632: The Last of Us Season One Catch-Up

[00:00:00] Hmm? Ah! Oh. Podcast of Drown. Joe? Hmm? Did you know diarrhea is hereditary? What? Yeah. It runs in your genes. That is so goddamn stupid. You laughed, motherfucker. I didn't laugh.

[00:00:30] Yes, you did. Jesus, I'm losing it. You're losing it big time.

[00:01:28] Podcast, I'm Jason. And I'm Lucy. And this is The Cast of Us, Episode 632. And this episode, we're catching you up on what happened in The Last of Us Season One to get you ready for the upcoming season. And to remind me what happened. I know, me too. It was a long time ago and I didn't have time to do a full rewatch. I did watch the pilot again. Yeah, I watched some good recaps and a lot came back to me. It's been a while. Has it been two years?

[00:01:55] Yep. 2023. So just over two years. My mind. Yeah, man. Too long. Too long. Like when this first came on, I'm like, okay, we're switching over. We're gonna be a Last of Us podcast now. And then we did a little bit of Last of Us. And then we dive right back into The Walking Dead. Then we're like, hello, we're back on our Walking Dead bullshit. Like, yeah. Yeah, I'm glad to have had the excuse to go back and sort of remind myself of everything.

[00:02:23] Yeah, me too. I'm glad to, I mean, the rewatch has been super fun. If you're just joining us and you don't know what I'm talking about, we went back to the beginning of The Walking Dead and started over with full knowledge of everything that happened and just talked about it through that lens. And it's been super fun. We're almost all the way through season four right now, which is a fantastic season of that show. Yeah, we just burned down the moonshine shack. Yeah, we never have we evered.

[00:02:50] But I like to switch things up to take a break. I love the Last of Us. So it's nice to just set that aside for a little while, right when it's getting good, but it's okay because that'll give us something to look forward to. We're going to be doing The Last of Us. You know, it's seven episodes. And right in the middle of that, Dead City comes back, the Negan and Maggie show. And that's going to be eight episodes. I think I like speak for everyone when I say pray for Ben because Ben has got a busy couple of months coming up. Yeah, yeah. He'll be good. He'll be good.

[00:03:20] And so that means that, you know, who knows if they decide to drop the Daryl show right after that, then it may be a while before you get back to the rewatch. But if they don't, then I think that's like late June. That's when we're getting back into it. Time for summer. Time for summer vacay. It'll be great. Yeah, summer vacay. So we're switching gears over to The Last of Us. We're going to do a season one catch up right now just to get you guys ready for season two. There won't be any season two spoilers in this podcast. No game talk or anything.

[00:03:48] It's all just reminding us and you what happened in season one. And I am a beautiful idiot who knows nothing about what happens in the games. So I am the proxy for all of you who are not gamers and yeah, are just along for the ride. Yeah. And I love that. And I really try to protect you virgins out there. That sounded so creepy. That sounded really creepy right now. I tried to protect you virgins.

[00:04:18] Like, whoa. No. You know what I mean though? I just, I love it that there's people who still don't know and I don't want to ruin that for anyone. I really don't. I like, I want to talk about all of it, but we really try to segment it all off so that we can warn you guys and you don't get spoiled on it. All right. Shall we get into it? Let's get into it. Okay. Season one, episode one, when you're lost in the darkness. Let's go. In 2003, a mass fungal infection of mutated cordyceps sparks a global pandemic and the collapse of society.

[00:04:48] Joel flees with his daughter, Sarah, and brother Tommy from their Texas home. Sarah is killed by a soldier. 20 years later, Joel lives in a quarantine zone, QZ, in Boston, managed by the Federal Disaster Response Agency, FEDRA, working as a smuggler with his partner, Tess. When Tommy fails to contact them from Wyoming, Wyoming, they pay a local dealer, Robert, for a car battery, but he scams them and sells it to the Fireflies, a rebel group opposing FEDRA.

[00:05:15] Attempting to retrieve it, Joel and Tess encounter Marlene, the Fireflies leader, who begs them to take a teenager named Ellie to Massachusetts Statehouse in exchange for a working truck. While sneaking out of the QZ, the three run into a soldier on the outside. He tests them for infection and reveals Ellie is positive. Joel kills the soldier and Ellie claims to be immune to infection. It was a great pilot.

[00:05:40] One thing that stands out to me, unfortunately, though, is it seemed like two episodes smashed together and then we found out it was. Yeah, I remember having that conversation. We were like, oh yeah, blah, blah. It's like, no, it was. It absolutely was. I'm like, all right. Because originally it was supposed to, you know, it was the story of the beginning of all of this and Joel losing his daughter. And then 20 years later, he's become this callous person who has no problem tossing a child into a fire.

[00:06:09] And that was going to be the end, that scene. And I think the execs are like, that's a real downer for a first episode of a series. Nobody's going to come back. So they went ahead and I mean, that's what I got from the news anyway at the time. So they put the two together. And then that meant that the second episode had to be kind of compacted. And it was a little confusing maybe with all the stuff with the battery and what was going on with all of that. I don't think it really matters that much though.

[00:06:34] But the point was just that Tess and Joel got the mission to take Ellie across the country. Yeah. Yeah, it got us to where we needed to go. And as someone who hadn't played the game, although there were bits that were very game-like in a good way, like that scene of them in the car sort of getting away from the chaos and seeing all the downtown chaos in town with like the plane crashing and stuff. That was all incredibly cool and impactful. I love that. That's my favorite part. And it did.

[00:07:03] Yeah, it sort of went from sort of scene setting into like trade wars. But like it was fine. Yeah. It was good. And it set everything up nicely. And I think one thing I will say, it was nice to have Ellie from episode one because it felt like she and Joel were equally the fabric of the show. Whereas if we hadn't met her till episode two, it might have taken us a bit longer to catch up with that kind of bond and relationship. Yeah.

[00:07:28] And I don't know how much I should talk about the games, but I think it's okay to say that in the first game you don't meet Ellie for kind of a long time. Oh, really? I always felt that was weird. Yeah, because it's so much about their relationship. I think we learn the things we need to know about Joel in that episode and then we pull him into that next relationship. And I think that's worth it. Who played Tess? Anna Torv. Anna Torv. Yeah.

[00:07:58] That's one thing that stood out to me is just really loving her portrayal of that character. Did you ever watch Mindhunter? I did. And I liked her in that too. She was so good in that. Yeah. I love her. I know she was good in Fringe too, but I wasn't really into that show. But that's where she kind of really broke out. I never watched Fringe, but she played in Mindhunter. Yeah. Yeah. Female psychiatrist. Profiler.

[00:08:25] Doctor profiler who works with the men on the serial killer profiling squad. She's outstanding in that. And I thought she was really good in this role as well. And I was pretty sad that she wasn't there that long. I know. Just like I'm sad that Mindhunter ended right in the middle of it. If I could bring back one show, like one show that I think really deserved another season, it would be Mindhunter because it just ended. It was like, what the fuck? You've set up so much stuff. But I just don't think they'll ever do it. I'd say The Walking Dead.

[00:08:55] Eleven was just not enough. Four more seasons. Four more seasons. I mean, I feel we should talk about what else stood out. Yeah, I really love the scene, the chaos of the night when they first, when it all goes to hell and how if you go back and watch a second time, you get even more of a sense of, oh, wow, this is really all happening in the background and people are kind of not paying attention.

[00:09:22] You know, I just love anything that shows the beginning of the zombie apocalypse. Does this episode open with the chat show? Yeah. With John Hannah. From like the 60s or 70s. Yeah, that was a cool way to open it. It was super cool. And the other thing that really stood out to me when I think about this episode is the moment where the kid turns up at the safe zone or the quarantine zone and gets, you know, they talk to them and yeah. And then they. Yeah.

