Last of Us is the hot new HBO hit.
We're three episodes in.
I'm gonna immediately go to John Ida Rolla to kind of set up the premise
of the show because I don't want John ruin it, John.
>> Sure, so the basic idea is that there have been two amazing video games,
The Last of Us and Last of Us too.
This show the Last of Us on HBO is apparently telling the story of
the first of those video games.
Basically in the TV version in 2003, there was this fungal infection
outbreak which basically turned people into fungal zombies.
Most of the story takes place 20 years later in starts off in what's
left of Boston and you have Pedro Pascal who plays Joel and
he is tasked with protecting this young girl Ellie.
And so that's basically where we're at the story now is we've had
a couple of episodes of setting up the world what actually caused the pandemic.
I think they refer to as a pandemic at some point and
the sort of growing kind of trust and maybe relationship between Joel and
Ellie in this incredibly dangerous world.
>> Yeah, so let's let's touch on the relationship between Joel and
Ellie because I think that evolved in an interesting way.
Now Joel really had no interest in saving Ellie but
Joel was pressured to save Ellie for a very specific reason, what is that?
>> You're talking about because test wanted you talk about
the biological reason.
First of all who is test?
>> Test is a longtime partner of goals.
He doesn't put a label on it, but she would probably like to in any event,
Ellie appears to be the first person ever who is immune to the fungal infection.
She was able to be bitten by one of the infected and she's actually healing.
That's not what's supposed to happen within a couple of minutes to a day,
you're supposed to turn into effectively a zombie.
And gradually decay from there potentially turning into something called a clicker
which is this like blind zombie.
>> Super scary. >> Super aggressive and
can hear really well.
>> But can't see.
>> Yes and Tess was early on was willing to believe that Ellie is actually immune,
he was a little bit more resistant to that.
He's heard these sorts of things before, but and
again there's a spoiler as of the third episode.
He appears to have accepted it.
>> Totally, yeah, he appears to have accepted it because there have
been multiple instances in which Ellie could have been infected but
didn't get infected.
>> And has progressively healed from it.
>> Exactly, yes.
Okay, so with that said I do wanna focus most of our review and
commentary on the third episode because I love the third episode.
I thought it was the strongest, just real quick.
I continued watching the show mostly because my husband loves it but
the first two episodes, even though I was still entertained watching it.
I felt like it was just a different version of The Walking Dead.
>> Look, there are obviously some genre tropes that are going
to be common in a lot of zombie stuff.
I think that this is a more interesting world and
I think there's much more society right off the bat.
I think that the flashbacks you get to before the infection happens are really
interesting.
Last of Us and we didn't especially have a ton of that.
At least at the point when I was watching Walking Dead because eventually,
like most people I gave up, I find this to be more interesting.
I think that Craig Mazen who created it and
wrote it well not created Neil Druckman from The Naughty Dog created,
but, he also created Chernobyl is just really good.
He knows what he's doing, he knows how to inject a ton of theme and symbolism and
just interest in super high production values.
So it's an HBO show.
>> The makeup, the prosthetics that they use for the clickers.
>> I think we have a photo of that that maybe we can bring up.
>> Incredible yeah, it's photographic six because it's just amazing.
I mean and very.
>> Yeah that's creepy.
>> Yeah, absolutely. >> Beautiful but creepy.
>> Yeah, that's the thing.
I just remember as we were watching it and we saw the first clicker.
I was like, man, that is absolutely terrifying, but
also in a weird way very beautiful, right.
>> They nailed like I played and beat both of the video games.
They nailed it.
That's exactly what it's like.
>> Yeah, okay, so let's talk about the third episode.
So there you have some imagery of, you know,
the artists working on and that's the other thing.
Mostly because my brain is not like set up this way in like this creative way.
I'm always like so fascinated by people who designed the costumes and
the makeup and all of that for shows like this.
Just really great work.
Okay, now let's talk about the third episode.
So in the third episode, I think meet for the first time, right?
One of my favorite characters now, Bill.
Yeah, he was referenced earlier, but
the third episode is where you get to meet Bill, right.
And Joel and Ellie were trying to get to Bill and
Bill and Frank are partners right.
Now, Bill was a prepper, which there he is.
He also played Ron Swanson of course in parks and rec.
So it kind of is the same person.
>> I haven't really seen much.
So he's like this libertarian local government worker in parks and
rec who wants to be self reliant and
wants to destroy government from within like that's his role in parks and rec.
But in this show, he's this prepper who clearly was prepared
because he is completely sustainable.
I don't know how he's growing his food or whatever, but
he's got gourmet meals every night as the world's burning from this insane pandemic.
And then all of a sudden he comes across Frank who ends
up becoming his partner, right?
Okay, so I want you to take it away because I don't know man,
I didn't see Bill as gay before.
I don't think.
>> He's revealed.
Before it's revealed.
>> Yeah.
>> I mean, they're definitely in the moments leading up to the reveal.
There's a lot of hints and stuff like that.
There are had missed it.
From what they're eating and there's a lot of comments and stuff like that.
But no, not before.
I don't think there's any reason to have any idea about sexuality.
Anyway, I loved that episode because it showed how their
relationship evolved and it was, I'm gonna cry.
I got emotional in this episode.
>> Yes, we're definitely gonna talk a lot about the relationship.
What I like about the beginning of it, is that the episode isn't even just about
them, you do get this sort of framing story of Ellie and Joel.
