House of R - 'The Last of Us' Season 2, Episode 6 Deep Dive

Episode Date: May 20, 2025

Joanna and Mal are back to talk about the latest episode of 'The Last of Us'! They take their signature deep dive and discuss this flashback-filled episode. They talk about Joel and Ellie’s trip to the museum, Eugene’s death, Ellie finding out the truth, and more! (00:00) Intro (18:44) Austin, 1983 (44:48) Vanilla … It’s Easier (52:59) “All My Missing Stolen Parts” (01:25:54) “This Is Just Too Good to Be Gone” (01:50:04) “When the Hurricanes and Cyclones Raged” (02:00:29) “I’m Grateful Now They’ve Left” (02:05:35) “All the Complexities and Games” (02:29:45) “When Wind Turned Dirt to Dust” (02:32:34) “All the Missing Crooked Hearts” (02:37:11) “All the Promises at Sundown” (02:56:03) Spoilers: A Fungus Among Us Hosts: Mallory Rubin and Joanna Robinson Producers: Steve Ahlman and Carlos Chiriboga Video Supervision: John Richter Social: Jomi Adeniran Additional Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Market. Welcome back to House of R. I'm Joyner Robinson and joining me today. Is that a freshly ink tattoo? It's Mallory Rubin. If I ever do lose you. Should we just start crying right away? Absolutely not. What are you doing? You maniacs. I'll wait six to seven more minutes to begin solving. Okay, cool. Here we are to talk to you about season two episode six of the last of us titled The Price. If you have not watched this beautiful episode television, I really recommend you go watch it for you listen to us yammer about it for a couple hours because it is a piece of art.

Yes. And you should see it, not hear us talk about it until after you've seen it. Okay, so before we get into everything we want to say about this incredible episode of television. I have some programming reminders for you. The Midnight Boys, Poo! Poo! We'll be with you Sunday night. Yeah. To cover the last-us finale, which is so soon. It's next week. Oh, my gosh. So that is coming on Sunday night. And there's also like a double button mash this week. They're doing Doom. The Dark Ages. And Tom Bissell is, no, I'm going to do that again because I know who that is. So I'm going to reverse that. say. I'm just going to not, I'm just never going to get

specific on button mesh. That's what I'm going to do. Okay. I'm going to go back to the beginning of programming reminders. You ready? Programming reminders this week, the Midnight Boys Poo-Poo-Poo! We'll be here with you Sunday night with our Last of Us finale thoughts. We are also hoping to hop on a little earlier than usual with our Last of Us finale

thoughts. So you should have a lot of solace for you at the end of this content paloosa that has been and or and The Last of Us in the form of podcasting. There's also double button mash this week. They've got their regular The Last of Us check-in as well as another treat for you. And then the Mint Edition crew are doing a murder bot check-in. Love it.

For the Scars Guard's heads. That's right. Welcome to Apple TV Plus, another sci-fi adventure. So that is happening. Also, we here on the House of Our are, of course, doing a second episode, this week, as we usually do. And we're doing a Rogue One re-visitation through the lens of Andor. Can we? So we talk about Rogue One. As I already told, threatened Mallory. I will also be watching re-watching a new hope to close out the Death Star trilogy. Email us, hobbiton dragons at gmail.com.

If you have rogue one thoughts or feelings, you already have. We've got a lot of those emails, but I always welcome more. And we welcome your Last of Us feelings and everything you have to say. That's jumping in the gun a little bit. I just plugged the email. But Malay Rubin, what else should people keep in mind is they're kind of putting all this beautiful, delicious podcasting we have available for them? Yeah, you know, on the email front, keep the emails coming because we're doing one of our favorite seasonal traditions soon as spring mailbag. Mailbag.

Hit us with your Last of Us Season 2 and Last of Us finale emails. Hit us with your emails about anything else that might be coming up over the next few months. And while you're at it, you're at your computer, your phones in your hands, follow the pod. follow the House of our follow the ringerverse follow the prestige tv podcast on spotify or wherever you get your podcast and follow the ringerverse youtube channel because you can watch full video episodes of house of our and midnight boys beo peop on spotify and the ringerverse youtube channel you can also follow the ringerverse on the social media platform of your choosing we are on instagram tick to twitter etc we can't wait for you to

spend the finale with us On Sunday night. Where's the world. One last thing. Spoiler warning. Right? Okay. So just in case you're joining us for the first time here at the end of the last of us, the season, just I'll let you know how it's going for us this season.

I watched a playthrough of The Last Was Part 2. Mallory Rubin played all of the game within just a couple weeks. That's all it took her. So we have gone all the way through the end. of the last one's part two, watching and playing the game. So we know what happens. We're going to keep all of those

future days, those future thoughts in our spoiler sections. We'll have a spoiler section, like a little game player. And it's actually going to be, I think, kind of a smallish one this week at the end of this podcast. So we have a little spoiler section at the end.

We will, however, be using our game knowledge and sort of compare, contrast, the adaptation choices that they made. A lot of the flashbacks that we see in these episode are faithful adaptations. And a lot of stuff is brand new. So we want to sort of talk about those two aspects to adapting this story.

We're here to talk to you about season two, episode six, The Price, written as per yuge by Craig Mason, but also Neil Druckman and Halley Gross and directed by Neil Druckman. And on the Neil Druckman, Holly Gross front, just want to plug. The Prestige TV podcast has a great interview with Neil and Halle that you'll be able to hear on that feed a little later this week. I just said great. interview. I did it. So like, you can decide it's great. You can decide it as great, but Neil and Hallie were phenomenal. Really, really wonderful, very generous at their time. We really appreciate it. So it really helped me appreciate this episode even more than I already did. So Neil and Hallie, of course, were like the co-writers of the original game. Neil, we've

talked about a lot, but Hallie's been working on season two. And so this is the first episode that has her name on a writing credit. She's also credited for the finale. So her insights are very very helpful here. Mallory Rubin. Love it. The price, Joe. Every path has its price. The tagline in the season. Episode 3 called The Path and here, episode 6, The Price? Delightful. Love a little bookend. Delightful or devastating when you hear Pedro Piscala, as Joel says, The Price? I mean, I was an absolute wreck watching list, so.

Blubbering my way through the title drop. Hey, that's the name of the episode. Okay. All right Rubin. We've already previewed that. We like this episode. Any big picture thoughts you want to share here at the top? I thought this was an all-caps masterpiece, just genuinely one of my favorite hours of TV, like, ever. I thought this was extraordinary, exquisite.

It was really breathtaking. It's the kind of episode that I already. know even before finishing the season, even before finishing the series, I will think back on for the rest of my life and always love revisiting. Obviously, there are a number of comps to the Bill and Frank episode, long, long time from last season, that we both loved and that many people loved so much, you know, this idea of exploring a relationship through these little vignettes and key moments across time. Your opening note in the doc was our favorite quote,

one of our favorite quotes from that episode. And it's the thing that was on my mind as well the most throughout this entire hour of TV paying attention to things. It's how we show love because what is happening between Joel and Ellie and these birthday memories, these flashbacks, the way that we saw how Joel tried to bring joy to the person who was most important in his life, the way that we saw those moments of wonder and genuine happiness between them,

while knowing where we would find them at the beginning of season two, the way we're moving throughout time here, the end of season one, weighing on our minds, Joel's death, the rage and vengeance tour that Ellie is on, this confluence of circumstances, it's time travel in many ways, right?