[00:09:49] And they're like, oh, you're going to get some toys and candy and they're just killing the kid. There's never toys and candy. It's always a lie. It's always a lie. That setting up the world as being cruel and militaristic in a way that as viewers of The Walking Dead sort of dwarfed a lot of what we saw in The Walking Dead, I think, because this world always had this militaristic Fedra force behind it. Whereas in The Walking Dead, you see pockets of where that didn't survive, where like Fort

[00:10:19] Benning fell and the army never managed to keep going. Later seasons, we find out that's not quite true. But here you get the sense of this, this grip that still is held on society of this kind of militaristic federal governance. And it's scary and it's really hits hard. Yeah. Yeah. And it makes sense that that would happen.

[00:10:42] And it feels maybe a little bit more relatable or not relatable, but real world like, oh shit, this probably would happen. Yeah. It was the first big post-COVID thing that dealt with a pandemic or an outbreak or something. And I think they worked with that really well by focusing on things like, what are the people in charge saying? What's the speculation? Where does the speculation take you?

[00:11:12] What happens when you take away civil liberties in this way? When does chaos come in? I mean, as we all know, if it was based on real life, it would just be people just buying toilet paper. All the toilet paper. All the toilet. We missed that scene. I also just love the infected, these weird mushroom creatures and the tendrils coming out of the old woman's mouth when Sarah comes in and sees her. And then she comes running out after Joel.

[00:11:40] Or yeah, just them running through the town when they're in their support utility vehicle or whatever, trying to get away. And the way that they're so fast and herky-jerky the way I like, you know, it's just super thrilling and disturbing at the same time. Oh, it's brilliant. It's an absolutely cracking opener. It's a really good season opener, I think. I don't know if it's one of the best because I don't know, it pulls a lot from the game and stuff, so I can't speak to that. But it was definitely one that got a lot of people hooked.

[00:12:10] Yeah. And I was glad because I had been talking that shit up for a long time. I really wanted it to be good and it was. I know some people don't like when I do this, but I can't help it. If I would compare the opener of The Walking Dead versus The Last of Us, I would say maybe The Last of Us has some things that are better, but it's also got some flaws. So I might put The Walking Dead a little higher because I think that's just such a perfect

[00:12:39] pilot to a show. Because I really hesitated a minute ago talking about this as a pilot because it's not really a pilot because the show was, it was a straight series. Like we knew, whereas with The Walking Dead, it felt like it was really asking a question of us as viewers to try something new. And one of the recaps I was watching today, I ended up watching a recap of some Walking Dead shit because, you know, you know how algorithms be. And it was like, speaking jokingly about The Walking Dead, but it's like when you're the

[00:13:08] thing that changes the conversation, you can quickly become a cliche. And I think that's where The Walking Dead landed after 11 seasons. Whereas right at the start, that pilot episode is so striking and so visual and so quiet. I would say The Last of Us is a very noisy intro. It's a much more chaotic intro to the series. But then that tapers off into a lot more silence and sort of quest, which I quite like actually. Yeah. I mean, The Walking Dead, I don't think ever has an episode where there are no zombies.

[00:13:38] And The Last of Us, even though it was a much shorter season, eight episodes, right? Or nine episodes did have a few. Yeah. And I was like, what the fuck, man? Come on. But there was a part of me too that was like, okay, they feel confident in what they have to offer that they don't have to. It's like, no, I don't want to put it that way. It's like, I don't know, when somebody feels like they need to add extra and they actually don't.

[00:14:09] Was it going to be about women and makeup? It was going to be about makeup, yeah. I know what you mean. But you know what I mean. I know what you mean, yeah. Yeah. And it was weird because part of me missed them, but part of me also admired that they did that. And I did still enjoy the show even when they weren't in it. And I'm sure season two is going to be the same way. There'll be some great zombie scenes or whatever you want to call them infected, but there's going to be episodes without them.

[00:14:38] I say this with like, this is not the burn that it sounds like. It clearly cost a lot to have them look that good. So I understand why they were more sparing with them. Not that the zombies, speaking to a zombie from The Walking Dead presently, I'm not saying the zombies didn't look good. But having like 300 people in Georgia versus the kind of effects that they're doing on the makeup and the CGI, you can see why they were a bit more sparing with them.

[00:15:03] And they did, I would say, a couple of really specific, very strong set pieces that they clearly needed their reason for. Oh yeah. We'll get to those. But I don't know. I think you could be right, but I think there's a chance that if they felt like the story called for zombies in every episode or infected, that they would have spent the money because it's HBO. True that. Maybe not. Maybe, maybe not. You know? I don't know. It's HBO money.

[00:15:34] And they're getting more money for the next season. So we're going to ramp it up. It's one of their big hitters. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Let's move on to number two. Season one, episode two, Infected. Two days before the worldwide outbreak in Jakarta, Indonesia, government officials show an infected corpse to a mycologist who tells them there's no cure or vaccine and advises bombing the entire city to prevent further outbreak. Lucy's favorite moment in the entire series.

[00:16:01] In the present, Ellie explains to Joel and Tess that she's being transported west in hopes of being used to find a cure. Discovering that the path to the state house is swarmed with the infected, they cut through a history museum where they are attacked by a blind infected known as Clickers, and Ellie is bitten. They arrive at the state house but find the fireflies dead. Tess reveals she was bitten while Ellie's bite begins to heal, proving her immunity.

[00:16:28] Joel shoots an infected, which alerts the swarm to their location. Tess convinces him to escape and take Ellie to their allies in Lincoln, Massachusetts, while she stays behind, blowing up the building and killing herself, along with the horde. With the worst on-screen kiss ever. Make-out session. That was gross, man. And they keep showing that in all the recaps. Oh, they're like, and then this happens, and I'm like, blah. Whatever it is. Nobody wants to see that. Stop it. That's really what stands out.

[00:16:58] But no, what really stands out is the debut of the Clicker. Yeah, and it was just handled so well because they're blind and in that dark museum. And when Joel looks around the corner and there's one just like a foot away. It's so creepy. And they do so much visual storytelling with that. Like, we are aware that they cannot see just through the way that they've shot it and the way that they set it up.

[00:17:24] And yeah, I remember this being a real strong set piece for the show and starting to get out into that world, which is primarily Alberta. But yeah, it really, really works. It really works. Was it Edmonton? Yes, Edmonton. It was Edmonton. It's a beautiful part of the world, though.

[00:17:47] It really works in terms of coming out from this rowdy, enclosed QZ into these big empty spaces that can suddenly become absolutely terrifying at our shrines to the world that was before. Like that scene of Ellie seeing the two skyscrapers kind of leaning against each other as they sort of look out over the cityscape. Boof! It's scary stuff. It's great.

[00:18:11] And they introduced this thing about the mycelium, how, because in, you know, nature, there's networks of fungus that are under the ground that connect. And they can go, I think, miles. And so here they just sort of turn that into this sci-fi concept where these creatures are all sort of connected and one can alert the whole horde that something's going on.

[00:18:41] It's kind of a neat concept. It was a big part of Star Trek Discovery's first season. Oh, wow. What Sasha did next. What else? I mean, I thought this was a damn good episode. And it actually did kind of set me up to think that we were going to get a ton of thrilling infected encounters like this. And we got a couple more, but not really.

[00:19:08] So it really stands out as one of my favorite infected related moments of the whole series. And if you play the game, you get a lot of moments like this with clickers, but they just had this one kind of stand in for all those, you know. I think in thinking about this, I missed one of my favorite bits of the first episode, which is the needle drop at the end. Is that Depeche Mode? Is that the end? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah. Because is it the year?

[00:19:37] Never let me down. Yeah. I'm taking a ride with my best friend. The decade tells the message and 80s, I think, meant danger or something like that. It's great. Because I was thinking about one of the things that was great about this episode was Tess's arc in the sense of her demise. And there was something about Tess and Joel's relationship that I really enjoyed in that it wasn't a great love, a great passionate love affair, but there was a companionship and an understanding there.

