop. We don't go in there. And, you know, I, even though I know the game, I'm not thinking about the game always. I'm just responding in the moment.

[00:47:15] And I thought it might've been like bloater land or something. Yeah. Yeah. And then, but then I'm like, well, it'd be weird dramatically to have two places in a row where the WLF don't go because of infected. Ellie thinks the same thing though. She mentioned the infected, but then. And, um, whatever the ones I can't do. Yeah. I can't, I wish I could do that really loud. I've never been able to. Stick your fingers in you. Maybe there's some good YouTube videos that actually teach that we could still learn. We should try. I know I've tried. I have got whatever. Yeah.

[00:47:45] I don't think my teeth, my mouth is built. I'm going to try one more time, but I probably won't be able to do it. Um, so Jesse says, Tommy and Jesse followed them out that they snuck out the next night. So I guess Tommy left. They didn't tell anybody. I don't know if he didn't tell Maria, but she couldn't have been too happy about it. And then he says the plans to meet Tommy and go home. And Ellie says, no. Uh, but then. And then, and, and, and Dina was like, Ellie. Yeah. Like what the hell?

[00:48:13] Come on, we're going to go home, but that didn't match up with what she was saying earlier. So thank you. That was another little thing. I was going to like, wait a minute. Okay. All right. So then they come upon the scene of the Sarah fights hanging this wolf and he's like, I'll join you too late wolf. I know what Isaac is planning. I can help you. And then, you know, they hang him and, uh, Sarah fights like we have no interest in your words for the corrupted soul knows only lies. So taught the prophet.

[00:48:44] So again, like, like the Sarah fight, Isaac was torturing. These people have really strong beliefs. They sound very self-righteous to me. Uh, this also happens in the real world. Self-righteous belief can lead to atrocities, you know, tribalism. This is fucked up. This is, this is fucked up. The guy was holding a sickle up to him and like taking off the buttons of his shirt, I think. And Jenny's like, oh, is he going to take his heart out? And I'm like, nope.

[00:49:14] See, that's a Mola Ram and a temple of doom. I believe I'm reaching in and grabbing the heart. Yeah. But, uh, then he, he disembowel. I was wondering if they were going to show it and if I'm sure most caught it, but this seems to be what they do. I mean, we already saw all these wolves hanging with their guts hanging out. Now. I don't think any of you were missed this one. There's a lot of things to miss. I don't think this is why. Yeah. I mean, they might've had their hands over their eyes or something.

[00:49:45] Um, so he died pretty quickly. That was one thing. I don't know if you have your stomach cut open like that. You would actually die right away. I do my best not to think about it. So then one of them shoots Dina in a leg with an arrow. That was, seemed to come out of the blue. There was no warning, I guess. Well, we got some whistles ahead of time. And then all of a sudden the thump. Hmm.

[00:50:12] Then Dina, then he looks up at Ellie and says, you know, I used to be an adventurer like you until I took an arrow to the knee. Oh God. You didn't play Skyrim. Did you? I don't, I don't get it. There's some Skyrim people out there who just laughed at what I said. That was for you guys. So the terror fights are just whistling frantically to each other now because they've encountered someone. Ellie leads them away.

[00:50:40] So Jesse can save Dina similar strategies to what she was trying to do with the infected in the warehouse. I'll lead them away. You be safe. And, and just hearing all this whistling, I was wondering if the writers of the game actually made a whistling language for the Sarah fights. So I asked chat GPT and it said, yes, they did. Yeah. For the last of us, part two, the game developers, naughty dog worked with a linguist to create a functional whistling language for the Sarah fights. It's not just random whistling.

[00:51:08] It's a constructed communication system designed to fit their stealthy ritualistic culture. Naughty dog hired David J. Peterson, the same linguist who created languages for the Dothraki and Valerian in game of Thrones. Oh, nice. To pay salt on how the Sarah fights would communicate using whistles. Uh, the whistling system was designed to convey that tactical information like enemy spotted move in flank, be nonverbal and stealthy, uh, feel ritualistic and eerie.

[00:51:36] And, uh, they vary in pitch length and rhythm rhythm suggesting different meeting meanings like a primitive Morse code. And, uh, I guess in game, the Sarah fights react differently based on these whistles, making it a gameplay mechanic as well as world building. So I don't know if there's a catalog anywhere of what whistles mean, what, but apparently they all mean something. It's a, it's a very groovy and very effective, uh, little way of doing it. I love it. I, I still, I hear those whistles.

[00:52:06] I viscerally react, you know, I'm just like, Oh God, the feet. Yeah. It's yeah. And, and the way again, going with lighting, like we were talking, like you talked about the lighting of the wolves with the flashlights in the coming into the warehouse and all of that. Uh, and then we get the, the torches in this, um, visually, this is probably my favorite scene. Just, um, seeing the torches, seeing the way that they're all dressed and, and this ritualistic way of them, uh, seeing a crossbow coming out, you know?