And I thought that, using the birthdays as a framework was like almost Andorian, you know, coming off of season two of covering Andor where it's like this like key moment in a year and what makes that day special. And of course, like the idea of love and joy and care, but also change and growth and evolution. And the thing that brings you together and that you share eventually becoming like a wedge in a moment where you feel the distance between yourself and another person. And And I thought the idea of using the birthdays was particularly brilliant, given that Joel lost Sarah and did not get to continue to celebrate birthdays with Sarah and, like, thinking about what those days for Ellie growing up and getting older would mean to Joel through that lens was like a really brilliant touch. And the other quote, like right there neck and neck with paying attention to things that I was thinking about all the time in this episode was you can't heal something unless you're brave enough to say it out loud.

and that this is what we finally got here. We had been talking, for anyone who wasn't listening to our spoiler section, we had kind of been talking throughout the last few episodes about, like, okay, when are the flashbacks starting? Because they are dotted throughout the game. And, like, I was longing for them and waiting for them and really eager for them to begin and getting them all in one episode. Like, this was not what I would have anticipated.

I was surprised by this choice, but I think it led to something truly, truly miraculous, just a little miracle of an episode of TV that I will cherish forever as like someone who really loves Joel and Ellie in their relationship. So I thought this was exceptional. I really can't wait to talk about it with you today. I'm just like really honestly emotional and like kind of overcome so I don't know how I'll get through it. But we'll try. That's what we do here. Like like Nemik would want us to. We'll try. We'll try. Listen, you said all of that so beautifully. And I'm so excited to talk to.

you about this. That paying attention to things, it's how we show love quote from long, long time last season is so immediately applicable, of course, to what Joel is doing here in terms of like, I told you I'd teach you how to play the guitar, so I'll teach you to play the, this is sharing a thing that I love with you. The next birthday, I paid attention when you talked to me about how much you love astronauts in space, and I've moved heaven and earth to give you this incredible experience, I pay attention to you.

The ways in which Joel fails to pay attention to Ellie as she grows up and moves away from him. And the way in which Ellie's revelation about what Joel has done, which she as she says at the end, she always knew but she really came to terms with over the course of these years,

she gets from paying attention to him and his like facial expressions. And, you know, as we've been talking about in the spoiler section and as the showrunners have talked about the revelation for Ellie in the game comes through like a side quest where she goes, leaves Jackson, finds a tape, finds concrete physical evidence of what Joel did.

To change that to be a sort of a relationship aspect, like, I know you well enough now to really, really know, and I am mature enough to know, and I have moved away enough from the denial that I, the comforting denial that I gave myself. that you did this, to know that you did this. And that's a form of love, even when it's exposing painful things, even when it's exposing hard truths, to really know someone is to love them. And so she's making a bid. And again, it's devastating that it has to be the child in this parent-child relationship who has to make the first move here. But she's the one making the bid for, let me fully know you. Let me know the darkest parts of you. Because that is important to being in

a loving relationship is knowing all of you. So I think that was extremely beautiful, extremely painful, extremely lovely. And I think to your point about the way in which the flashbacks are used inside of the game, they're sprinkled throughout. They're often juxtaposed with horrible violent acts. And then we sort of like, like, A, here's a break. B, here's what we're fighting for. C, et cetera, you know, throughout the game.

But all those vignettes are from Ellie's point of view. So what we're watching those flashbacks is Ellie's memory of Joel. We're sketching together who Joel is via Ellie's lens because Joel is gone and we don't have that opportunity. They constructed this episode differently and, you know, Neil talked to me about it. You'll hear about that if you listen to that interview. But this is a Joel POV. We're getting memories that Joel has that Ellie doesn't have access to. So it removes this question.

You know, we got an eel from Tim. And this is a question that a lot. lot of people had going into this season of television was there's this debate inside the game fandom of whether or not that conversation between Ellie and Joel on the porch, which comes at the end of the video game, was a wishful thinking memory. Is this something that Ellie wished had happened so that she got this kind of resolution before she lost Joel? And because these flashbacks are from Ellie's POV. That's an argument, I think, a game player could make in theory. But since this is a Joel POV episode, that makes that memory feel just a true thing that happened

and not remove some of that question and some of that subjectivity. It feels like we're getting a more objective version, or at least a Joel prospective version of how this story went. And I think that's really interesting and really, really powerful. And also, most importantly, it's been zero days since we last saw on. Yeah. Great to be back with Sweet Shimmer. And great to be back with Joel. Yeah.

Equally important. Beautiful. One A, one day, you know. Anything else you want to say before we get into our breakdown? I think that the three of the, like, I mean, everybody has their personal favorite things and everybody's list is specific to them, I think. But painting with a very broad brush and generalizing recklessly here, I feel like if you like polled gamers and said, you know, what are your favorite moments from the game? What are like the most iconic moments from the game?

I feel like three of the answers that would pop up in the top five are in this episode. Future days. Future days. Museum. Kinelli to space and the porch. This is just genuinely iconic stuff all packaged into one moment and stitch

together. Not only with as you alluded to the amending and removal, like the subbing out of certain scenes from the game that we don't get here. We'll talk about those in more detail as we go. But then the introduction of new canon I love what you're saying already about the way that this Eugene reveal is deployed to be anchored in this relationship and what Ellie can clock about Joel.

Everything that we get, which we're going to talk about at the beginning of our deep dive here, about Joel's history and childhood and father is new. So this is just when we talk about the last of us overall and we talk about not only the world and the story and the performances and the writing and the themes, but also like the last of us as an act of adaptation, this is a fascinating. episode and a lens into that process. What stays and remains exactly intact? What do we slide out or alter and what do we introduce here that maybe we didn't have an opportunity to do before or never even occurred to us, which was really interesting. I thought to hear Neil talk about with Javier with Joel's father. Yeah. Yeah, this was just like every minute and it's a longer episode, 60 minutes. Every minute counts. Yeah. Before we get to my new favorite character in television, Javier Miller, I want to mention one of the thing.

And this is with, I mean, do you do with fans, but no. With, I just want to bang the drum one more time for one of my favorite ways in which we talk about television, which is this idea of surprise versus suspense. And you brought this up. when you talked about the fact that, like, we know where this lands. Like, we know the arc of this relationship. We're watching the way that Craig Mason described it is like a ticking time bomb. Every year, we're moving closer to a moment in their relationship that we know is fractured. And we also already knew that Eugene had not only died, but that Joel had killed him in a way that upset Gail.

Yes. So these are the things that are looming, and we're getting ever closer to them. You know, we have a scene a little earlier between. Gail and Joel in the diner, essentially, that, like, Gail's, like, annoyed, but she doesn't, like, hate Joel to his core yet. You know what I mean? And so we're just sort of, like, it hangs over. So there's an inside of this story that is full of so much love and hope and connection,

there is dread and anticipation. And it is always my preferred method of storytelling that. suspense over surprise. We know that the bomb is ticking under the table and we're listening to it ticked down even as songs are being sung or we're going to space or whatever it is. The time is running out on these years with these people. So really, really powerful stuff. All right.