[00:20:07] And they were well matched in that sense. And although I was bummed to see Tess go, I can kind of see why it was necessary for the storytelling. Yeah. Yeah, because it's, well, why? Because it's about Joel and Ellie? Yeah. I think Joel needed to have everything else stripped away for him to be able to open up to Ellie in that way. And he needed the encouragement of Tess saying, you know, take her. Have that hope. Take her. See what happens. And he ends up opening up more emotionally with Ellie than he seemingly ever did with Tess.

[00:20:36] Yeah, Tess is like, fuck you, man. I got a new gross clicker boyfriend in my life. So I like this guy better. So that, you know, like you said, the needle drop with Depeche Mode playing Never Let Me Down. That's Frank and Bill's message that there's trouble. But I guess Joel didn't see it, didn't hear it, right? Because we knew that was the message, but they were already on their way. And we were the only ones that got to hear it. So it was really foreboding. But anyway, I love that too.

[00:21:06] And Jenny and I just immediately bought tickets to Depeche Mode, but they weren't here until December. So it was like 10 months later or something. And when it came around, I was still like, I hope they play that song. And they saved it till the very end. And I think they knew that it had a resurgence, you know, and they played it and it sounded really good. They sounded great. Yeah. I remember seeing Echo and the Bunnymen at a festival in 2007.

[00:21:35] And they were like, sort of half laughing, half rolling their eyes when they played Killing Moon. Because they're like, some of you may know this from a small film called Donnie Darko and everyone loves it. And I'm like, now I just think about Yellow Jackets. But yeah. Yeah. It's funny for bands like that when they become, yeah, they become famous again for this one hit. Well, that was Bohemian Rhapsody in Wayne's World. Oh, yeah. You know, it was already a song before that, but it really brought it into the public consciousness.

[00:22:03] Jenny and I are going to see OMD next. What's OMD? That's If You Leave. How else do they sing? They're really good. 80s song. Excellent. It's right in line with Depeche Mode and all that. Excellent. Okay. Should we go on to the next one? I don't wanna. I do. I do. Season one, episode three. Long, long time. Joel and Ellie begin the hike to meet Bill and Frank.

[00:22:29] Ellie sees evidence of the government's execution of innocence during the early days of the pandemic. Back in 2007, Frank leaves Baltimore and stumbles upon the compound of Bill, a paranoid survivalist who reluctantly takes him in. The men begin a romance, sharing a love of music and food. Years later, Frank contacts test by radio and the two groups enter a tenuous friendship. In the present, Frank is terminally ill and asks Bill to assist his suicide after they marry. Bill, not wanting to live without Frank, kills himself as well.

[00:22:58] When Joel and Ellie arrive, they discover a letter Bill left for Joel. Bill wrote that protecting Frank gave his life meaning and that he has bequeathed all his supplies to Joel and Tess. Unbeknownst to Joel, Ellie takes Frank's pistol. They take Bill's truck and set out to find Tommy. And the hearts of everyone in the world broke in joy. Because this is the best episode of anything ever. I mean, you know.

[00:23:23] This episode surprised people and elevated the series. It surprised everyone because these characters, well, Frank is just mentioned in the game. He doesn't even show up. And they decided to really, really delve into it. And it's like such a great surprise. So good. I might rewatch that episode actually. And Nick Offerman won Outstanding Guest Actor, I think.

[00:23:53] I think they both should have. I know it was Nick Offerman. But Nick Offerman won. Yeah. I mean, he was outstanding. And there was such a touch of genius in casting someone who's known probably most famously for playing someone like Ron Swanson in this role of a very macho coded man who is actually gloriously queer and living his best queer life in the apocalypse. Like, I just thought that was really amazing. And how Frank could tune into that and gently encourage it, you know.

[00:24:23] Murray Bartlett, man. Murray Bartlett. Yes. He's my favorite. Any winner, Murray Bartlett. I mean, come on. I think I watched this before I watched season one of The White Lotus. When I watched season one of White Lotus, I was like, oh. He's great in both those. He's so good. It makes me want to see him in something else. I've never seen him in anything else. This was like a, it wasn't a controversial episode, but it definitely raised a lot of opinions and thoughts with listeners about what Bill and Frank's life, the path that it takes in terms of how they choose to end it.

[00:24:52] So it will always stand out for me for being provocative, not for the reasons you might expect, which I think is nice in a way. And I'm sure it was probably provocative just to feature two gay characters. But in the circles that we travel in now, we don't really hear about that because it's no big deal. They're just people. Exactly.

[00:25:13] But there is a lot of, with the game and the show, there's a very vocal group of people who just complain about everything. And they want it to be more standard with sexy women and typical everything. And I'm like, everything's typical. Come on, let's have something that shows different kinds of things sometimes. How about that? God.

[00:25:40] I was surprised at how much conversation it provoked around the morality of taking your life at the end with the person you loved and how strongly people reacted to that. It was interesting. I mean, I know the way I feel about it because I viewed it as quite a positive end for them both. But it was interesting and very eye-opening to me to listen to what some listeners had to say and what some people spoke to in real life had to say about it.

[00:26:07] I thought they dealt with a lot of really complex stuff quite profoundly in this episode. It bears a rewatch for a lot of different reasons. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And you're reminding me now that we had separate feedback episodes, which I think we're going to do again this season if we get enough feedback. And we got people, you know, speaking really personally and we handled that the best we could and just, you know, set our own truths and everything.

[00:26:36] So we'll see what happens this time. I mean, that's what these stories do. They deal with things that bring up those kinds of things. And yeah, I felt a little differently than you about what Frank and Bill did, but I could see your point of view for sure. Yeah. I think it was, it's one that will always stand out to me in terms of, I wasn't on the actual episode. I think Karen and I came on for the feedback episode and we kind of spoke about it a little bit, but it's outstanding. It's really brilliant.

[00:27:05] And Linda Ronstadt, long, long time. Who knew? Yeah. Little Nick Orfman playing his piano, singing. So great. And also, I guess in the larger story, what it means for Joel and Ellie and Bill, again, imbuing Joel with this sense of meaning. And when we see what their relationship was like in life, we only see glimpses of that with Bill and Joel.

[00:27:29] The fact that he's bequeathed his supplies to him and he allows him to take that further step out on the road with the truck. That's a great act of respect between the two men and it sets the path for the next bit of the journey. It's just lovely. Really lovely thing to have. I think the moment that stands out the most to me is when they eat the strawberries. Yeah. The joy. It's just the sensory joy.

[00:27:58] The joy of these things, you know, the giggling. I could listen to Nick Orfman giggle for like ever. And if you get a chance, any whiskey fans, if you get a chance to try one of Orfman's Lagavulin. Lagavulin's. Yeah, they're good. Like I'm very, I used to be very skeptical about whiskey, celeb whiskey, but he did, his first one was Kraken. And yeah, I thoroughly recommend. Not sponsored, not SpawnCon, but if anyone wants to send us a bottle, please do. Give us some. Yeah.

[00:28:26] I haven't had a chance to try it, but I like the regular Lagavulin quite a lot. Very bourbony, which is nice. Peated. For the American stuff. Yeah. Okay. All right. Season one, episode four, please hold to my hand. Traveling through Missouri, Joel and Ellie are forced to take a detour through Kansas City where they're ambushed. By Shauna Shipman. Yeah, that's right.

[00:28:48] Joel kills two of the bandits, but a third overpowers him and nearly chokes him to death before Ellie saves him by shooting the man with Frank's pistol. Shauna is much more like this character now. I know. I was going to say, I was like, oh. It's almost the same person. Maybe this is the future of what happens after season three of Yellow. Right. Ellie saves him by shooting the man with Frank's pistol. More bandits find the bodies.

