TV: The Last of Us (HBO)

[tacogeoff]

I guess playing the game i knew what was going to happen in the finale but it kind of fell flat on me. overall the series was good. i would give it a solid 8/10 for season 1.

 

[HanSolo]

Yeah I think all in all, this show falls short of the highest echelon of prestige TV but I'd say it's still well well above average. Not a masterpiece but a great piece of work all the same. And certainly the top of the line when it comes to video game to live action adaptation.

Pedro Pascal deserves all of the awards. I knew the ending from a friend playing the game years ago, but man it still hit me hard. Back then I thought it was extremely stupid but now you can understand why he made that choice as selfish as it might be.

I appreciated that his performance had the right amount of restraint where a less nuanced actor might have spent the whole episode over acting and yelling. His visual cues and tone of voice indicated a lot of things. In the first third, you can see the growing unease. The almost desperate desire to not just save Ellie from the danger of the world, but from the hidden hurt her experiences have already caused and could continue to cause her. And then through every line of dialogue before and after the rampage, you know that Joel is aware that what he did was monstrous and selfish, but he's so desperate to protect someone he loves that he looks at it like he has no choice. You can pick that up through context just fine, but I thought Pascal imbued that in his performance really well. Best part of a somewhat disappointing finale.

 

[sdf]

Well, this continues my feeling from the previous part that something about this story is a bit simple and unsatisfying

 

[Walkingthroughforest]

My thoughts on the finale.

As an adaptation of something I love? It was good. As a stand-alone TV show, I felt it was excellent.

I don’t know why, but the Giraffe scene never really connected with me in the game. But this version of the scene? Unbelievable. I feel like the scene finally clicked into place for me, and it was beautiful.

Joel’s massacre in the hospital was a little too unrealistic, but it’s executed so well I can keep that suspension of disbelief. The editing, the music, Pedro’s performance? They did their job very well.

Ashley’s role as Anna was so tragic and wonderful. It’s impossible to separate her from Ellie, and that connective thread was done so well. Hearing all the familiar grunts and breathing while she’s running during the opening scene gave me goosebumps. Her characters addition to the story was smart and grounded Marlene even more.

My main criticism, and it’s been my criticism for the last three episodes, is the infected. Specifically the lack there of. This feels like the biggest “gimmie” moment they could have done with the infected by having it directly be in service of the story, and they fumbled it.

In the game, Joel and Ellie enter a tunnel after the triage area and it is full of infected. I feel not utilizing this in the show was a mistake. This would have offered a perfect spot to reintroduce the fungal network, pay off the Bloater introduction in episode 5 with a “boss fight”, and have Joel put everything on the line to save Ellie. It would have been a great juxtaposition to how he "saved" her at the hospital. It would have hammered home the lengths he will go to sacrifice for her, which would have only heightened his eventual rampage of the Fireflies, as he would run head first into certain death (AKA a Bloater) to protect her. Heck, adding that scene could have even paid off Ellie’s line about her inability to swim by having Joel save her if an infected hits her into the water below.

That scene would/and should have served as a fake climax. It would have allowed the audience to breathe a sigh of relief when they see Marlene and know that Ellie is safe and has fulfilled her destiny. Then the floor drops right out under you along with Joel when you learn the truth.

It would have been the perfect spot to use the infected in a place to serve the story and I don’t understand why it wasn’t taken advantage of, especially since we really hadn’t seen them since episode 5.

In saying that, what we got was still an incredible episode of TV, and comparing it to the game only does it a disservice.

9/10

 

[kihei]

I thought it was a great ending. Very powerful.

 

[Jussi]

As a non-gamer (of the game), that was a dud. Really unsatisfying finale and to a degree, season.

 

[norrisnick]

I'm fine with unsatisfying endings. Leaves you wanting more, provided there will be more. That is what GoT got wrong.

 

[MAHJ71]

It was OK. Solid 7.

Too many parts that felt rushed. Ending a bit too short, led to a dud feeling.

 

[shadow1]

I think the first season of TLOU is probably a 9/10 for me.

I felt like the ending two episodes were a bit rushed though. I'm going off memory a bit here, but as I recall it...

In the game, when Joel and Ellie made it to the University, it seemed like that was the end of the game. But then it turned out there was a ton of game left - nearly half of the gameplay it felt like - which included the David plot line and the hospital ending. The show didn't miss any major arcs or anything, but the David story in particular felt beefier/more grand in the game compared to the series.

Might've helped if there was more zombie action to make Joel and Elle's trip seem more arduous. I thought the scene with the clicker in episode 2 was excellent.

 

[HanSolo]

I'd probably give the season as a whole an 8.5/10. When it was at its best it was 10/10 material but it wasn't consistent.