Should we go to the 1980s? Let's do it. Let's do it. already have done. Austin, Texas, 1983. Yes. Mallory, my beloved BBI expert, check my math. Joel is 16 years old here? That's correct. I thought you were going to say, check my math. This is the last time the Baltimore Orioles won a World Series, also true.

As you know, that's top of mind to me always. I'm always orienting my perspective around the year 1983, because I know as well as you know that that's the last time the Baltimore Orioles last won the World Series. Okay. We made a second. 16-year-old Joel Miller, he is already a protector of Tommy. And something I think that's really interesting here is that, like, we immediately admire Joel, right? He's protecting his brother, not only from this, like, scrape that he has found himself in, but from their father who were about to meet. And those are all good things. And then wraps up inside those good things, as is ever the case often with humans and certainly with Joel Miller.

There is this negative aspect that, you know, Mazin referred to as like, his savior complex, right? There's the protector, Joel the protector, but also Joel the Savior is part of it too. And I also love what Holly Gross said where she was talking, I think, in the post-episode conversation, she was talking about this idea of Joel putting his body between the people he loves and pain and willing to lie for those people. So, like, this is so much of Joel already formed at 16 years old. Joel the protector, Joel, like the way in which family is so important to him.

And then the way in which lies are wrapped into this entire concept right from the jump here. Yeah, I love this as an opening note. And we often talk about Joel's protective instincts, Joel, the protector, through the lens of Sarah, right? Through the lens of Joel becoming a father. And so it was so fascinating. You know, we'll use the word, I think, like recontextualize a lot as we go today. And it is a deepening of something that we already understood to be true about Joel, like the idea of this germ of his core identity tracing back to his relationship with his brother. Then we can think about all of these moments between Joel and Tommy as well in different ways, right?

Like his need to go find him. You're sure he's safe at the beginning of season one. And like, why are you doing here? Like I came to save you. Like even when they're adults, Joel still thinks he needs to do that. And to trace this back to this home that they share. with their abusive father and to understand that for Joel, this need to defend the person closest to him in the world

is like not only ingrained in his sense of self, but ingrained in how he thinks about what love is and loving another person and being close to that person and being present for them. I just thought this was like so illuminating as an opening note. But I really, really love that we get to understand this about Joel because, again, this is all new canon. Yes, this is new to the show. The Joel and Tommy scene that came to my mind first was when they first get to Jackson and Joel and Tommy have this conversation.

And Tommy reveals to Joel that he's going to be a father, right? And Tommy says, and we always look to scans at Joel for his reaction here. It was never a good look. But when Tommy says, I don't know, I feel like I'd be a good dad. and Joel says, guess we'll find out, like a real piece of shit, honestly. So tough. And then they, you know, they basically have a further conversation about that. It's not just left there.

But the added context of the fact that they came. So, you know, but I will just say on the official podcast, Neil and Craig were like, hey, we grew up in the 80s. Parents hit their kids. So I'll just say, I grew up in a household where our parents hit their kids. So, like, this is a household that I grew up in. And like the fear when you grow up in a household that you or other people consider abusive, the fear you have of becoming a parent as a result of that and what kind of parent you'll be, one of the greatest joys of my life as an adult is watching my sister be like an incredible parent to her boys.

And something that like we were, I will say I was always like really, really nervous about, not about her, but about myself. And it's just sort of like, how ingrained are these patterns, how inevitable are these patterns? And so for Joel to like push on that bruise for Tommy of like, guess we'll see if we'll be a good dad.

And like I think I had always interpreted that as like, you're my younger brother, you're not very responsible, you were in jail, like when the mushroom apocalypse happened, like all like those kind of implications. And jealousy? Well, jealousy, yes.

But like that that those were the, vulnerabilities that he was hitting at Tommy. And learning that there is this other vulnerability that he's hitting at here specific to their joint upbringing is, again, it's a terrible look for Joel, but we already knew that. And then getting to see inside of this episode, I like that in all of ways that this has echoed down the line for Joel and something that I think is so important inside of all of this is that

the good with the bad, right? What are the negative cycles that are passed down the generations? And then what are the, like, slight improvements that we can hope and look for, like, that are passed down the generations? That's something that's very top of mind for the creators of this episode. But I like that inside of this very joel, P-O-V-Joyle-centric episode, we get Tommy the dad, right? Like, Tommy taking Benji to bed in the dance scene. So, like, Tommy as a, like, we don't know all the ins and outs of that household, but, but like as an apparently pretty good dad inside of this reality is just like it's just a moment inside of this episode, but it's there.

And it feels important. Absolutely. Mallory, I try not to like, because I'm usually ahead of you and we're watching screeners and I try not to like spoil things for you ever. But the one thing that I did text to you kind of early. Yeah. And I tried to like crop certain things out. Yeah. to avoid any spoilers,

but I just wanted you to like know, because I think I cropped out his name tag, which says Jay Miller on it. I was like, let me crop that out. So Mallory doesn't see that, but I wanted you to know that Tony Dalton was in this episode. Jack DeCaine himself.

Lalo Salamanca, like Tony Dalton, our guy is here as Javier Miller. And Mallory immediately was like, Detective Mallory is always on the case. She's like, hmm, that looks like it said in the past. And I just like did not reply to him. I was just like, Detective Mallory put the magnifying glass down.

I was trying to protect you to spoilers. Unless my dude is just like walking around in a deputy uniform, you know, three decades into the mushroom apocalypse. It had to be said in the past. But did you, did you know from the moment I sent that to you that he was playing Joel's dad? Okay, good. No. We did one thing right. And that was crop a name tag.

Okay. So it says Jay Miller on the name tag, but we know from the criticism. This is Javier Miller. This is Tony Dalton. We love this actor so much. So much. I think in an interview with Alan Seppin Wall, Neil called him the most charming and dangerous man on television.

And I just, like, love that combination. And the thing that I love, we're obviously going to go through this whole thing on a grand level. That's what we do. But something he did. I have spent so many hours between, you know, various Marvel properties and in a long, term investment better call sol staring at tony dalton doing what tony dalton can do like i felt like i

knew most of the cards in his deck there is a thing that he does inside of this scene where he basically transforms himself into pedro pascal in a way that i've never seen from him and i thought was so impressive like there was just no when he is breaking down later on and then you watch jol break down over the course of this episode. There is just a clear father-son link between these two guys that it was just stunning to me. Absolutely stunning. Marvelous. They kept this cameo quiet, man. This is like an impressive thing to keep quiet. And, you know, particularly because like Joey pants had been announced and like other things had been formally announced. But this was just a really delightful little little secret to stumble upon at the start of this episode of

True Thrill. What an incredible performance. And yeah, just like one that will stay with us and feels like we got more time with this, with this person that we did. A secret only slightly spoiled by your, by your friend and podmate, me. Okay. Okay. So we get this, we get this lie from Joel.