[00:29:12] Their leader, Kathleen, that's Melanie Linsky, believes Joel and Ellie might be in contact with a man named Henry and orders a manhunt. Joel counsels Ellie about the firefight and gives her the pistol back. Kathleen's second in command, who that's the guy I think who did Tommy's voice in the game, whoever played Perry, thinks he's found Henry's hideout. But something is growing under the building. Kathleen orders it kept secret until they find Henry.

[00:29:39] Joel and Ellie sleep in a high-rise apartment for the night, hoping they can scout away out of the city in daylight. They awaken to find Henry and his younger brother Sam holding them at gunpoint. Henry and Sam. I'd forgotten about them till the rewatch. Yeah, this is what you said about it being Tommy from the games. Marlene is Marlene, right? The actress who plays Marlene is Marlene from the games. Yes.

[00:30:08] This journey into Kansas City was quite exciting. I think this is probably the weaker half of the kind of two Kansas City episodes, but it sets everything up beautifully for everything that happens there. And it was nice to see Mel Nielinski in this kind of bad guy role, which at the time seemed novel. Yeah, what stood out to me was that ambush with these bandits.

[00:30:33] And it's right out of the game where they're hiding in this store or something and shooting through the window and hiding behind things and having to commit violence. And then Ellie killed the guy that was about to kill Joel or something like that. And that was, I think, her first time killing someone. And it was a big deal. You know what? I love Melanie Linsky. I think she's amazing as Shauna.

[00:31:02] I need to go back and watch these episodes again because I felt like something felt a little off about her playing this character. But that's just my opinion. She didn't quite carry it in the way that we thought she might. Like there was a bit of evil, a bit of evil kind of came out in the next episode. And there was definitely a kind of soft power there. But it was hard to see how she kept a hold of such a big militia, I feel like. Yeah, I think that's what it was. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:31:33] But yeah, I think you're right. Just reading through this, I felt like the next one was really the one. But there was, I think this one, one thing that stood out is there were a lot of puns from Ellie. And she was kind of trying to win Joel over and eventually succeeded because in the end, she said, did you know that diarrhea is hereditary? What? Yeah, it runs in your genes. And then he started laughing and she's like, you laugh, motherfucker.

[00:32:04] That was awesome. To be fair, that was just a really good one. It was good. I mean, that's the thing because these puns, most of them are taken from the game. And I don't know where they came from originally, but she has this book of puns and they're all pretty good. Yeah. No, that's a good one. And he does laugh. And it's a beautiful, beautiful moment. Yep. And we're hoping for more puns this season.

[00:32:30] And I encourage you guys all to send in your puns. I won't promise we'll read them all, but we'll read the good ones. Yep. I love it. I love it. And of course, we meet Sam and Henry, who are really formative characters for Joel and Ellie. Yeah. They're very cute. They're just a cute little hair. Just seeing, yeah, hearing about them, it also reminds me that it started to feel like a pattern. Like, oh, meet cool character. Character dies. Meet different cool character.

[00:33:01] Because this is more about two people than The Walking Dead. We were used to this big sprawling cast. And they're traveling the whole time. So they just travel somewhere, meet someone cool. That person would die. They go somewhere else. Yeah. I feel like The Walking Dead is traveling somewhere, Rick kills everyone. Yeah. It's a bad place. Meet a good community. Rick blows it up. Rick ruins it next thing. Whereas Joel and Ellie, it's like, they probably won't ruin your community, but if you meet them, you will die. If you're really cool, you're probably going to die. Yeah.

[00:33:30] If you're awesome, you're dead. Sorry. Well, episode five, Endure and Survive. Henry and Sam make a tentative truce with Joel and Ellie. Joel wants to part ways, but Henry proposes they escape the city together using the underground tunnel routes that only Henry knows. Joel hesitantly agrees. Henry confesses to Joel he was responsible for the death of Kathleen's brother, turning him over to Fedra in exchange for medication for Sam's leukemia. Ellie and Sam quickly become friends.

[00:34:00] After escaping through the tunnels, the group is attacked by a sniper from an upper story window. Joel sneaks up and kills him, but finds out he was radioing Kathleen, who arrives with her militia. Before Kathleen can kill Henry, a horde of infected emerge from the underground, including a large bloater that beheads Perry and a child clicker that mauls Kathleen. After the group escape to a motel, Sam shows Ellie he was bitten on the leg. The next morning, Sam is infected and attacks Ellie. Henry kills him before killing himself.

[00:34:29] Joel and Ellie bury them and set off on foot heading west. Am I right in thinking that Sam is deaf? Yeah. Yeah, and they're signing in this episode as well. Aww. Yeah, I forgot about that actually. Person passes away. Yeah, what this one makes me think of aside from the incredible zombie scene or infected scene is that it's about how you can have people on two sides of a conflict.

[00:34:58] And you can sort of understand where they're coming from, but they've been wounded in some way, and so they become rooted in their vengeance mindset. And the other side does too.

[00:35:15] And it just creates this like cycles of violence, you know, this conflict where you wish that they could just drop all of it and come together and make some kind of an arrangement where they could live in peace. Because it was, uh, uh, Kathleen was in charge of rebels that took the city from Fedra, the militaristic group that you were mentioning earlier.

[00:35:39] And then, um, there was somebody who ratted on her group because he needed medicine, right? Was it Henry needed medicine for his brother or something like that? And so you could understand why he would do that because he didn't want his brother to die, but you could understand why, uh, Kathleen would be upset because Henry ended up getting her brother killed or something like that. So it's just tragic, you know? It's really messy. Um, there's no kind of, there's no easy heroes in this world, I don't think.

[00:36:09] Yeah. And that's why it feels to me a lot like things that happen in the real world where there's two sides, two sides to this conflict and you can understand why both sides would be upset, but you wish they would just stop fighting. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that applies to a lot of situations. Yeah. Yeah. It's true. It's true. Nothing's ever as simple as someone's completely good or completely bad. Yeah. It's not like the empire of Star Wars usually.

[00:36:39] Look, all I'm saying is Vader had some points. You need order. Hear me out. He had two kids who just would not behave. Like, what do you expect from him? Like, come on, man's got to do it. He got burned like half his body off, like whatever. Sometimes you just need to choke a bitch. Yeah. Right. Sometimes things are just annoying. So, uh, zombie scene. I mean, big old bloater.

[00:37:09] No care. Came up out of the ground, remember? And, uh, then they all, and what I loved is that they were like, it just made me think of my time on The Walking Dead where they're like, oh yeah, you want to be a zombie? Go ahead. And I'm like, oh, do you want to like teach me how to do it? Hey, it's just a zombie, you know?

[00:37:55] Yeah. I think I broke my toe. Yeah. It's not great. It's not great for the hips. No, it was brilliant. The bloater was incredible. The bloater. But I mean, the other ones of the way, they were all just like, like birds or something, you know? So wild. The bloater was really cool. And when you watch the behind the scenes stuff, the bloater looked like, oh man, it looks kind of cheesy. I can imagine them being a little worried that it wouldn't come off well, but I think they

[00:38:22] added enough CGI to really make it very good, you know? If you were sitting next to him in the canteen, you might be a bit like, but no, it worked. It really worked. The whole set piece was wonderful. And the ground giving way and like basically burping, like it was incredible. It was just so extra. Like they came right out of hell or something. Oh, just unbelievable. And it's so, it's set up, you know, like there's tunnels, something's moving underground. We've just got to keep going and pretending it's not there. And then it all just falls apart at the last fucking minute.

[00:38:50] And it's just so like satisfying. And you got Henry and Ellie hiding behind cars and there was that little girl clicker that was really tragic. Yeah. Ellie's relationship with Sam breaks my heart because she's allowed to be a kid again, but she's also kind of a big sister to him. And then he dies. Yeah.