[00:52:32] Uh, I do doubt their, their, well, uh, again, I'm kind of like, wait, so Dina and Jesse got away that easily. They just take off and really just distract you. Yeah. Okay. Whatever. And then, and then Ellie evades them pretty easily too. Yeah. Yeah. Was this, uh, was that going through the hole? No, that was later. That was in the hospital. Sorry. That was the hospital. Well, it was, yeah, no, it was, yeah. I mean, she like hides behind a tree. That's right. And then she sees the hospital. She's right next to the hospital. Yeah.

[00:53:02] And she's like, I'm going to go for it. Yeah. She's basically, huh? Should I go do the thing? I probably should do. Yeah. I'm here. I need some coffee. So they did get away from them pretty easily, but I loved it visually too. And everything you mentioned also just, I always love in the game, the lush greenery and they replicated it so well that you can skulk around in and hide. Yeah. Yeah. It's just gorgeous. It really was. It was great.

[00:53:27] And I liked, uh, I liked the seraphite, uh, the dude with the sickle. I mean, I don't like him as like somebody I want to go out for a drink with, but he just have a beer. But there was a very certain, um, you know, there was, there was, I guess you could say a confidence to him that I appreciate, you know, he's got the big old beard going on. So he's almost like the, uh, I guess he's going to be the analog to maybe an Isaac, right? The seraphite Isaac. Um, might just be a Lieutenant or something.

[00:53:55] But he's big and scary and he's got a sickle and that was very effective. Yeah. And they're just like this guy and the guy that Isaac interrogated and tortured, they just embody that strong belief. So well, it's. Yeah. It just feels like, yeah, I like it makes me believe that they would actually be like that. Oh, a hundred percent. Okay.

[00:54:19] So then they get to the hospital, which, you know, like this, I was going to say probably my favorite sequence in the episode, but this episode had three amazing sequences, the warehouse, the park, and then the hospital and Nora's inside tending to wounded. Do you think they were fighting seraphites? We don't really know why there's wounded people. I mean, I would guess so. I mean, absolutely.

[00:54:46] Cause they also said that, you know, wherever, um, wherever Isaac was, you know, there, there were kind of like a, there was a front line there because it sounded like there was some battling going on. So back to war. So I think they are back to war. I mean, I think that's exactly what's going on, but they're also, it seems, um, did it sound like they were trying to clear out the hospital as well? I mean, didn't she say like it was. I think they're trying to clear the infected so that they can use it. Okay. Cause I couldn't, I think so. Yeah. Okay.

[00:55:13] I couldn't quite understand what hammerhead was saying at the very beginning of this about, um, no, she just says a too important of a thing to lose resource to lose. Yeah. So I think they want to get the infected out and be able to use, use it. Uh, so Ellie catches her alone from behind, put that shit down, hands up, turn around. You remember me. And through this whole sequence from here on out, I felt like Bella Ramsey's better than ever.

[00:55:42] Uh, I wondered how they would handle Ellie's intensity when it came to these scenes, you know, because like you were saying, it seems like, oh yeah, we're having, we're out having a good time of vacation. But in this whole sequence, she's so focused. She's scary. Uh, she has the scary intensity. She's steady. She has the stare where she's got her eyes open and just like not moving at all and staring right into Nora. And I don't think Bella Ramsey blinked at all in any of these scenes. Probably not.

[00:56:11] I just thought it was so well done. You know, Nora says we could have killed you and maybe you should have, or maybe you should have stayed the fuck out of Jackson. Nora. Where's Abby? I like when, when she said her name, it is Nora's face definitely had a look of like, oh, oh, you, you did research. You're going to, you did some research. You actually know who we are and oh, oh crap. Yeah.

[00:56:39] Um, I felt scared for Nora. Well, yeah, I know that. I thought I do believe that entire sequence was phenomenal. Like you said, we finally got to see Ellie, uh, coming out of her, uh, her cocoon and and turning into a butterfly of death in a horrible way. Um, I also found it interesting that she attacked the legs, you know, much like Abby did. So, uh, again, you get the parallel Abby looks over or excuse me, Ellie looks over and sees

[00:57:09] a pipe, uh, much the way that, wait, before we get to that, let me just, uh, I, I loved how Nora seemed like she was going to try to connect, which seems like a scene. Well, it was, um, it was like this, uh, wolf that was about to be disemboweled. Oh, I'm sorry. Actually, that was more of a begging thing, but we've seen this scene a lot of times where Nora's saying, you know, um, I'm sorry you had to see that happen.