He lies to protect Tommy. And then when his dad says, like, I'm not stupid. Right. Tommy's buying the drugs. You walked by. I saw it was going on. You started punching. I'm not stupid. And then we get this like nostril flare. You're not going to hurt him from Joel. So this is like everything we're talking about. The lies, the violence, blah, blah. But I thought was so fascinating in Craig's analysis of this scene that he helped, right, was this idea that when Javier goes, like, sort of sighs and goes to get the beers in the fridge and opens one for himself, opens one for Joel, in a way that we can. tell that this is the first time that he's done something like this, right, in the way that he opens it for him. He's not like, let's do our regular father something of getting a beer. It's like, this is a rite of passage growing up moment, a ritual for Joel. And that Craig is identifying Joel using violence as his dad being like, well, you're a man now. And I can connect with you on a new level because you like me are using violence in the name of love,

which is a wild, upsetting thing to bond over. But nevertheless, that's where we find ourselves. Yeah, I mean, this early glimpse into like how violence and protection, the manifestation of violence and the idea of protection are and have been and entwined. For Joel, you know, harming. I mean, like, on the one hand, you can think of, like, teens getting in fights and beating each other up as, like, teens being teens. But when we, you know, really assess what is driving that, like the idea that,

Joel harmed another person to make sure that Tommy was okay. It is a pattern. It's like us seeing the beginning of this pattern that will then last through Joel's life. And I love like, you know, these archetypes like that are a part of who a person becomes. You know, we already talked like Joel to protector, Joel the liar, Tommy the troublemaker. All of these things are here in this amazing way. You know, on the Tommy front, like I was thinking about again like that we've talked about the scene between Joel and Ellie in the car where Joel in episode four of season one is describing Tommy as a joiner.

And we've talked about that part of it a lot. But now you look back at more of the Joel aspect of that. And just even talking about how Tommy convinced them to go to Boston. Like, I went mostly to keep an eye on him. Keep him alive, right? I got to go get him. Like the idea of need of how another person needs Joel. It's just like so interesting.

And the other thing that I was thinking about on the liar front, Joel the liar, Because obviously so much of this episode is about lies and truth, right? And Joel's lie and the cost of that lie. But I was thinking a lot about like Gail saying, you know, in episode three of this season, I think they were walking side by side from the start and the way we and the creators talk about Ellie is a liar. And how interesting that is too. Like that the thing you recognize in another person is a part of you? It's just like such a rich aspect of their bond.

We have talked that before with like sort of the violence, the darkness and the violence and something like that, this line that comes the end and hand. And the way in which like, oh, but I never thought you would use that against me, sort of. I love that you bring up the Gail thing. The thing that really struck me rewatching this episode, Gail calling Ellie a liar. She's a liar. and Gail's most impactful moment of Ellie with Ellie being Ellie telling her the truth. Right. It's fascinating to me because we have, you know, we've heard from a lot of like therapists who watch the show or whatever and they're like, we don't think Gil is a very good therapist.

I think Gail would say I don't think I'm a very good therapist. So like it's no surprise. But like I can't help but think about like, is Gail resentful of Ellie telling her the truth in that moment? because there is, she hates Joel for what he did. But when Joel tells Gail that lie, she is comforted. And she snuggles into his embrace for comfort. And then Ellie tells her the truth, you know, and as the showrunners see it, she tells her the truth, not for Gail, but to punish Joel. And it wounds Gail. And so Gail walks away from that, yes, hating Joel, but also.

I think resenting Ellie for destroying that fiction for her. And so is she truthful in saying Ellie's a little liar? Yes. But is there a personal resentment attached to that in terms of like, and the fact that that personal resentment might be attached to a moment of truth telling is pretty fascinating. Love that. Okay. So Javier is telling this story.

And I loved, this is such a disturbing story. He's telling. He's telling it with like a little bit of detachment and a music. He's about to break down. So we know that this is not like light, but he's just sort of like, you know, I stole a candy bar. Grandpa made me apologize, blah, blah, right before I got out of the car. And then he makes this really violent smacking noise. As he's just sort of like laughing a little bit, he's like, blood everywhere. Your grandma thought I was dead. Like this is a deeply disturbing story. Horrified. That he's just like, this is just a thing that happened to me. This is just how it was. And mouthwired shut for two months. And then this is the like kicker for me. humiliation because everyone knew.

It's not just, and like, okay, so I will say this is someone who grew up in a household with parents who were not the best in general, is when other people know that that happened to you, there is this, like, such deep shame associated with because this is the person who is supposed to, like, love you and protect you and love you the most and the deepest. And there's this shame associated with, like, walking through the world and people being like, oh, that's so sad that your parent did that. And you don't have that basic thing that all the rest of us walk around. That is just like the warped way in which you take it upon yourself and think it's a default in you. And this is just like, that is such a key part of it, this humiliation because everyone knew that my father had done this to me.

And, you know, you have to walk around this, like, physical representation. of it for Javier and then for Joel later, I was thinking about this a lot with Joel later when he pushes Seth at the dance and Ellie, you know, screams at him in front of everyone and he has this like

basically walk up, Ellie's right about a lot of things and so I'm not saying Ellie is wrong to yell at him at any point because he's got this big lie that he has let fester between them. But the way the like shameful, wounded walk

embarrassment that he does out of that dance. I was just thinking a lot about this idea of like humiliation because everyone knew about the breakdown in our relationship about this person, my daughter, who is supposed to love me because I love her, is so angry at me. And I have failed her in this way that I'm not even ready yet to talk about. I will in a few minutes on the porch, but I'm not ready yet. So it's just festering right now. So it's really fascinating.

The layers of, and you know, Craig and Neil talked about this as like experiential for them. Neil said that he like talked to his dad later in life and was like, hey, man, you hit me a lot. What the fuck? And his dad like, you know what? I wouldn't do that now. Right. I wouldn't. It was just a thing we did in the 80s and I wouldn't do it now.

I thought that was really interesting thing for them to channel through this. backstory that they give to Joel. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I thought that like those bookends, obviously, we'll talk about that much more through the lens of the porch conversation and what Joel shares with Ellie. But, you know, we get the first part of that here with, I'm doing a little better than my father did.

And, you know, when it's your turn, I hope you do a little better than me. And I don't think that the show is saying that Joel is like an abusive father. I think Joel is very like nurturing and doting. But, and obviously would actually harm anyone in anything else in order to ensure the safety for his child. His violence is directed outward. But obviously what the show is interested in is the cycles of violence, the role that violence plays in our lives, the cycles of trauma. the cycles of trauma, the cycles of grief and regret, and then also, and this is central to this episode and to the world of the story, the cycles of forgiveness and the cycles of progress

and the way that those things are entwined. And so expanding our understanding of Joel to include this moment with his father, which heightens our understanding of him and then heightens that theme when he imparts that message to Ellie on the porch, just do a little better than me, was such a beautiful way to convey this to us and help us understand. And this gets back to one of your opening points about this episode being rooted in Joel's point of view in perspective. And like what all of the things that that unlocks and clarifies for us, but also like really the significance of that is our time to understand Joel runs out. Right. Like there is, there's time that we still have to understand Ellie

and to process how Ellie is thinking. And this is such a central, essential moment to really try to better understand for us and for Ellie, Joel. And then when Javier reached over to pat Joel's shoulder and we saw The Watch, not a watch, the watch. The watch.