[00:39:16] And she tried keeping it a secret that he was bitten and giving him her blood somehow because she thought that might help because she was immune and it didn't work. And then Henry, how did Sam get killed? Did Henry shoot him? And then Henry shoots him and then can't live with what he's done. He just turns the gun on himself. Yeah. And Ellie's like, what the fuck? Like it's, oh, it's just so, so horrifying. I hate this show.

[00:39:46] I don't know. Fuck you, show. Fuck you. All right. Next one. Season one, episode six. Isn't it my turn? No, I'm sorry. We're on. Am I in the wrong way? No, it is you. It's me. Yeah, it's you. Yeah, you're even numbers. Are you ready to move on? I am. I need to leave this heartbreak behind. Season one, episode six. Kin. Three months after Henry and Sam's death, Joel and Ellie have a party and it's really cool. The end. Yay.

[00:40:16] Everyone is happy. Huzzah. Huzzah. Joel and Ellie reach a small thriving community in Jackson, Wyoming, where Joel's reunited with Tommy, whose wife Maria is pregnant. Ellie learns about Sarah's fate from Maria. Joel confides in Tommy about Ellie's immunity and his own declining mental state. Joel asks Tommy to take Ellie to the Fireflies as he's afraid he cannot keep her safe. Ellie overhears them and confronts Joel, who insists they will part ways.

[00:40:45] Joel changes his mind after remembering Sarah and he and Ellie travel to Colorado on horseback. They find the Fireflies have vacated their base, possibly relocating to a hospital in Utah. Joel and Ellie attempt to escape a group of raiders. When one of them attacks Joel, Joel kills him but is stabbed during the struggle. Joel and Ellie escape the others, but Joel soon collapses and falls off their horse, leaving Ellie unsure how to proceed. Yeah.

[00:41:13] And Tommy learns he might be a communist. What? That was my favorite bit. He's like, sorry, what? And his wonderful partner is like, yeah, so like it's just basically a communist. Tommy's like, what the fuck? I'm a communist? Huh? How'd that happen? Whatever. Seems alright. Must be the pregnancy hormones. Yeah. I mean, after all the shit they've been through to come to this nice community was pretty jarring, right?

[00:41:43] Yeah. Yeah. And it's so beautiful the way they filmed it in Jackson. Like, it's proper almost like Western territory. And we've had this time skip, so their relationship has obviously deepened in that point. Yeah. Joel has a real crisis of soul here, really, doesn't he? We see him almost have like a kind of panic slash heart attack at the thought of what he's going to have to do or what he might be opening himself up to. I mean, it starts with him losing his daughter, the series. Yeah.

[00:42:13] And then we skip ahead 20 years where he's toughened himself up, throws this kid into a fire. He's just clearly decided, I don't want to care anymore. And now he's come to care. And that's, yeah, crisis. Like, oh, I can't, I can't deal. And then we have this immediate role reversal of suddenly Joel is incapacitated. And it really reminds me, actually, because of our Walking Dead rewatch, really reminds me of Karl Papa and his chocolate pudding. Oh, that's right.

[00:42:40] This kind of chapter where suddenly you're the kids, your adult is out of action. And where does that leave you? We need a wrap now. Come on. I know. Come on, Ellie. Bad lip reading. Get it going. You know Bella Ramsey would do it. They would absolutely do it. Chickie Jar Jar. Find some chocolate pudding and some puns, man. Yeah. Um, it's nice. It's nice to see.

[00:43:04] I remember being happy that Tommy was alive and not dead because it seemed like kind of a cheap thing to have it be like, oh no, and the country has fallen apart and this part is gone and Tommy's not there anymore. So it was jarring in a way to find this normalcy. And, you know, Tommy and Maria are in a good place. Joel has this thing of like, the roles are reversed and like his little brother is now the one with the partner and a kid on the way. Being responsible. Yeah. Yeah. It's everything.

[00:43:31] And open himself up to a family and caring. And I remember Ellie in the cafeteria just being a little shit. Yeah. Just like, this is stupid. I don't like anything. Yeah. She doesn't play well with others all the time, Ellie. I thought, yeah, Bella was just fantastic. I liked the way that the two of them played off one another. Yeah. Yeah. They seem to have a really nice relationship.

[00:43:58] I love that despite not having his own children and Pedro Pascal is everyone's daddy. And also. I know. That's right. And he loves LA. What? In this episode. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He. This is where Ellie screaming at him. Like everyone I've cared about has either died or left me. And she didn't want him to do that too. And that, I guess, got to him, which was nice. No one wanted your stinking tiara.

[00:44:31] All right. Next one. Oh, Ellie. This is where I remember it getting quite dark. Oh, yeah. So season one, episode seven, Left Behind. Ellie and an injured Joel shelter in an abandoned house. As Joel approaches death, he urges Ellie to leave him. In a flashback, Ellie remembers her time in federal military school, which she attended with her best friend, Riley. While Ellie causes trouble and fights with her peers, Riley ran away and has been missing for three weeks.

[00:44:59] Riley sneaks back into their dorm room and reveals to Ellie that she is joined the Fireflies. She brings Ellie to an abandoned mall where they explore a photo booth, an arcade and a carousel. Riley tells Ellie the Fireflies have assigned her to a post in Atlanta and it is her last night in Boston. Ellie is upset but convinces Riley to stay and they kiss. An infected attacks the two and Ellie kills it but both are bitten during the struggle. Cheerfully, they decide to stay together and wait for the infection to take hold.

[00:45:27] In the present, Ellie finds a sewing needle and stitches Joel's wound. This was another harrowing episode. Yeah. I got, was it I Got You Babe by Sonny and Cher? Oh, yeah. Never. I think you're right, yeah. Never not make me cry. Did you know how this plays out in the game? No idea. Is it different in the game? Well, no, it's similar but it was a DLC downloadable content.

[00:45:55] So you played through the whole game and then they came out with the left behind DLC and you play through this part of it. So this was the last thing of the first game that anyone played. Oh, and is it pretty much beat for beat? It was really good, yeah. I mean, it was so good. Just like this episode, you know? Yeah. Storm Reed was excellent as Riley. I really enjoyed that portrayal. Good match.

[00:46:20] It was a very scenic episode, like that vision of the mall and these kind of relics of a country that they don't know. And all these moments of like, I felt like Ellie's coming into herself and maybe her own sexuality a little bit, like what she wants and the fact that she likes Riley as more than a friend. And I remember there's a scene where they're looking at like an old Victoria's Secret and

[00:46:45] there's a look on Bella Ramsey's face as Ellie that's not disgusted but kind of curious about it. And this idea of sort of people being sexy and laundry and things like that. And I remember that really stood out to me because she would have been at that kind of age of like, oh, oh, oh, oh. Yeah, yeah. They played that really well. Like, should I be trying to be like that? Or is that really not me at all? Or am I attracted to that?

[00:47:15] Yeah. Who am I? What do I want? Do I want my friend? Is this what friends feel? Like, yeah. Yeah. It's like, it's really this, it's an interesting juxtaposition of innocence and blooming love with this horrific backdrop and this tragedy at the end, you know? There's all this fucking tragedy at the end. It's all so well done and so emotional. I know, I know. Another cool character that dies.

[00:47:45] Awful. Stop it. Stop killing everyone. And the idea is this is when it was confirmed to Ellie that she was immune because they both got bitten and they both decided to ride it out and see, you know, just become, what did she say? I forgot. There was a great line in there at the end about come apart together or something like that. I forget. Yeah.

[00:48:10] I don't remember if they really spelled out what happened because you just presume that Riley's going to turn and Ellie won't. But did they say that Ellie had to kill Riley? I forget. I guess if you're immune, you wouldn't have to, but I guess they can still rip you apart, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. That's what I'm thinking. Yeah. I think they might've alluded to what happened, but I can't remember. Anyway, we know Ellie made it out. Yes.