 

[Hivemind]

First, she might've avoided everything if she'd just asked Ellie to submit to the surgery, which she probably would've, since she came all that way and wanted to help.

The fact is that neither Marlene nor Joel gave Ellie a choice. That's part of the point. Both were too afraid of what Ellie's answer might be to give her agency in that moment. You can argue that Marlene could have forced her if she didn't like the answer, but they added the intro to build on the relationship between Marlene and Ellie's mom for a reason. Marlene was having a tough time making that call, and didn't want to add anything to make it potentially even harder.

Finally, Joel shooting unarmed and incapacitated people (including even a surgeon) in the head and lying to Ellie afterwards (after all they'd been through) soured me a little on Joel and put a damper on the episode and season.

That's also intentional. It a stronger point to make in the game than it is on TV, as it forces you, the player, to actually take agency in that situation and participate in the killing. The moment with the surgeon it will literally sit there indefinitely until you kill him. But Joel is very much not supposed to be a flawless protagonist, and the decision he makes here is at the core of both the game and show's message. It's about the lengths a parent will go thru to protect their child, and asking each of us what we would be willing to sacrifice to protect ours. Joel was willing to sacrifice a cure for humanity and the lives of even the unarmed and defenseless (let alone killing plenty of others).

 

[blueandgoldguy]

9/10 overall for the season. I few minor flaws here and there, but overall an excellent show with good pacing. As far as the lack of infected, I would have liked to seen a little bit more of them but if given the choice between seeing them too little or too much, I will take the former every time. If I saw them every episode, their appearance would quickly lose its impact.

I'm sure this will be nominated for a boatload of Emmys as it probably should, but as of right now, if I was picking best drama series, I would go with Better Call Saul (2nd of the final season will be eligible) or House of the Dragon from the shows I have seen. I feel both those shows maintain a slightly more consistent higher quality than Last of Us. As for Best Actor, Pedro was great and is deserving of a nomination, but I would go with Odenkirk as it is long overdue for recognition as Saul Goodman. I could see Bella Ramsey snagging Best Actress in a Drama though.

I didn't have a problem with the final scenes of Joel fighting his way through the guards and the way it was edited. It would have seemed a hell of a lot more unrealistic if it was filmed as one continuous scene with Joel rampaging his way through a dozen or more Fireflies like a John Wick movie or the video game. Editing it such a way to suggest what he had done is much better.

I was actually more bothered by the infected chasing Elly's mom through the woods. How exactly did it know she was in the house and how did it know what specific room she was in? That didn't make sense given it was several hundred or even over a thousand of feet behind her and there would be tonnes of other sounds in the woods that would attract its attention. It really shouldn't even be able to hear her running on the grass or enter the house...and once she is in the house, it shouldn't be able to hear her rummaging around in there.

 

[Kcb12345]

Despite competing with the Oscars damn

 

[John Price]

Good behind the scenes 30 minute "making of" documentary on hBO Max for those interested

 

[Osprey]

The fact is that neither Marlene nor Joel gave Ellie a choice. That's part of the point. Both were too afraid of what Ellie's answer might be to give her agency in that moment. You can argue that Marlene could have forced her if she didn't like the answer, but they added the intro to build on the relationship between Marlene and Ellie's mom for a reason. Marlene was having a tough time making that call, and didn't want to add anything to make it potentially even harder.

Joel did give Ellie a choice. He offered to take her back to Tommy and she turned it down because they'd come so far and she didn't want it to be for nothing.

That's also intentional. It a stronger point to make in the game than it is on TV, as it forces you, the player, to actually take agency in that situation and participate in the killing. The moment with the surgeon it will literally sit there indefinitely until you kill him. But Joel is very much not supposed to be a flawless protagonist, and the decision he makes here is at the core of both the game and show's message. It's about the lengths a parent will go thru to protect their child, and asking each of us what we would be willing to sacrifice to protect ours. Joel was willing to sacrifice a cure for humanity and the lives of even the unarmed and defenseless (let alone killing plenty of others).

That was my point, that it seemed so intentional that it felt contrived. I guessed as much that it worked better in the game because the point of view was different.

 

[Pierce Hawthorne]

Yeah I think it gets a solid 8.5/10 for me. It definitely lost a little, just a little steam for me down the stretch after the first 3 episodes were damn near perfect television and it really was flirting with 10/10 numbers in the early goings.


After reading more about how the video game ended as well, I get why the finale was so short, but I still feel like another 5-7 minutes with Joel and Ellie before the fireflies entered the picture would have really helped to even further drive home just how much Joel had started to look at Ellie and how much he cared for her, which in turn would have made the payoff of attacking the Fireflies to save her, hit a little bit harder.