But once we jump to him, you very quickly a minute in, he's now your guy,
he's going around, he's going to home depot.
Always put up stuff, it's all really cool and you're invested in it.
And then when you see frank in the hole you're like, no,
because this is a setting that because it's post apocalyptic can have so
much stakes any individual is, this might end up killing you.
And you're immediately thinking, my God, if he lets him in this guy,
he's going to betray him and he's gonna die, it's gonna ruin everything.
He's gonna bring more people, he's being so friendly, but that's just a ruse.
That's what I loved about me too.
>> Me too, there was a lot of tension.
I felt a lot of attention watching that scene.
But pretty soon they developed this relationship and
you can see how Bill goes from being kind of untrusting.
Hesitant to really allowing himself to feel the emotions and
engage in this relationship with frank.
And I just love that dynamic and I don't know why I'm
hesitating in sharing too much about the episode.
I think it's because if you haven't seen it, we've shared too much.
Yeah, especially in a situation like that, I mean,
think about how lonely, yes, he was self sufficient.
He didn't need anyone per se to survive because he's a prepper and
he thought of everything miraculously, right.
But think about how lonely that existence was.
>> Yeah, I mean, he had a lot of things to keep his mind occupied, but
it had to be super lonely.
And then also I think, look, I forget exactly when he meets Frank,
it might have been three or four years in or something like that, but
they spend a great deal of time, 17 years or something together.
Like their relationship is not presented as universally awesome all the time.
And how could it be?
I mean like for years and years it's just them two.
Like we've been through the pandemic now.
You had to be close quarters with mostly just Christian.
I was living in one room with my wife.
We did that for a few months,
maybe a year before we eventually moved out to a bigger place.
But think about what it would be like for largely one person, no TV,
no nothing, 17 years.
I mean it's interesting because like obviously this is a a gay relationship,
right.
But I could relate to it so much because in terms of temperament,
personality introverted traits,
I definitely relate to Bill and Frank is more social.
Frank wants to socialize with others, bring others in and
since Bill is kind of terrified of people betraying them or
some of the safety concerns associated with that.
He's hesitant but you can tell that he loves Bill so
much that he kind of loosens up and allows it to happen.
>> And even at the end, it's not like he's 100% different by the end.
Like he's still the more guarded and restrained and hesitant of the two.
But it's two different approaches to how you live your life.
Like Bill is very much the preprint it is not worth it to take these risks if that
could result in me dying.
But if you didn't take those risks in, what's the point of living at all?
Like first of all you wouldn't have had the relationship with Frank.
But then even once you did you wouldn't have met other people talk to them,
they've enriched your life by just just purely material things they bring in.
But then also the experience like what would
your life be if you did everything to minimize the risk to you?
And the risk is real.
They get attacked in all of that they could have died at any given time.
It is super scary but you still have to live your life and
I think it's obviously designed to make us think about Joel and Ellie.
>> Yeah.
>> Because Joel is not Bill in the beginning but
he lives a pretty specific sort of life and he's not interested in extra risks.
>> Exactly.
He's not interested in extra risk.
And you can see the relationship between Joel and Ellie kind of develop,
right in a positive direction where he goes from not really trusting her.
Thinking that her story about immunity is BS with the help of test
really because test was the one who wanted to get Ellie to Bill and Frank.
To see if there was something they can do to figure out why it is that
she is immune from this fungal infection.
And Joel was not really buying it until at one point the test gets bitten, right.
And so the last thing she told him before she died.
>> She sacrificed herself.
>> And she did that by blowing up a building she was in as a bunch of
these clickers were chasing them, right.
So she did that intentionally because she knew she was gonna become a clicker,
she was gonna die anyway, right eventually.
And then she was like let me blow up this building so
the clickers don't go after Joel and Ellie.
But before that happened she told Joel, yo you gotta get her to Bill and
Frank asap, please do this.
And I think that was the final persuading factor for Joel and
he went for it like he decided okay fine I'm gonna.
>> Yeah also naturally I think he is predisposed to play a sort of
paternal protecting thing.
He had that with his daughter for many, many years and now we have to believe that
he was with tests for at least like 16 years, he had that.
Because of the traumatic experience of the pandemic, he never was like super open
with her again kind of like Bill in the beginning but
he's also predisposed to protect things I think.
So anyway look I'm really enjoying it, the next episode seems like it's going to be
very action, it's gonna be a huge change it feels like from this one.
I hope that people watch it,
I hope that they realize that there are amazing stories being told in video games.
This episode is super similar to what actually happened in the game, but
the game has an amazing story.
The second one playing the second Last of Us was one of the most like gut wrenching
story experience I've ever had in my life.
I've read so many books but it's just so amazing and
I cannot wait until they eventually make, that's gonna be in the show eventually and
it's going to blow people's minds and things that happen.
Final thing I'll say is HBO might be the only streaming
service that I pay for every month and it's worth it.
>> That's the only streaming service you pay for every month.
No, the only one I pay for and I feel like it's always worth.
>> Sure.
>> You know like I'm gonna cancel my Netflix pretty soon because I
don't even watch Netflix right now.
A few things but yeah, I mean they've got House of the Dragon and
they have the Last of Us.
>> They have all the good shows.
>> Sure.
>> Yeah.
>> It's good shows on everything but.
>> They have all the good.
>> You don't watch the marvel shows, I understand that but.