[00:48:36] Ellie survived and we get a little bit more context and the show once again gets gay and it's great. And it's just the characters are allowed to be three dimensional. It's brilliant. And I love anything with zombies or zombie-like creatures. When you go to a mall and you revel in the past, it's fun to me. I think that's a staple of the genre and it was fun to see them playing a video, pretend video game and everything. I like it.

[00:49:05] Moles and zombies are pretty intertwined at this point, I think. Like it's, it's part of the visual language, isn't it? It's yeah, it is. Absolutely. Um, all right. Where are we going next? Next one. Season one, episode eight. When we are in need. This is the dark one. Oh, and that's saying something after we just talked about how this Ellie's girlfriend died. No, now it gets dark. Would you rather go to Terminus or the steakhouse? Terminus. I'd rather go to Terminus.

[00:49:35] They seem more fun at Terminus. I'm just going to say it. I just think if you got on the right side of Gareth, you could have a nice time. Yeah. Maybe you could be like, Hey, I'm good at stats. Can you hire me? I really like your clipboard. Can I help? Okay. Ellie leaves Joel who is still recovering. Yeah. Because this guy, uh, David, he, I just want to punch him in the face. Oh, he's the fucking worst.

[00:50:00] The actor who plays him does an incredible job, um, of making him an absolute piece of shit. Yeah. This actor has got to be an asshole in real life. No, I'm just kidding. He's like, I donate to charity. I'm just kidding. Pedophile. I'm thinking of Porch Dick who was a super nice guy in person. Okay. Ellie leaves Joel who is still recovering to hunt for food. After shooting a deer, she tracks the wounded animal and counters a preacher, David, and his fellow hunter, James.

[00:50:29] James, by the way, played by Troy Baker who voiced, uh, Joel in the game. Right? Yeah. She trades her deer for penicillin. David reveals the man who stabbed Joel was a member of his group. Ellie leaves to treat Joel. The next day she discovers David and his men have followed her to seek vengeance on Joel. She flees to draw them away, but is captured. At David's camp, he reveals he's been feeding his group human flesh.

[00:50:55] Meanwhile, Joel awakens and tortures some of David's men into telling him Ellie's whereabouts. David and James attempt to kill Ellie, but she kills James and escapes. I forgot she did that. Wow. David hunts her down and tries to rape her, but she kills him with a meat cleaver. Joel finds a traumatized Ellie inside the cult's burning community center and comforts her. I just remember her wailing on him with that meat cleaver. Rah! Just intense.

[00:51:26] It went kind of full final girl rage. Mm-hmm. Rage. It was such a transformative moment for her. Um, and she does it all without Joel. He comes in at the end after the damage is done. And, and yeah, it's a real turning point. I think it's like the proper death of innocence for Ellie. Like it's really, really dark. It's sad.

[00:51:50] And it's the, it's very like terminus in the sense of like, it looks not great, but it might be okay. It's shiny. So is it fine? But there's something not quite right. And then, oh shit. Oh shit. They're eating people. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause you're like, ah, cause I remember, uh, David, he just seemed like a cult leader, right? He, he would, somebody would say something that he didn't agree with.

[00:52:19] And then he would just in a really sort of passive aggressive way, correct them. If I remember right. And you got the feeling that, okay, everybody's just sort of beholden to this guy in a creepy way. And say what you like about Gareth from Terminus. He wasn't a pedophile to our knowledge. He wasn't a pedophile. Yeah. I mean, this feels much more like Terminus to me. Hokey. It's hokey.

[00:52:48] It doesn't seem like it could ever really happen that way. With. I have, as you know, I have a lot of questions about the logistics of Terminus. I'm like, sorry, what? How is this efficient? How is this helpful? Whereas this, you're right. There's this vibe of like, oh shit, it's been 20 years. This is, this is dark. This has been happening. This is probably going to happen. Yeah. If we have an apocalypse, you'll find pockets of communities like this. Yeah. With guys like this leading them. Yeah. And I remember how cowed all the women and everyone else were at the dinner. Yeah.

[00:53:18] That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Like just awful. Awful. Bad vibes. Bad vibes. Bad, bad vibes. That's what they should have called it. Bad vibes. The bad vibes hotel. Do not come. Do not recommend. I think this is where Joel fully sort of took on Ellie as his surrogate daughter when he's holding her and calling her baby girl like he called Sarah. Yeah. That's what I call my cat. Okay, baby girl. Oh God. Awful.

[00:53:47] Awful. Formative for Ellie, but really awful. And she, we see the trauma of that in the next episode. She's, she's gone. She's gone to a really dark place. Oh yeah. And by the time we enter episode. And he's trying to bring her out of it. That's right. Yeah. And it's. The game was like that too. I remember she'd just walk around with her head held low and you're like, come on Ellie. Cheer up. Here's some puns. Yeah. It's a proper trauma.

[00:54:16] And it's only going to get worse. Because in season one, episode nine, look for the light. Things do not take a happy turn. Um, in a flashback, Ellie's mother, Anna, who's played by the real Ellie, right? Ashley Johnson. Yeah. Ashley Johnson. Yes. Yeah. I'm so glad to see her. And, uh, she did a freaking great job and brilliant opening. Just hearing her voice. I heard that voice so much playing the game.

[00:54:43] So it was kind of weird to hear that voice coming out of the character's mom. It's so profound to have Ellie give birth to Ellie as well. I just love that. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so in a flashback, Ellie's mother, Anna, is bitten by an infected as she gives birth to Ellie. She is found by Marlene, who hesitantly takes Ellie and kills Anna at the latter's request. In the present day, Joel tells Ellie of a suicide attempt after Sarah's death. Firefly soldiers capture Ellie and knock Joel unconscious.

[00:55:10] After Joel awakens in a hospital, Marlene explains that doctors are preparing Ellie for surgery in hope of developing a cure, and Joel protests when he realises this procedure will kill her. Marlene orders Joel to be taken away. He escapes and kills several Firefly soldiers, including those who surrender, and kills Ellie's surgeon for resisting. Joel carries an unconscious Ellie from the hospital. Marlene intercepts them, stating there is still time to find a cure, but Joel shoots and kills her.

[00:55:36] When Ellie awakens, Joel lies and tells her the Fireflies had already failed to develop a cure from other immune people. As they hike to Jackson, Ellie insists that Joel swear his story about the Fireflies is true. When he does so, she replies, okay. And that's where the season ends. But you can tell on her face that she does not believe him. I feel like this recap missed out the fucking giraffes. Oh, giraffes. You see giraffes in this episode. That's what kind of helped cheer her up. Yeah. It's this moment of wonder.

[00:56:06] Mm-hmm. And that's right out of the game, and it was like that in the game too. It was just, oh my god. Except you can look around wherever you want at all of them and stuff. I love that. I thought that was such a standout scene. Absolutely. This was a hard episode to watch, to watch Joel become that killing machine. Terminator. Whilst fully understanding his reasoning, but also, I don't know that he did the right thing. I guess it depends on whether or not you believe they could have invented a cure.

[00:56:37] Yeah. I mean, we talked a lot about this at the time. Yeah. Um, so I don't know if I really want to get into a big, long discussion about it again. Yeah. But it is relevant going forward too. Yeah. Um, I just, I guess I'll just try to sum up what I thought. That, uh, the doctors and the fireflies probably should have tried to get consent from Ellie at least. Yeah.

[00:57:05] And since they did not, then I feel like Joel, I can totally understand why Joel would say, what, wait, you're going to kill basically my daughter. No, I'm going to do whatever I can to stop that. So I'm behind him, whether there's a cure or not, I'm behind Joel. But I understand. I mean, the great thing about it is that it creates this situation where you could reasonably be on either side of it.