[00:57:35] And sometimes at night I still hear his screams and it was a terrible thing the way he died. But yeah, the little bitch got what he deserved. Like that was, uh, unexpected and great. And, uh, it really turned a scene that seemed like kind of a cookie cutter scene into something special. I thought, yeah, you had to wonder what was going on in her mind about how is she going to approach this? You know?

[00:58:01] Cause that was when she did that, that was still before they went down to the basement. Yeah. That was right off the bat. Then they, then they're chasing and they get down, you know, she jumps on the elevator and it falls and Ellie follows her down there. And, um, then for a minute before we get to the part that you were wanting to talk about first, Ellie's exploring this cordyceps infested. Okay. Yes. Holy shit. Thank you for, for slowing me down before we talk. Yeah, it's okay.

[00:58:30] So that, when I mentioned like at the very beginning of the episode, I mentioned something about some horror aspect as well. This whole. So, so good. Now I know this person is, is kind of persona non grata these days, but in Neil Gaiman's Sandman and the comic book series, not the, not the TV show even, but in the comic book series, his depiction of hell, this reminded me so much of Gaiman's depiction of hell, except it's not mushrooms in there. It's like body parts and flesh kind of a thing, but that's what the walls look like.

[00:59:00] And just the, and it evoked that image of hell to me. And it, the, these images of the soldiers being, becoming one with the, the cordyceps and being kept alive in order to be able to exhale these spores. The visual of that was just, it was straight out of Hieronymus Bosch, man. It was just like, just beautiful and horrifying at the same time.

[00:59:30] It was like we had a, who's, who's the other great horror pinhead from Hellraiser. You know, we were just like exploring the, the, the horror and the pleasure and the pain of all of this. And it's just, oh, it got me. It got me, man. Yeah. Seeing poor Leon breathing out those spores and his eyes are still open. You know, he's still alive. And that's the sun by the way. That's the sun. Leon Park. Man. Oh shit. That was so good.

[01:00:00] That was so good. And just beginning to see the spores kind of floating around and then the way they exhale. Like a wispy hanging in the air. Oh, so good. So good. The Lovecraft, I'm thinking Lovecraft. Lovecraft. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was just a really just cordyceps infested place in the game or in the show. I think this looked the best. Yeah. Of anything. Yeah.

[01:00:29] It was just all crusty and slimy and green and tenderly, but in, in a way that the way it was arranged, it just felt almost evil. Like you're saying like a hellish place. Oh, it was, I thought that you could see him walking around the corner at any moment. I thought that was such a just spectacularly well done set design. It just, it creeped me the fuck out. And, and when I'm watching something like this, I want to be creeped the fuck out. So yeah, well done,

[01:00:59] man. I thought that was seriously effective. And just to have it again, though, the pacing of this entire scene from Ellie coming out of the shadows to, to Nora, to the chase, uh, to, to the elevator, which was a harrowing sort of, like you said, like, Oh, I hope somebody didn't get hurt dropping on the elevator like that, uh, to then open up those doors to hell. Just, it just, God, so well played. And then to where I was going and they meet. Yeah. And they meet.

[01:01:27] And just like turning on the red light. Like you said, it's just the, that color of blood and anger. And, and when Nora says, you stupid bitch, we're breathing spores. We're infected. You killed us both. And Ellie calmly says, did I, yeah. No. And then Nora says, you're her, the immune girl. You're real, which confirms something I've been thinking that they did know Ellie story. Just weren't sure if it was real. And, and now we,

[01:01:57] now we know that Ellie knows what Joel did. Yeah. She lays it out. He killed everyone in the hospital, including the only person that can make a curve from you. That was Abby's father. And Joel shot him in the head. That's what he did. Ellie says, I know. And, and, you know, honestly, like Nora looks surprised that Ellie would still be there knowing that, but I'm like, Joel was saving her life. It's like, Hey, that person who beat your father to death in front of you. She did that because he killed a guy who was trying to murder you.

[01:02:27] Yeah. Okay. Fuck you. There does seem to be like, you're skipping one important little fact in all of this is that that guy that Joel killed was about to kill this girl. Me right here. Yeah. And then she's screaming at her, where's Abby? And I guess we'll have to find out if she told her. Yeah. So, and, and that those scenes. Uh, so now I want to go back to what I was saying about, you know,

[01:02:54] Ellie looking over and seeing the pipe as the analog to Abby looking over and seeing the golf club, uh, in, in the original thing with Joel, they shoot out Joel's knee and, you know, she breaks the golf club over his leg, not over his head. You know, that's how she has the, the, the half of the golf club to spike him in the neck. It's because she broke it over the dude's leg that had already been shot. So all of a sudden we see Abby or excuse me, Ellie doing the same damn thing to, to Nora.