I also had a couple minor issues with episode 8.


But overall it was still very, very good for me. Probably just a tiny step down for HOTD. A shame it'll be almost 2 full years before we see either of them come back.

 

[Bounces R Way]

I'm going to agree with much of the general sentiment here that the finale fell a little flat for me. Not exactly with the ending itself, although I didn't really love that either and thought it was kind of boring, but just felt rushed and as a result not much of the dialogue had the desired impact. Maybe the whole point was to be anticlimactic, that this altruistic journey they had undertaken was for nothing and everything and everyone sucks.


Overall a good season of television that I think would have benefited from another episode or two where they could have developed and followed some more minor plotlines. Seemed like they just jumped from one group of bad people to the next after episode 3. And for a zombie(sry fungal infected w/e) apocalypse show there sure wasn't a whole lot of zombies. Would have liked to learn more about what the combat tactics, interesting capabilities of the variations, and other strategies that people had tried and failed for controlling the spread. They just seemed unimportant for much of the last half of the season.

-Conversely I don't think Ramsey was all that great in this one after back to back to back excellent performances. I get that Ellie is supposed to be pensive and nervous heading into this momentous destiny but I just wasn't feeling much from her until the last scene.

-I think part of what probably held Ramsey back was that the dialogue scenes didn't get enough room to breathe. I agree with what someone else said, it wouldn't work to extend Joel's rampage more than what we got. I think that risks extending into tedious action for action's sake. People are saying this was note for note just like the game so idk what more you could add but maybe you let the Ellie and Joel moments breathe a little more. It's not that I think those moments weren't powerful, but they did feel a bit rushed.

Yeah that wasn't a great episode for Ramsey. Realize that recently traumatized by narrowly escaping rape and having just murdered a bunch of people teenager is a big ask for even a very experienced actor/actress but I mostly just got loopy and vaguely in her head about stuff. Never played the game so maybe that's exactly what it was.

 

[Hivemind]

Joel did give Ellie a choice. He offered to take her back to Tommy and she turned it down because they'd come so far and she didn't want it to be for nothing.

That was well before they knew what was involved. Ellie was never asked if she'd be willing to sacrifice her life.

We know what her answer would be (in part because of the conversations that occur afterwards) - but she wasn't actually given the choice by either Joel or Marlene.

 

[Jussi]

That was well before they knew what was involved. Ellie was never asked if she'd be willing to sacrifice her life.

We know what her answer would be (in part because of the conversations that occur afterwards) - but she wasn't actually given the choice by either Joel or Marlene.

That was one of the irritating bits. They absolutely should've asked her.

 

[Hivemind]

That was one of the irritating bits. They absolutely should've asked her.

The point is that they don't. Ellie is stripped of her agency.

 

[Jussi]

The point is that they don't. Ellie is stripped of her agency.

But it doesn't make sense.

 

[Osprey]

That was well before they knew what was involved. Ellie was never asked if she'd be willing to sacrifice her life.

You said that Joel was too afraid to ask her because of what her answer might be. I don't understand how you can blame him for not giving her that choice when he didn't learn what was involved until he woke up and she was already unconscious.

 

[Hivemind]

You said that Joel was too afraid to ask her because of what her answer might be. I don't understand how you can blame him for not giving her that choice when he didn't learn what was involved until he woke up and she was already unconscious.

He didn't just stop the procedure to wait for Ellie to decide, he murdered the surgeon! He killed Marlene to stop her from coming after Ellie in the future. He invented a lie cover story to tell Ellie after the fact, and built into that lie are statements designed to make Ellie think there's no point in going down that route again. He told her there were others like her, dozens. He told her that they had stopped looking for a cure. He intentionally set up a narrative where she wouldn't have incentive to try something like that again. Through all these actions, he took away Ellie's choice - just as Marlene had done.

 

[Walkingthroughforest]

But it doesn't make sense.

Of course it does. The Fireflies had made up their mind and they didn't want to risk losing the very real possibility of a cure. The chance of a vaccine was bigger than Ellie's agency, it was bigger than any of them. They also saw it as the most humane option, as Ellie wouldn't have any fear or pain.

Marlene knew that Ellie would likely have said yes, but she wasn't going to take the risk that the answer was no and something goes wrong.

Joel also knew that Ellie would likely have said yes, and he couldn't take that risk either.

 

[HanSolo]

But it doesn't make sense.

Wait, why? I agree it's the right thing to do in that situation but under the circumstances with two characters pushed to their extremes it absolutely makes sense why both Marlene and Joel would disregard Ellie's right to choose what happens to her. One wants to save the human race, one wants to save himself and the adoptive daughter he loves. Both at the expense of Ellie's agency to choose.