[00:57:30] I think, yeah, it's a hugely interesting moral relativism problem. Yeah. Like what's more important? Who do you believe? What information do you have? What role does consent take? Yeah. It's a difficult one. It's like, I think it's interesting because that means that Joel doesn't, he doesn't cover himself in glory in what he does. Like it's, it's, it's a horrible start or rampage that he goes on. And it's a bunch of people who are trying to save humanity that he kills.

[00:58:00] But I, I think there's two big ways that they majorly fucked up. I think the lesser way probably is that they didn't get consent from their point of view. That's the lesser way. But the major way they fucked up was to tell Joel what was about to happen. Yeah. I don't think you're going to care about this, but just, just so you know, she's about to The fine print there, just a really small bit. Did you read that? Did you read that? No. Okay. Just sign it. It's fine.

[00:58:30] There's coffee out there. Cool. Go for it. Yeah. Bye. Yeah. It's, it's so dark. It's just a really dark, like all of it's dark. Both sides of it are dark. Like the people getting killed is dark, you know, lying to Ellie about it is dark. What they're trying to do is theoretically good, but is there any hope? Can they do so? Like, you know, it's, it's, it's, I mean, personally, I think the moral conundrum of it is only interesting if you presume that there was a really good chance it would have created a cure. Right.

[00:58:57] Because if you think there's not that good a chance and maybe it was like a 2% chance and you're like, no, fuck those guys, clearly. But if it was like a 90% chance, then, then it becomes a question to me. We were one fingernail away. We were so close and you just shot everyone. Like, oh, sorry. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. So, uh, that's season one. Do you have any hopes for season two?

[00:59:24] Um, I'm hoping for another enjoyable season. I'm hoping for some stuff that has been worth the wait. I'm looking forward to seeing Catherine O'Hara, who I think has been cast in this season, um, meeting some of the new characters. I'm wondering if it will be less of a road trip and more of a one place situation, which would be interesting to see. Um, yeah, I, I, I'm going in quite open. What about you?

[00:59:55] Yeah. I mean, I have a lot of hopes that relate to knowing the plot, so I won't say those. But, um, I hope that the characters have good chemistry. There's some new characters I'm really looking forward to seeing. And from what I've, the feeling I get from interviews and, and clips and things, although I haven't watched that many is good. You know, I think it's going to be great, but I hope that I'm right about that.

[01:00:19] Um, I hope the themes of the second game come across and get people thinking in an interesting way. And that's super vague. Cause I don't want to say what they are. Um, I just hope it's good. Like the first season was, if it's as good as the first season, then I'll be happy. And I, and I, there is a lot of just going through season one.

[01:00:41] And it reminds me of how many, um, just sad moments there are and tragic and bad vibes. And they, I think did a pretty good job of balancing that out with fun moments and triumphant moments and good emotions like the strawberry or the puns or whatever else. So I hope they can do that this season too, and not have us feeling just all fucking bummed out all the time, you know, even though I know that'll be a part of it.

[01:01:11] I have a lot of faith in Craig Mason, so we'll see how it goes. We will see. Um, but yeah, a bit of Catherine O'Hara can't go wrong. Have you been watching the studio? No. Uh, yeah. I only saw the first episode, but I enjoyed it. She's great. The second one's amazing. And she's really good. She was really good. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I was going to say we should cover it, but it's kind of a half hour comedy. There's not much to cover in it really. Oh, I'm sure we could. Yeah. If people haven't seen it, they're really recommended.

[01:01:41] Yeah. Apple TV plus Seth Rogen. It's, um, he's a movie executive and it's all about the forces, the struggle between people who want to make good movies and people who want to make movies that make a lot of money basically. Yeah. Yeah. And season two is one of the most like, uh, season two, episode two is one of the most meta things I've seen in a long time. It's great. Um, but when Catherine O'Hara came on, I was like, Oh yeah, she's going to be in the last of us. That's exciting. We'll see. Yeah. It's cool.

[01:02:42] Infected news. Okay. So a couple of things. One, the last of us part two remastered is now available for the PC. I don't know if the last of us to any version has been on the PC. I think this might be the first time, but anyway, if you've been wanting to play it and you don't have a PlayStation, but you have a PC, then you can do it now. Amazing. Next. Uh, this is kind of related to what we were talking about before.

[01:03:09] IGN sat down with Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann and a few of the other actors to get their take on whether they think Joel made the right decision in the hospital at the end there. Oh, okay. And I've never heard Neil Druckmann say this before, but he said, I believe Joel was right. If I were in Joel's position, I hope I'd be able to do what he did to save my daughter. That's like pretty direct, you know? Yeah.

[01:03:34] Uh, I was surprised that he would, a lot of times the creators don't want to give an opinion on something like that. I think, I think. Kind of refreshing. Yeah. I think he's right. I think you would do that if it was your kid. Yeah. Absolutely. I would hope so. Yeah. I would hope so. Unless your kid's a dick. I don't think I, I think someone, yeah. I'm like, oh, I don't know. I don't know. Which one is it? No, I'm just kidding. Just kidding.

[01:04:00] Uh, Craig Mazin said, I think that if I were in Joel's position, I probably would have done what he did, but I'd like to think that I wouldn't. So he seems to think it was wrong, but still thinks he would have done it. I guess there's a question. Yeah. It's about nobility, isn't it? You want to know that you would do something to protect the people you love, but are we all a Eugene deep down, you know, it's difficult? Yeah. Or just the weighing the needs of the many versus the needs of the few. Yeah.

[01:04:30] You know, Gabrielle Luna, who plays Tommy said, I'm his brother and I understand. And you can't see the scope of the whole world. You can only see your world. And Ellie is his world. And so, I mean, I can't personally fault him as Tommy and maybe not even as Gabe. So I don't know. He seems to be on Joel's side. Druckmann chimed in again. He said, it's a difference between, okay, if I had, if I had to kill a random person to

[01:04:57] save who knows how many lives in the abstract, you would say, well, yeah, that makes sense. Of course. But now remove it from being a random person and it's your kid. Now the answer is very different. Yeah. Young Mazino, who plays a new character, Jesse, said, yeah, it's his world. Who cares about the world if your world isn't there? Well, that's selfish, but yeah. And Bella Ramsey, who plays Ellie, says, yeah, he saved his world, just not the world. Which sounded a little barbed. So Ellie, Ellie is like, fuck that.

[01:05:27] I know, I know. Yep. And it's so funny how a lot of times actors, I feel, I don't know how much of it is that they are purposefully choosing to inhabit their character's mindset or if they just naturally do that. And it's not even a choice, but I've interviewed a lot of actors at this point, especially on panels at Walker Stalker. And I've noticed that a lot of times and ones whose characters have done questionable things because it's the walking dead, right?

[01:05:54] But they will stick up for their characters a lot of times. I think to give a convincing performance, it helps if you can inhabit that space of like, I understand how I would get to this point and do it. But to truly act, I think you have to be able to do both, I think. And this is something that comes back to perhaps one of our biggest gripes with The Walking Dead, which is the character of Negan, where I'm sort of like, well, if you can't cope with what your character is doing, maybe don't be that fucking character.

[01:06:24] But yeah, I think you do have to give a... Acting's about truth, right? And it's about finding the truth in it. And being like, we don't go around saying, oh, what I'm doing doesn't make sense and it's not right. Just people usually don't feel that way about what they're doing, you know? Yeah, exactly. They rationalize it or justify it in whatever way they need to. So if you really want to inhabit that, you at least have to know how to do that.

[01:06:51] And I think some actors are pretty good about going, oh yeah, this is how my character feels, but this is how I feel and they can separate it. But I've just noticed so many times that the actor won't do that. They'll just stick up for what their character is doing. And I think that's probably a part of just trying to give the best performance by really understanding it. Yeah. By being able to put yourself in that headspace of what drives someone to this. Um, yeah, it's hard. It's, it's a difficult one. Okay.