[01:03:22] She went for the legs first and that's. Yeah. Oof. I mean, but I mean, it's disturbing, but not out of just a sadistic need to see her suffer. It's because she wants information. Yeah. Yeah. It's a tad better, but still not. Well, it's like when we saw Joel do that in, in season one where he sticks the knife in the dude's knee and he's like, tell me the truth or I'm going to pop your kneecap off. You know, where's, where's Ellie? Um, this is what these not got it from dad.

[01:03:52] Yeah. And these are not nice people. I mean, she, they, they make a point of saying, you know, Joel and Tommy used to do horrible things to people, you know? Um, so it's, it's kind of like, and I wonder listeners, right. And let me know what you thought of Ellie here. Do you think she's a horrible person? Do you understand her? Is it somewhere in between? You know, I think we can go back to my feelings. Like, yes, these are horrible people. And I understand. I know. That's how I feel so much in this game. That's the shitty part. I guess these are horrible people,

[01:04:22] but I understand, but I understand. Yeah. I mean, like, uh, Ellie here, like I was talking about how, when you get tribal and self-righteous that you can commit atrocities just because you feel so right in your position. And Ellie's like that right here. Yeah. And, and seeing that, you know, those, those couple of, uh, swings on Nora and seeing her face contort into the, you know, the, the monster she is becoming. And I had this overwhelming sense of there's our girl.

[01:04:52] All right. There she is. We've been waiting for you. How are you doing girl? Big hug. Yeah. And then we get this, all of a sudden Ellie's in bed and there's a knock at the door, I think. And it's Joel and saying, Hey kiddo. And she's smiling. It says, hi. And I mean, I felt like, I don't know,

[01:05:15] like I just was coming out of the cold and drink a cup of hot cocoa and it was spreading throughout my body. I'm like, Oh my God, it's Pedro. Oh, definitely a very, uh, a very, a very welcome face to see again. It's like, Oh, I remember you. Yeah. And, and to see the two of them have, I'd say the warmest exchange between the two of them that we've ever seen in the series period. Mm-hmm.

[01:05:45] Yeah. It felt unusual and made me wonder. And, you know, we have some pretty good ideas what this is all about because we've played the game, but I'm going to try to talk about it without any of that coloring about it. But part of my brain right away went straight back into like the denial mode of the five stages of grief. Like maybe she just dreamed Joel died. And then I was sort of like, no, no, no. Maybe this is her happy place because, um,

[01:06:15] she's still torturing, uh, Nora and this is happening in her mind. I, I think that's probably a little bit, uh, yeah. Going, going into a different room. Yeah, exactly. In her brain. Yeah. But, um, whatever it is, I think they probably just didn't want to end the episode on such a dark note. Maybe, I don't know, but anyway, it was great to see him. Y'all get, y'all get Papa Joel again. Everybody's favorite Pedro.

[01:07:22] All right. So we're back. It's game talk. We are, I think mostly going to be again, not spoilery for future events in the game. We're just going to talk about differences and similarities until we get to the end. And I'll warn you before we do that. Cause I, I do have a couple of things to say about things to come, but we'll save that for the variant. So spores. Yeah. We finally got spores. Yeah. That's cool. I'm glad. Uh, I am too. And I was wondering how they were going to do the Nora scene without them. You know,

[01:07:52] that was kind of right. That's probably why they're there. Yeah. Yeah. Had to. I mean, and I think they did, they did find a good, a good way to, to have it make sense. This has been sealed off for since 2003, since the beginning, since the beginning and shit happened, you know? Yeah. It's been festering. I mean, there was a scene similar to this in the first season where there was a guy embedded in a wall of cordyceps and there were no spores there, but,

[01:08:21] but yada, yada, whatever. It didn't have the cool hellscape that this one had. So, you know, not at all, because it was, we get to say, because it was sealed off and it had so much, you know, I don't know. It's, it's just great to have this area. Yeah. That's just been sealed off for 26 years and is the worst thing you've ever seen. Yeah. Yeah. And, and if you don't, if you're, you haven't played the game and you don't know, you know,

[01:08:46] you get that whole beginning scene with Joel when the infection first breaks out and he, his daughter gets killed and then you skip ahead, I think 20 years or something. And then there's, at that point there's spores all the time. Whenever you're in an area. Oh yeah. Yeah. Uh, has a lot of cordyceps that you'll see spores and Joel, you're playing as Joel, but he automatically just takes out his gas mask and puts it on. And then you can walk around in there. Yeah. There's a lot of the game, uh, where the arc main characters are in gas masks.