I was like floored just to understand not only that this was a part of Joel's father and Joel's history and Joel's past that he carried with him, we have always thought about this as the symbol of time-stopping for Joel when Sarah died, and it is. But now it takes on this whole extra dimension of symbolic richness, which is it doesn't just represent to Joel time-stopping in the way that loss can totally unmoor him. It represents the capacity to try to forgive somebody in your life who has wronged you. And what could possibly be more important than that as we head into the seminal moment between Joel and Ellie? I was honestly like blown away by this. I absolutely love this touch.

And I think that's so key. And I think this idea of recontextualizing it via that lens and also this idea of like, and we talked about this when Ellie finds the box on Joel's bed and it has the watch and the gun. And Craig Neal talked about the fact that like she goes. blows right past the watch because that's not that is nothing you do with her and she goes for the gun because the watch is that's Joel as Sarah's dad and so it was like Joel the dad watch is what we thought that was the fact that it is also Joel the son watch yeah like what does it mean to be a dad what does it mean to be a child and something that Craig has been coaching us to look out for from the beginning of the season is what's the difference between loving something as a parent

and loving something as a child or loving someone as a parent, loving someone as a child. And so this idea that this watch represents for Joel both stages of that and that Ellie as we meet her on the porch at the end of this episode

only knows one side of that. You know, I didn't put this in my nose of one of my favorite sort of Craig Mays and dad moments was when he got sidetracked onto this tattoo diversion on the official podcast because he was like, he's like, kids just don't understand

me get a tattoo is forever, man. And they don't understand. I mean, I got a tattoo and I was like the minute I turned 18, I got a tattoo. And I have no regrets about that tattoo. But it is like, yeah, it's very different from like me decades later contemplating and getting a tattoo. It's a different kind of decision. You know, it's interesting. Molly Rubin, how much pain did it cause you to watch the opening credits and see the double the double mushroom sprout of Joel and Ellie at the end of the opening credits?

It just was already inconsolable. At that point, like, I just like... Several episodes of Ellie just alone, you know? Like, the show has such an amazing ability to give us these little life rafts that are also the tip of Ellie's switchblade, like, right into the heart. You know, it's all of it at once. Like, the pain and the sorrow is also the beauty and, like, the reason it hurts is because we care. And yeah, I just... I think the other thing, in addition to, like, recontextualization and paying attention to things that we'll probably repeat...

and hit a lot and hammer a lot. It's like how human so much of what we see is. You know, the showrunners talked about this a lot, how important it was to show what is true. And the true things, as you noted beautifully at the top, are not always good. It's like about the good and the bad and how those things are entwined.

And like, that's what you miss when somebody's gone, all of it, right? And so just like to get that little return, like this episode is a portal. I mean, it is a, and that is, that is the, function too of the flashbacks in the game. It's additional insight and understanding into these crucial moments that have transpired between Ellie and Joel, but it is also just this little like a blessing of time with the person you lost. And like we've talked about this all season, right? What is the reaction to seeing the jacket and putting your face into it and crying?

What is the reaction to being able to reflect with appreciation and tenderness when in the take on me scene like Joel taught you well? And then what is the reaction when a, a, a, bar of future days, sets Ellie concretizes the wrath and the pursuit, right? Like, it's not linear. Depending on what is happening in your life and where you are with, like, your own pain, a memory of somebody is going to mean something different to you. And I think like the way that this episode, including just seeing the two of them together again and then remembering what that journey was of them becoming in us, it was.

it was such an effective little shorthand to like pull us right back into the space and not only tell us you're about to be with them again, but like remind us of all the time that we had already spent together. And now we get to fill in the blanks of these missing years. Just like incredible. I think also that's beautiful. I think also like given how much we've been talking about what it means for Ellie to be all alone in this world, what is what is the danger of Ellie all alone? Something that, you know, Dina and Jesse have. tried to like sort of pull her back from, you know, in their friendship, partnership capacities. But, you know, thinking about the scene we get between Jesse and Ellie the morning after the dance, after now that we've seen the porch scene. When Ellie is talking to Jesse and she says, you know, yeah, we've had our problems, but he's Joel and I'm Ellie and nothing's going to change that. Like that's it.

We're us. Like, you know. And now we know a little bit of. more about where she gets that certainty, which seems so contradictory to the outburst at the dance the night before. And so we know the substance of that. But even without the port scene, that was just always true, that there was just this, like, spine of usness that was so key to who they are.

And Ellie is walking around without that, like, with that spine ripped out of her, without this, like, centering identity of us. And so Ellie all alone in the world is a dangerous thing. And even inside of these vignettes, even inside of these episodes, these years, these later years where there's trouble with her and Joel, even when it's at its worst at the dance or with Eugene or whatever, there's still an usness that is rooting her to something. Yeah. That even when it was bad, it was still stabilizing. And now it's just gone. Right.

And if I ever should were to lose you and I'd surely lose myself. This is where we find yourself. Okay. Let's talk about cake. Shall we? Let's do it. Let's take solace in cake. Sounds good.

Okay. Vanilla. It's easier. We get introduced to Seth in a different mode than we see him. Seth the Barkeep, I mean, we've seen him making sandwiches. But Seth the Barkeep, who used to be a police officer, is a grandpa. and also responsible for making some birthday cakes. And I loved this, again, to use your buzzword that you're identifying recontextualization of Seth.

Does it surprise me that Seth was part of the Milwaukee PD? No. Is it interesting to me to think about Seth as like doting grandpa getting Legos for his grandson? Yes. Is it interesting for me to think about. Joel the smuggler, which has been such a part of, like, his crime and thuggery as, like, I'm a smuggler of Legos, and I've smuggled some Legos out in exchange for a cake for my daughter. Yeah, that's an interesting recontextualization. And having Seth in this episode, the expansion of Seth outside of his role in the game, we've already gotten a bit in his, like, supportive alley on her way to town.

But the expansion of Seth inside of this episode, he's here not only to helpfully give us some exposition about the fact that Joel has been in town for two months so that Mallory and I can write and I can write down our BVYs and we know where we are on the timeline. Yeah. But like this,

this, you know, ugly mirror of Joel because it's part of what Joel's trajectory of knowing Ellie inside of this episode is coming to terms of their sexuality and not just tolerating it but embracing it and supporting her in it going from like I can't conceive of it to a rejection of it to a so you and Dina what's up she'd be so lucky to have you and so his shoving of Seth inside the dance is like a shoving of

a version of him an uglier version of himself perhaps you know the house Javier Miller that exists inside of himself sometimes. And I thought the use of that inside this episode was really, really smart. Yeah, this was such an interesting way to, because now we're not with like the new character of Javier, but people we know to really like some meant for us what the experience of the episode was going to be, that we would be learning something new while also then thinking about what we had come, what we had known already before, wherever, whether it was in the past of season one or the past, the past, for us watching at home of season two, the future for the character's lives. And I like right away just like,

okay, two months, Joel's kind of like, come on, man, it's been two months. I'm not the new guy. And we understand why, because we know Joel, so it's like, that's a decision, right? We returned here and we put down...