[01:07:18] Showrunner Craig Mazin talked with the Hollywood reporter. Uh, I thought there were some interesting things in here. They said the footage in the trailers gives off serious empire strikes back vibes, uh, of the season two of season two strikes back. I love it. This is like non-spoilery, but, um, kind of getting us ready for season two. So he says, it's true. The first season, Joel and Ellie got away with a lot. This time they aren't getting away with shit. I think about that a lot because I love the empire strikes back and I think everybody should.

[01:07:48] We love that one because the second act is the tough act. That's when everything is challenged and characters go through these moments where they can't be who they used to be, but they're also not ready to be who they're supposed to be. That's a sense of feeling lost. And I love that. That's a nice quote, right? That's deep. Say that again. I want to tattoo that on my head. The, the, the, everything is challenged and the characters go through these moments where they can't be who they used to be, but they're also not ready to be who they're supposed to be. Oh my God.

[01:08:17] I feel seen. I know. I kind of felt like that too. I like that. Yeah. Oh, fuck. That's deep. He said, uh, you mentioned at South by Southwest panel, how you guys really figured out how to do the show this season. Aside from pacing out the action, what did you learn from the first season that you applied to the second? He says, making a first season of television, especially of that size is like building a plane in the air.

[01:08:44] We learned how to improve our process, which means basically more efficiency combined with more money from HBO. We could do a lot more. We certainly got much better at portraying the infected. Our two core actors, Pedro and Bella now occupy those characters completely. And we assembled this other group of actors who fit right in. Maybe that's because the new cast members had seen the first season. So they were coming into a show. They understood. So that's nice. Sounds like they they're humming along. Yeah.

[01:09:12] Um, he said, not that your show needs more hype, but what excites you most about the new season? He said, there's a lot of duos. Our show seems to live in this duopolistic world where you have Joel and Ellie, Henry and Sam, Ellie and Riley. It's always this interesting duopoly where everything gets shrunk down to these twosomes. This season, we introduced more of these duopolies that I love. By the way, the word is pairs or duos. I don't know why I'm saying duopoly. That's ridiculous. I love that you said that.

[01:09:43] Watching Joel and Ellie is special in this season, but our community of Ellie and Dina, newcomer to the show, Isabella Merced, is special. Ellie and Jesse, newcomer, young Mozzino, have this remarkable friendship. I can't wait for people to experience our world through these new twosomes. That's one thing he's excited about. We should change our podcast notes. Catch up with your favorite duopoly. Duopolies. Yeah, brilliant.

[01:10:09] They said, maybe the show is that way because you just like writing two handers, which is, I guess, an episode just with two characters mostly. He says, well, nothing's more exciting, honestly. When my writing day is writing one character talking to another, like in episode one with Pedro Pascal and Catherine O'Hara. Let's go. So that's cool. I'm into it. As Ellie's friend Dina, Isabella Merced jumps off the screen. She's so charismatic.

[01:10:38] Is it challenging at all writing all those scenes yourself to channel young female characters? He said, not at all. I'm going to be 54 when this comes out, but in my brain, I'm still basically 15. My body's falling apart, but I'm still me. I remember what it was like to be 19 and 20. I'm not a girl, but I'm a human. And as a writer, part of my job is to become other people in my head. I do it all the time. I've been doing it forever. Isabella, in her first scene with Ellie, she radiates.

[01:11:04] We wanted somebody that was this contrast, the sunlight, because Ellie's tough and reserved and careful. And we wanted somebody who's radiating sun. We also didn't want someone that was 5'9", because Bella's pretty short. It's one of those things where it gets a little wonky to frame two actors of a very different height or Dina might feel maternal like a mom. Interesting. Like Mulder and Scully, they used to put Gillian Anderson on a box. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's a tall one. They said, you mentioned Bella's size.

[01:11:33] There's been this thing on social media where some of the game's fans say, Bella isn't right for adapting The Last of Us Part II because they're not big and strong enough to be that character after the story takes a four-year time jump. I was thinking watching the first episode of the new season that somebody appearing physically vulnerable in this world is more interesting and makes you lean in more. Like if a character is in a dark room with an infected and they're built like Charlize Theron in Mad Max Fury Road, how worried are you about them really?

[01:12:01] I think people discount how vulnerability can be additive. He answers, correct. I agree with you. One of the reasons why we show a fight scene early is to address what I think is a question that gets glossed over all the time by action movies and shows. How does a small person fight with a big person? It's not going to be karate. It's not going to be awesome punches and kicks. They'll lose. The answer is jujitsu. I watch a lot of jujitsu and I've specifically watched sessions where a small person is taking down a big person.

[01:12:30] That's how that would happen because nobody's fucking around in this world. So I understand the difficulty that some people have where they say she looked like she was 14 in season one. She still looks roughly the same to us, even though now she's 19. Ellie in the game looks much older. Some people do change quite dramatically and some people don't. I'm not interested in the physical aspect. Although I've been looking at Bella's face for years while editing and I can see that she's certainly grown. I'm interested in the emotional maturity and the change in personality.

[01:12:59] I've watched Bella grow and become independent and start to find her own two feet separate from and apart from her parents who are amazing. How do I figure out how to be my own person now and test that full independence? And I feel that I feel that in Ellie completely. So I understand where people are coming from, but when they watch this year, I think they're going to see the difference. It was kind of a lot, but talking about how she's changed, you know, I trust Bella Ramsey as a performer. Yeah. Yeah. Me too. Now for sure. Yeah.

[01:13:29] I'm excited to see her and that character again. I mean, look at Judith in the walking dead. She's tiny. I wouldn't fight her. It's scary. She'd take you on. Who would you be more afraid of? Ellie. Judith or Ellie? Yeah. I would say. I don't know. Judith in a katana. That could fuck you up. Yeah. I feel like. Yeah. Judith. I think I'd still be more afraid of Ellie, but if Judith had a weapon, you'd be fucked. Yeah.

[01:13:59] She's going to get you around the bloody ankles and calves, you know, stab you and run away. Yeah. I don't think I'd want to fight either of them. I'd want to be their friends. Yeah. Absolutely. Be like a cool aunt. Both of them. Who's one would I want to be their friend more? Ellie's probably more fun. That's hard to choose. I'd love to Judith speak to you. She knows a lot of jokes. Yeah. Judith is really sweet. I think they'd both be pretty cool. Yeah. They would. Yeah. If they didn't kill each other. Yeah.

[01:14:32] All right. That is our show. Episode 632. Thanks for listening, everybody. Next episode will be The Last of Us. Season 2, Episode 1, Future Days. If you want to write in or leave us a voice message about it, you can find all our contact information at podcastica.com. And while you're there, please check out our other podcasts. One that I have been remiss in not mentioning is the Wheel of Time podcast with Greg and Veronica.

[01:15:01] Season 3, I hear, is good and they're chugging along in that podcast. So if you're into fantasy, check it out. That's so exciting. And also, I'll just say your coverage of The White Lotus, Jason, has been very interesting and that's the finales this weekend. Yeah. Get caught up on that. That show has been so great. And that podcast is doing really well. I just started looking at the numbers in the charts and we're getting more downloads

[01:15:28] on that show than I've gotten on a podcast in a long time. And we're like the top White Lotus podcast aside from the HBO one. So I'm really excited about it. Like, oh, I guess we've been doing something right. Cool. Yay! All right. This episode is made possible by Patreon supporters like Corin Henderson, who pledged their support at patreon.com slash Jason Cabassi. So thank you so much to Corin. Corin gets ad-free episodes of all the podcasts plus access to our Discord server where we've

[01:15:57] had, you know, more and more activity lately as people flee Facebook. So come and check that out if you're in the Patreon. I really recommend it. I love the Discord. I'm way more active on it than I was on Messenger, so I'm very pleased. Yeah, that's a bonus. Yeah, you get extra pictures of my cats. That will entice you. All right. That's our show. Thanks for listening. Don't get bit, literary sireen.