[01:09:15] And my understanding is that that was a big reasoning behind why they didn't want to do that in the series to begin with was they didn't want Pedro, uh, who's already had his pretty face, his pretty face. It was already being hidden in the Mandalorian, uh, to also be hidden again by, um, by a gas mask. Yeah. As to whether or not that's true or not, I don't know. It seems a prockerful, you know, but, um, maybe they just, it makes sense to me or maybe they always have like superheroes taking off their masks, you know, so they can see the emotion, but it would,

[01:09:43] now that you're saying that I'm picturing Joel putting on a Mandalorian. Oh, wait, wrong one. This is the way. I mean, no, no, no, no. I'm so confused. Come on, Ellie. We gotta go here. This is the way. So in the, in the game, um, I was thinking about how they're so complimentary Dina and Ellie to each other, where Dina's the planner and the cerebral one. And, and Ellie's more of like good in a fight. And in the game,

[01:10:12] their skill sets weren't as clearly delineated. Their differences were more about roles. I think Dina was there for emotional support and otherwise. Well, and Dina did, she did like listen to all the radio. She was trying to, was figuring out where everybody was located based on all the codes. She did do that. However, not as much as I, not as much of a stretch. However, the reason why she's doing that is she's stuck in the theater. Yeah. And she stays back because what? She's just, she's pregnant. She's vomiting. And,

[01:10:41] and basically you're like, that's it, right. You can't do this. You're not going to be able to do this. So this whole thing of Dina being the one really motivating Ellie is, that's a difference, you know, in the game, it is very much Ellie's pushing it. Yeah. Which again, this gets into the, the difference in mindset where it seems like, why is she being all cutesy with this girl when she's supposed to be on a vengeful quest? You know? Um, yeah. Whatever. If we get there, it looks like we've gotten there.

[01:11:12] You know, that's fine. And it is, it gave us another. So, so one of the other differences then with the Dina Ellie thing, I'm going to skip forward. Just this bit is with the Sarah fights. Uh, Dina's not there. Jesse's not there. That's, that's, uh, Jesse shows up, uh, in Hillcrest in a scene that does not show up. Later on. They were fighting the wolves. Um, yeah. Ellie was fighting. Outside. Yeah. And, and the difference though,

[01:11:41] is that when the Sarah fight scene, uh, Ellie's alone and Ellie gets shot with the arrow and the shoulder, you know, so that's Ellie getting shot. This by having, that was a hard scene, man. That was hard. It was a very hard scene. And having Dina take the arrow now. Okay. This brings us back to where we were at the game where Dina is now no longer with Ellie. Ellie's going to have to do this on her own. So it gets her out of it and it makes Ellie not, you know, in a game. Okay. You get, you know, some rags and some, um,

[01:12:10] alcohol and you can heal yourself from an arrow. So, uh, it's a little less believable if she gets shot with a arrow in the shoulder that she's still running around doing all this. Yeah. She's hopefully, I mean, not hopefully cause I don't like Dina, but it would make more sense if she was incapacitated now for, for a bit because of this. And I was sort of thinking, okay, why are they changing the show to have Dina go out with Ellie? Uh, instead of Ellie going on her own. And my first thought was, Oh, I wonder if they're going to have Dina witness what Ellie does to Nora. But, um,

[01:12:41] no, they didn't do it that way. And I'm glad cause it was more effective with them alone. And I think it was more just about, yeah, having Dina just play a more active role in the story, you know? You know? And, and yeah, as I keep saying, my quibbles, my quibbles and, but now they, they made all these changes, which now in so many ways, uh, they made all these changes to end up in the exact same place where the game was. Yeah. I think they were hoping that people would enjoy the journey more that they presented, but it sounds like, yeah,

[01:13:10] we have our quibbles. Exactly. It's, I mean, that's for me, the biggest issue would be the time, the time span, uh, of, of Ellie and Dina's relationship that they had more time to maybe justify a, you love me comment versus that happened yesterday. Yeah. I mean, again, they've known each other a long time. That's fine. I get it. Bah, bah, there's all these reasons, but I mean, to me, it almost felt like the day before they were saying, okay,

[01:13:40] now we're going to be together as parents of my child. And then they skip to the scene where it's like, you love me. And it's like, well, yeah, you just said you were going to spend the rest of your lives together. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Fair enough. Fair enough. But whatever. It was fine. So, uh, the theater. So good. I mean, just another, yeah, another, I just can't believe how much they're pulling. I wonder if they constructed this theater to look like the one in the game. I did.