Two months means a lot. Yeah. Yeah. Like, we made a home here. We are settling in. So I thought that was just really interesting in terms of what that, like, represents for Joel and Ellie's decision to just say that this is where we're going to be,

this is where we're going to stay. I really liked that. And the Legos, I mean, could I love Joel Miller more, finding Legos and the Apocalypse just this is like really extremely my shit here. Well, here's a question for you, Mallory. If you're out in the outskirts of Wherever'sville that he was looking for these Legos and Seth couldn't find them, but Joel could. Where is Joel looking that didn't occur to Seth?

Where are you keeping your Legos that Joel can find them and Seth can't? It's a great question because he's all like, you know, I'm a smuggler, so I know all the, you know, a floorboard under a rug, whatever. My assumption is more like Seth that didn't open like a crate where the Legos were. That's kind of my assumption. This is not a praise for Joel, but you come to bury Seth even further into the dirt. Exactly. But the thing that I did like about this from the Seth perspective, I don't know. It's just like a reminder for us. So, okay, now we know that Joel knows this about Seth moving forward, that Seth has family, that he is grandkids. But we didn't know that. And then we think about how like when Joel does what he does with the doctor with Abby's father at St. Mary's, it's like, you never know who somebody else has in their life, right? And you never know why they are the way they are and why they do the things they do are what's important to them. And I think people make the mistake.

all the time of assuming they know that about other people. And so, like, I thought this was another just really quick and effective way of reminding us, like, you don't know who somebody else's us is until you do. You don't know what their reasons are until you do. And I don't need necessarily, like if someone calls someone a D-bomb at a dance, like, fuck you, Seth, I don't, like, you being a grandpa doesn't change that for me. But, you know, given that what we see, Seth, later do, which is like insinuate himself into the us of Ellie, right?

They came for us, our people. It is interesting to see the other sort of shapes of Seth. It doesn't change how much I hate what he did. Okay. Dispectable. Our listener Mikhail wrote in about the vanilla is easier point to say it's comforting to know that the islands of Madagascar and Tahiti

have been unaffected by the mushroom apocalypse and continue to ship vanilla bees in distant areas of the Continental once United States. Vanilla extract, it's easier to find than the cacao bean, I guess. Yeah, I'm assuming this is a very expired

Yeah, deeply expired. A glass bottle of McCormick's vanilla extract. But I did think that this was very exciting fodder for you for, you know, where we get chocolate at the apocalypse corner. Yeah, so it's big.

Chocolate's our source. You know what? Since we last had this conversation about Dina's cookies, which to be clear is where this all started. Yeah. Yeah. I've gotten into making my own trail mix. Oh. And.

Lightful. Let me just say. A dried tart cherry. Wonderful. Is the number one. Oh, yeah. Dried fruit option. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. I love a trail mix. And most of the variances that I pursue. Because I have on like, you've never attempted to make my own, nor will I, but I love this. Your entrepreneurial spirit is always on display. It's not that. It's that I hate cashews and it's so hard to find a trail mix without a cashew.

That's a very present nut. Rather than like picking out every cashew, I'm like, I can just buy the discrete ingredients and make my own. You know what? I don't love a cashew either. This is just one. I won't say I hate a cashew, but I don't love a cashew. It's not the nut that I'm most excited to see. But I am excited to see a dry chasu.

cherry and some sort of chocolate. I am basically buying trail mix that is as close to a mixed-up grab bag of candy as possible. And then I'm like, fruits in here because of the cherries. Basically, my trail mix is almonds, dark chocolate chips, and dried cherries, which is essentially a cadbury, like, fruit and nut bar. But I'm just sort of like, well, whatever. I can put a sunflower seat in there. Okay. Joel needs a bone phrasing from Seth.

And he says, relax, you got a lot of it. Great, great reveal of then him, like, clutching the femur? That was a femur, right? I think. No, maybe. Is it big enough to be a femur? Maybe it's an arm bow? No, I don't know.

I don't know. And I won't. I don't know and I won't pretend I do. And tibia? I don't know. Um, it's a dragman's at gmail.com. You're the best. Okay.

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Rest of the sections I've decided to name with the lyrics for future days for some of the bizarre reason, just to make us cry more. So I'm calling this all my missing stolen parts. So Joel goes home clutching the humorous question mark, A-bone. And Ellie's room is empty, but so. still full of her, right? Like, later we will see her room gutted of her belongings and some of her art and her mattress, but this is like the room still full of its elliness.

And I love the Kurt Cobain poster on the door, the middle finger, Kurt Cobain poster. And anything else you want to mention about this? Great to travel across time and see the room and a few different. moments in Ellie's life, you know, later, after future days, we get to really, like, linger on the Pearl Jam poster that has made its way onto Ellie's wall. So that was really fun. But, and we had, we had in a previous episode acknowledged without saying outside of the spoiler section why we were acknowledging it, that we had caught a glimpse of the hat in, in Ellie's room. So now we have an excuse to say, like this hat, which we'll talk about later when we get to the museum team,

is from that sequence of the game, finding the hat, putting it up. on all of the dinosaurs. Honestly great. So over the course of the entire season, that is still my favorite thing that I have seen in Ellie's room. But without question, my favorite detail about Ellie's room

was shared on the official pod where we learned that the Matrix poster could not make it into Ellie's room because Joey Pants is in the Matrix. The Matrix.

You're like, why is Eugene in my movie poster? That's just so funny. And I just loved that. It really made me laugh. Sometimes it happens in film and television. They're like, wait a second. If that poster's there, who do you think this person is? This actor who's in your film or television.

Great stuff. I take you now to Luthier Corner with T.M. With Joanna Robinson, TM. Luthier is the name of someone who makes a guitar. Okay. Or any stringent in different who is to say. Lute, it might be, if you make a lute, you might also be a luthier. So a couple things.

We watched Joel very tenderly and meticulously make this guitar for or refurbish this guitar for Ellie. Worth noting that this guitar inside of the world the game is in many ways a metaphor for Joel himself. And when you hear the creators talk about it, this is how they talk about this guitar. So when we see him rebuilding this guitar and fixing it and tuning it and shing it and shing it and shaping in and replacing missing parts, he is in a way rebuilding himself into a worthy dad for Ellie. We met Joel the dad of Sarah,

and then there was Joel the fucking despicable smuggler, a bad partner to test. Like, that guy existed for a while. And here he is trying to sand down his sharp edges in order to become Ellie's dad. inside of this down to the bone. And I just think that that is incredible. Being of bones, okay. So here's, yeah. Yes. Continue. Please. Some things that break my heart is like I will go, I will, because I watch things like a maniac, because I watched them for work. So I saw him do this,

and I pause, was like, let me figure out what exactly the name of that piece of the guitar is. And I looked all around and I figured it out. And then later he just says it. He's like, the saddle is bone. And I was like, God damn it. I had to look at guitar diagrams to figure that out. Anyway, I'll talk about the guitar. I'll talk about the guitar saddle right now, actually. So I, like, read a couple of guitar blogs about, like, the saddle and what it is. And the saddle is, you know, you've got your strings.