[01:14:09] I did listen to part of the podcast. Um, it says, I think the theater was there, but they had to make some, some tweaks to it. Like, I think the, uh, okay. The, the ceiling, I think they put in there and there are a few other things. And like the name of the band, I guess it's on the drum head. There in the, uh, it has something to do with like Craig Mason's band when he was a kid or something like that. Okay. Some goofy thing. So this part, Ellie and Dina see the art of the Sarah fight leader with feel her love

[01:14:39] painted below. And that looks just like the game. Yes. It's even the same look to the leader, which makes me think maybe we won't see her in the show either. Um, but the whole, I wish I would have talked about this a little bit more in the, in the main part, but maybe it's better here. I don't remember in the game. We saw a lot of that. We saw a painting of the leader and feel her love. And I don't think we ever saw it in blood. And no, I don't think so. You know, in the dialogue, in the game,

[01:15:07] the guy who's about to disembowel the other guy, the wolf guy, he says something about, I'm going to free you. So you can experience her love or something like that. And so they're in the show, something different than the game, I think is they're equating this phrase, feel her love with die. It means die in the, in the sometimes to feel her. Like, that's why, yeah,

[01:15:36] that's why they wrote it in blood in the same room where they just hang or disemboweled the guys that were hanging with their own blood. They wrote it with their own blood because I think in the show, feel her love can mean go on to the next world. Yeah. What did he say after when he did kill the guys, did he say like he's been released or he said something like that? Let's see. I have it here. Let me, the Sarah fight said he is nested in sin. And then the group said,

[01:16:06] free him so that he may know her love. So it just means, you know, if you die, then you can feel this guru's love. I, you know, I mean, look, everybody's got their different recruitment techniques. That for me doesn't really work. Yeah. Like, can you feel it if you're still alive? That's my first question. Yeah. Cause I may consider it if you can. I'm pro me living.

[01:16:34] That's what that's all. Yeah. That's the main thing. Um, so the warehouse, um, I don't remember there, this is being a one-on-one one-to-one comparison with anything in the game, but you do meet stalkers in, in part two, you never see them in part one. And, you know, when Ellie first met the stalker, a few episodes back, there was only one of them. And in the game, there's usually, I don't know, like anywhere from three to eight or something.

[01:17:05] So meeting one was unusual because it's less than usually meet here meeting a whole bunch. I don't, I don't know if we ever meet that many in the game, but it does give you more of a feeling of what it's like in the game than that first encounter, because they draw you in and then they surround you and they come at you. Yeah. I actually appreciated that. It wasn't a one-on-one with anything in the game. Cause, cause in the game we have so many different moments of like, Oh, here's the group of runners. We got to get through. Oh, here's some flickers. Oh, here's some stuff. You know,

[01:17:33] you get a smorgasbord and you're not going to get that in a TV show. It's just that would, again, different wrong media, different media. It's not going to work. Um, so I, I appreciated it that it was a, a nice, you know, the, the third faction here in Seattle, right? You've got your wolves, you've got your seraphites and yeah, you've got your infected and there's still a problem. Um, and then you got our Jackson contingent just kind of coming in and fucking things up. Um, I,

[01:18:01] I'm really looking forward to what's going to happen in the next two episodes. Me too. Yeah. And at the end, when we get to the spoiler section, we'll talk about what we think that is. Uh, but yeah, I, I, I love that they decided to go ahead and add more infected this season and they're still managing to keep it. So it doesn't feel like old hat yet, you know, or anything. I really, like I said before, I do really like that. They're, they're giving us the, the, they're, they're making them a scary. They are making them like terrifying. And,

[01:18:30] and I like that so much that we're not lingering on it. So we can sit here and like complain about the makeup or something. You know, it's, it's, it is giving you that, that we're feeling stuff. Yeah. And I'm, and I'm a fan of that. I cannot get over those visuals of the, the dudes trapped in the, the hell wall and breathing out the spores. I mean, I, I, that was so good. I mean, even if the game had something like that, I would have been like, Oh my God, that's so bad, you know?

[01:18:59] And when you hear Druckmann talk about working on the show, he'll, I've heard him a few times go, yeah, you know, we talk out ideas about maybe changing things up. And sometimes there's an idea that comes up that was different from the game. And I go, that is such a good idea. I wish we'd done that in the game. Yeah. You know? So they're still discovering cool stuff. I think it's great. I think that's great. Uh, the, as we said, Jesse arrives at a different point, but he does arrive and we, and Tommy had already come out earlier in the game.

[01:19:28] So Tommy and Jesse arriving together is, is different. Yeah. So we don't know exactly how that's going to play out. Um, the park scene, uh, that was Ellie by herself, but there were a lot of elements that were similar to the game, the hanging and the disemboweling and having to hide from in the brush and all that, or in the foliage. Oh, and I, I loved playing those scenes. They're so terrifying. Um, yeah. Oh, dogs in front of the hospital. Yeah.

[01:19:58] I was afraid that was bear. Who's a bear? Yeah. We get so many dogs in the game. And I mean, when Ellie got to the hospital, you know, seeing the army tents outside and the lookout guy standing on this like raised platform. I played that scene. So it took me so long to get through that scene and play it. Well, you know? Yeah. Yeah. And she just sneaks by them and I'm like, she's more of a stealth player than me. I usually just kill everyone.

[01:20:27] So the game though is designed that you can play the game without ever killing a dog. Well, I know. Minus one. I don't think I'm skilled enough. I'm not skilled enough either. I just don't think I could do it, but you got to kill a lot of dogs when you play this game. It's really sad. It's not a fun thing. Uh, then the Nora stuff played out almost exactly the same. Almost exactly. I'm, I'm looking forward to seeing that actress in this, uh,

[01:20:56] upcoming naughty dog video game to, uh, intergalactic, interstellar, intergalactic, intergalactic, intergalactic, planetary, planetary, intergalactic. Yes, me too. Yeah. I was thinking about that the whole time she was on the screen. Yeah. Yeah. Like, and then if they end up doing an HBO show, I wonder if she'll get to play the part. Bella Ramsey as, no, that would make the internet really happy. I'm sure.

[01:21:27] So now we're going to move into some stuff that's more spoilery for future stuff. So if you don't want to hear any of that, if you haven't played the game, then you should probably just stop listening. Thank you guys. So I feel like seeing Joel at the end is a clue to where we're going to go next time. We already know. Yeah. We've got the big flashback scene next, next, sir. Big dinosaur. We're going to get the museum or we're going to probably get some Eugene, you know, get the answer to what Eugene is about. So I think, I mean, will it be the entire episode?

[01:21:56] I don't know. Will it be many flashbacks? I think it will. Cause I'm really hoping we get that guitar scene between Ellie and Joel playing that song that she was about to play in this episode. They have to, just for the, the followup line that will, that will make everything makes sense. You know, if you ever were to leave, I would surely lose myself. It's like, Oh, well that's what Ellie's about ready to do. She's about ready to lose herself. Mom's spaghetti. So yeah, there's that. And, and I,

[01:22:26] I cannot even begin to say how excited I am to see these flashbacks in the museum and how they're going to play these out. And more Pedro Pascal, more Pedro Pascal. And like I mentioned, like the, the relationship between the two of them, this will be her 16th birthday. So, um, she and Joel seems so happy together at this point. And so cute. And there's, didn't have the 19 year old surliness after she finds out all the stuff and it's all angry, you know, and, and,

[01:22:54] and didn't have the 14 year old surliness she had when she first met him. Uh, it was that in between period where they were like a father and a daughter and we're going to get to see that excited for that. And yeah, you can tell both Bella and Pedro adjusted their performances in that one brief little scene to give us that sense. Uh, yes. Younger, happy child, uh, living happier Joel, you know, the living part was key. Um,

[01:23:23] he did a good job showing that. I think they have just like in the game, the creators of the show have a sense of when the darkness builds up too much. We need a little relief. Yeah. But according to the internet, as I've been listening, reading today, Craig Mazin knows nothing about the point of this game. Uh, Neil Druckmann is a stupid idiot. And, uh, yeah, you know, just reading these things. It's like, wow. Druckmann, like he,

[01:23:53] he screwed up the whole franchise just by writing part two. Oh, absolutely. He's ruining it now as a show and it's all just, well, they refer to him as Neil Cuckman. First of all, that's, that's a very common thing. So God, this internet we created. One thing I'm, I've been thinking about is, um, I really, really thought that they were going to go back and forth. So did I. And Ellie. I'm, I am genuinely surprised they chose to do it this way. Yeah. They hired, uh,

[01:24:23] Caitlin Deaver and man, she's hasn't had much going on. And I think they decided, no, we're going to go for the same effect in the game where you see everything from Ellie's point of view. And then you switch to Abby and that, and that is really odd to me because that means, I mean, I like how that works, but it's weird because in the next season could be mostly Abby. Yeah. And we're not going to have, I think just like in the game, when you start playing as Abby and you're like, Oh, I'm going to play a little Abby section here.

[01:24:53] And then like 10 hours later, you're like, I I'm still playing as Abby. And next season, people who don't know, there might see an episode with Abby and go, Oh, they're doing an Abby focused episode first. And then we'll get back to Ellie. And then, and then I'm like, are they really going to do that? Because if you know, uh, it takes two years to film one of these apparently. And so that means the next time Bella Ramsey is really in it a lot, could be four years from now. I don't know if they'll actually, I think so. No, I do think they're, I think they,

[01:25:23] I, I did not think they'd have the balls to do it quite honestly. Cause I thought it was kind of like, that's a risky move, man. Cause that was, that divides the gaming, you know, even though I felt that it was extremely effective and a great way to do loved it. But for the TV show now on the flip side, the biggest complaint everybody seems to have about this series has been Bella for the most part. Right. Yeah. Right. Well, if they're not in it, maybe people are going to love it more, love it more. I don't know. Maybe not. I mean,

[01:25:53] um, are we going to spend an entire season of people complaining that Abby doesn't look the way she looked in the game, even though they all complained about the way that she looked, how she looked at the game. So, you know, it's like, they're mad about the way she looks in the game, but now they're going to get mad because they changed the way that she looked in the game and it doesn't fill their, their muscle mommy desires. And wait a minute. I'm so mad about that too. Oh, ah, yeah. Ah, it's maddening. It's maddening.