You've got the bridge, which is sort of like the arc piece at the end. And then you've got this piece that can either be bone or plastic or, in some cases, brass that sort of rests right against the strings and has to do. the resonance and you can raise and lower the saddle depending on the resonance or to fix buzzing in your strings or whatever the case may be. And I just think that that is a really

interesting piece of the guitar and something that I'm going to quote one of the many guitar blocks I read. Quote, it takes a great deal of patience and skill to carve a square piece of bone into a compound shape that fits exactly into a bridge slot.

Somehow I, the person I'm writing this guitar blog. Find this process ridiculously fun. I think the best part is shaping the top and carving into a compensated angle to allow the strings to intonate properly. And I just think that like, this is the other part. There's much to making a saddle that is somewhat unquantifiable. I take measurements where I can, but with much of the final shaping is akin to sculpture, file a bit away here, sand some there, and voila a beautiful bone saddle. So it's just like, in terms of the piece of the guitar to

spend time sculpting and shaping I thought this was like a really beautiful and like also really dark and disturbing that this is like a human bone

inside of the guitar but that's that's all part of this we got you don't have to believe me or the guitar blogs I read the bad babies

came through and I just want to note that one of these emails the one from Jacob that I'm about to read I swear came in

before the episode was on airing on HBO. Because I was just on my email working on notes while the episode was airing. And this email came in and I'm like, Jacob, were you writing an email when you're watching the show? I appreciate your dedication. Okay.

So Jacob writes, as Joel is working on Ellie's guitar, we see that it's a tailor. In the background of Joel's bedroom, we see his guitar, which is, I'm going to say it's pronounced epiphany and is a pun. But what do you think, Mallory? Epiphone or Epiphany? Let's go with your interpretation. That sounds right. Hobbiton dragons to Gmail.com by mispronounced a guitar. Epiphany is the quote, consumer brand of Gibson guitars. And while they are fine, they're typically significantly less nice than the tailors. Also, yes, on a guitar like a tailor, there are a few pieces which we made of real bone. Whereas on the epiphany, they were made out of fake synthetic new bone and would not produce as nice of a sound. Joel giving Ellie the nicer guitar, maybe a subtle way to say, quote, I hope you do a little better than me while actually providing a pathway to do so. Love. Beautiful.

And then Sean pointed on this might be more of interested to you, Mallory, the game player, than is something that I understand. In terms of Joel's workbench here, Sean says the same mechanics used to upgrade weapons in the video game are shown to cut down a bone saddle, clean tuners, and carve them off inlay for Ellie's guitar, dad of the year, for sure. Mallory, did you make that connection between weapon upgrading and guitar building here? Yeah, thinking just about the role of the workbench more generally in the story. Like I was thinking about that as well, and I really, I love pairing that with what you're beautifully describing about how this is a way to understand Joel working on himself and rebuilding himself for Ellie and when he, when he becomes better as a result and when maybe all you do when you're crafting is heightened a thing that was already there. Really interesting to think about.

Just lacquer over some of the vlog. Exactly. Exactly. I'm going to hope that that was an animal bone, not a human bone, but who knows? Why did I just assume it was a human bone? I don't know. Because it was sad. It was like you have a lot of it. I guess you have a lot of animal bones from meat. Wow.

I just like was like, this is definitely a animal camp. Why did it take you this long to say that? And why did I just go off of the fact he's a human bone for so long? I'm hoping it's an animal bone. Dare to dream. Dare to dream. But boy. I think, you know, just piles, could be.

I mean, you know, 10 miles to the graveyard. It's just, maybe they wait. Maybe they wait. What if it's an infected bone, like a bone of the infected? Mmm. Mushroom bone. Interesting. Let's just say mushroom bone, shall we?

Sure. So many of our passions combined into one term. I love it. I simply wouldn't eat a friend in the wilderness, and I simply wouldn't shave down a human bone to make a beautiful guitar gift for my daughter. No, but it did come together nicely. I think this was just such a beautiful scene. And yeah, like when you're at, when you, it's really always a thrill, especially from like, if you're like me, and quite bad at the game.

When you get the opportunity to upgrade your weapons, it's incredibly important. Like when I can add a scope or, you know, upgrade my fire rate, whatever the case may be. How much ammo am I able to carry particularly useful for me, a person who wastes a lot of ammo because my aim is dark. dog shit. No. You know, the workbench is a, is a tool for enhancing your violence. And so for this workbench here to be a way for Joel to enhance a representation of his love and his care and his desire to share something with Ellie.

I thought, like, I mean, obviously we'll talk more about this in a second when we get to the actual song, but like then to put a little piece of, because the music is about him, right, but to put a little piece of Ellie in it, a piece he does not fully understand as we will break down in time. but to put that moth in there, to make it for her. I was Googling Taylor because I'm not a guitar expert. I've dabbled in my youth with the idea that I would one day learn to play the guitar and then spoiler alert never did. But I just tell you that I have, I owned a guitar.

Same. Multiple acoustic guitars for like 20 years without ever properly learning how to play. I eventually like, I had a nice one and I eventually just like gave it away to someone. He's like, why are you giving? I was like, because it has just been like gathering dust in my. house and I feel so guilty. So like I get he plays all the time. That's great. Okay, go ahead. I got it from a family member and then gave it to another family member once I realized that I was never going to learn how to use it. But yeah, it just, you know, this is like the level of care

and detail. Taylor in real life sold like you could buy a version of Ellie's guitar. Very cool. That would be a fun thing to have. But this was like, not the last time, but the real beginning of the hammering, the like, the blaring, the paying attention to things that's. how we show love, Claxton. Like, this was just, it's not just a gift. There's a level of care and detail and, like, the desire to craft, which is how we can think about their relationship overall. You know, the journey from your cargo into you are the most important thing in the world

to me, and I want to find new ways to show you that even when I don't always know how. And the pairing across these flashbacks of, like, something that really mattered to Joel. It also matters to Ellie music, but like the guitar really is. the portal for Joel there and then something that really matters to Ellie space, like that it worked in all directions. I just loved, loved.

I thought this was beautiful. And also I could just watch Pedro Pascal craft a pretend to on camera for a show, craft a guitar forever. Wonderful stuff. Yeah, Nick Offerman, Eat Your Heart Out. I think that like, if the guitar is Joel,

this idea that like both the guitar and Ellie are marked with his mom, moth tattoo, matching moth tattoo is something that is marked by death, not great, but also extremely beautiful. And I think, like, you know, just as we get this shot of Javier Miller's arm coming in frame and the watch is front and center, as we're watching either Joel's hands or hand double, I don't know, make this guitar, the watch is ever present in like every frame of that.