[01:26:23] but yeah, I, I'm, I am really surprised that they're, they're going. So, I mean, we're going to get, we are going to end this season on a straight up bitching cliffhanger, uh, the same way that we all played it in the game at end of day three at the aquarium, right? Yeah. Spoiler at the movie theater. Oh, okay. Well, okay. I don't know because yeah, maybe you're right. Yeah. Okay. Cause here's a big spoiler guys. Um, where are we at the, at the aquarium, you know,

[01:26:52] we're going to see if it goes by the game. Ellie goes to the aquarium and kills Mel and Owen. Yeah. And I was thinking maybe that would be the cliffhanger, but you're right. Then Abby follows, uh, goes back to the theater and attacks Ellie. Cause Abby finds the same map that led, well, in this version led Tommy and Jesse to find them. That'll be a lot for one episode. It will be, but they've been doing it, man. They've been doing a lot. Going pretty fast. Yeah. They could start it. They could start that by the end of this next,

[01:27:22] but the next episode, it could not be all flashback. It could go to. So maybe they would finish. Uh, so, you know, cause they've been saying maybe they can do it in three seasons. So that would mean, uh, next season would be first half or, you know, two thirds could be Abby's story. And then they wrap it up in Santa Barbara. Yeah. That's what I'm thinking. And the farm and all that. Cause I mean, they're doing day one was one episode day to one episode. Uh, day three is going to be one episode.

[01:27:52] I mean, they're going to probably cut out all of the, uh, her driving around in the little, uh, you know, fan boat, uh, through all the buildings and all that. Uh, Yep. You know, there's a lot, but that they can, cause that's where Jesse came into it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was a little bit before that, but it was so it was, yeah, we do have a lot to cover in the next two episodes. I think we're going to, and I think it will be, you know, Abby pointing the gun. I can't remember the exact line.

[01:28:22] Something like, you know, we, I, we let you live and you blew it. Something like that that she says. I think that's the last thing we're going to hear of this season. And then it'll go to black. Uh, and then we're going to be left with the pieces of, you know, Dina's going to be either knocked out or having love with an arrow on her. Um, Tommy will be knocked out. And Jesse, Jesse, not even going to say that. Um,

[01:28:51] just in case anybody decided to travel into this, uh, part of the episode, we don't want to completely ruin everything, but you get the idea. Yeah. So it's, it's going to be then. And then, yeah, next season, dude, all Caitlin Deaver. I mean, maybe she'll put on some muscle between them. Maybe she'll do that. Maybe not. I don't think she needs to. I doubt it. Yeah. Maybe. Who knows? It's going to be interesting. It'll be really, really interesting. And then we won't see much of this crew for quite some time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. Oh,

[01:29:21] I can't wait to see. I can wait to see how people are going to react. It's going to be another shit storm. All right. That is our show. Episode six 43. Thanks so much for listening. Everybody. Next episode is going back to the walking dead, dead city season two, episode two, entitled another shitty lesson.

[01:29:49] I love they're giving them these Negan esque titles. Oh, is that honestly the title? Yeah, it is. I think that's the first time I've ever heard shitty as a title of anything. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, if you want to write in or leave us a voice message about it, you can find all of our contact information at podcast.com. And while you're there, please check out our other podcasts. Yeah. We just started up our coverage of poker face season two. Love that show so much.

[01:30:20] Ryan Johnson started it up with Natasha Lyonne. Have you watched that? No, I haven't. Check it out. I do like Natasha Lyonne. You should try it. It's a throwback, but it's very clever and funny and it's great. And, um, Penny and, um, Becky and Mandy are covering that this season. I'll probably jump in on a few of them. Nice. So recommend checking that out. This episode is made possible by Patreon supporters like April Palmore Sullivan, who pledged their support at patreon.com slash Jason Cabassi.

[01:30:48] So thank you so much to April and everyone else who does that. They're all going to get to hear me interview Karen this week to talk about her life and our history in podcasting together. Karen. Yay. Remember her? I'll have to hear that. All right. That is our show. Thanks for listening. Don't get bit. Steph O'Halloran.