And this watch that Sarah, of course, had built and remit. made for Joel for his birthday. This idea of taking a broken thing and rebuilding it and remaking it, reshaping it, and giving it as a sentimental birthday gift is something that Sarah did for him. And I just think that, like, this idea of Joel, yeah, I love knowing. I didn't know this necessarily when I watched the episode, but thinking of Joel sort of like holding out the guitar and staring down the sight of the strings and the arm of it, the word I wrote in my notes was YAR, but that has to do with boats.

I don't know what it means if something is all in alignment on a guitar. But to make sure that it was just like straight and sound and what it should look like. But it's like looking down the scope of a gun. You know what I mean? Not to be like El Mariachi about it, but like that's what like that's what that looks like. And this idea of thinking of Joel doing this stringing and tuning and this is the thing did on the last night of his life. For Ellie,

causes me a lot of pain personally. Agonizing. Causes me a lot of pain. Absolutely. All right. Here comes Ellie. Tell us what's going on with Ellie on the eve of her 15th birthday here. Ellie has burned her arm.

Tommy has brought her home. It smells like pork. It's not Sunday night on HBO if a character isn't talking about the burning of human flesh smelling like meat that they would like to consume. Not a chemical burn, so a little bit of an update here, press it against a pot. And I thought that this was like a, just the evolution across just a couple minutes of this sequence here from angry dad. It's dad mode the entire time for Joel, but the shift from angry dad into just concern and care, right? Okay, okay, easy baby girl, easy. We get the baby girl, which makes us think back to the end. Of course of episode eight from

season one, instant waterworks at association. How can it not be? It's okay. It's okay. You're okay. Like, wanting to comfort. And thinking just above all else, like, how can I prevent your suffering? How can I take away your pain? That this is just like the orienting aspect of Joel's entire reality. And like the emotional distinction between something like, in the fourth episode of this season, Ellie and Dina talking about the arm. Like you said, it was a burn. Most of it is. You did it to yourself. I really wanted to wear short sleeves again and the humor of it. And like Ellie is, you know, high on pain killers here. So Ellie is kind of in like a good energy. Bella, really funny here. Incredible. But for Joel, it's just the worry. The worry of a parent looking at your kid who's in pain and wanting to understand why but not really being able to.

But then saying very shortly here, I do understand. I understand why you did it. This is a of risk, it's a danger. It's a thing that holds you back and you don't want it to. You cover the bite and then people won't ask you. You won't have to worry, but also it's like a mask of this reminder of the immunity quest. And so we have this like source here of understanding that then is a real, a real note of contrast to the moments in the subsequent memories where that understanding is missing. So it's a key thing for the evolution. You and Jesse, right? Incredible stuff. I have a keen eye for these things. You and Jesse? Great, great scene.

Shipp it? Remarkable. I love this too because, so the burn is to conceal something. Yep. The bite, but also to reveal something, allow Ellie to wear short sleeves, right? And so it's like, again, this is throughout this episode where good is tangled up with bad and truth is tangled up in lies. This is just like one of those moments where you're hiding the bite, but you're revealing your arm. And you're just sort of like freeing yourself from long sleeves.

And I think that that is. And also like the secret that she's concealing is one that they share, you know, with the two of them and Tommy. Okay. We get a shot of Ellie's mom's knife. It's just always worth noting. A lot of relics in this episode, the watch, the knife, the guitar, like a lot of like, you know, symbols of people and generations. and then we get the cake. I was waiting on the podcast for them to, like, explain what Ellie does here because, like,

I'm not sure that Ellie is beating the, like, two childish allegations that some of the shitty fans have when she just, as a 15-year-old shove. But Mallory Rubin. Yeah. I love you. You're the closest thing to a grumbling that I know in my life as a friend. Yeah, thank you. What's now?

Yeah. When my back was turned. just shove a handful of cake into your mouth, or would you wait for me to cut you a slice? You know, the last character I can remember just digging in fist-first into a cake with a misspelled name was Dudley-Durzley. So it's not a flattering comp. Not a great comp.

I thought, yeah, this was like a... A real bog-trotter energy here, you know? This was a real, you could feel how young Ellie still is kind of moment. I really did chuckle it. God damn. It's happy birthday, Eli. I'm very funny. Very, very funny.

There are two things that happen here, though. Like, her hands get all cakey, which means, like, she can't take the guitar right away. He has to hold on to it. That's something that it functions. And also, he cracks the hell up when she does this. And, like, thinking about how infrequently we've ever seen Joel crack up, you know, in his life in season one, you know, so to see this, like, moment of levity between them.

Because, like, later, like, in the museum sequence and stuff like that, there will be laughter. will be enjoyment and stuff like that. But like, also, Joel's just doing a lot of crying then too. So, like, this is just a nice moment of just like, me and Joel, say, okay. Some folks call this a guitar. Right from the game.

Love it. Love it so much. And then he, like, talks about all the things that he did, reminds her of his season one promise to teach her how to play. And I love this. Like, Neil Druckman described this as fulfilling his role to her as a dad. And then Craig cited that that line you already quoted,

Dina to Ellie, he taught you well, the beautiful things that we can pass on. Along with the violence, there's the strumming and the fingering. So, you know, yep, I did say that. Indeed. We contain multitudes. And then he sings.

Okay. Yeah. Here's what I'll say about this And I I like if you listen to the interview we did on the prestige pod Neil did talk And he might have talked in other interviews about this But he did talk about sort of like

How Pedro performed this And what I told Neil I will say what I told Neil Which is like one of my all-time favorite musical moments in television Is in you know I love a musical moment Yes Is in the leftover verse when Justin Thoreau is singing Homer Bound badly.

Yeah. But there's so much emotion and vulnerability in it. And anytime I watch that scene, sometimes I just watch that YouTube clip to cry. So, like, that's what this does for me is like, Pedro's performing this badly or like talk singing in is this or like. the best way that I could describe it. I think Petro Pescalo himself is not a very, like, musical person. And so this is just sort of like his approach. This isn't like an acting choice he made for Joel.

He's just sort of like, this is how I can perform this. The emotional authenticity here is so pure. And it really hit me, like, this idea that Joel Miller, okay, with love and respect, Petro Pescal is like top of the world right now. Can is like kissing his feet and his ass and his exposed arms. So, like, he's not going to be insulted by me saying, does not sing her. But, like, the fact that Joel can't carry tune in a bucket,

but we have this season one wish from Joel, when I was a kid, I wanted to be a singer. And then, Ellie, shut up. Why is that funny? And then Ellie says, you got to sing something now. No, come on, man. I'm not going to laugh. You're already laughing.

Yeah, okay. Well, true. Well, you're singing for me later. Then she says, I'm going to save the fucking world. old man, it's the least you can do for me. And he says, fair enough. This is interesting going back into these, like, Astronautil, L.E., uh, guitar, Joel moments from season one and how they're, how they're often juxtaposed because they happen right around, uh, them getting closer and closer to the fireflies is this idea of, I'm going to save, like, it's time. Here's my destiny.

I'm going to save the world. So I'm going to save the world. The least you can do is same for me. I'm going to save the world, not something she got to do in Salt Lake City, something that she believes he took from her, something she's not ready to like sort of address and confront yet. It'll be a couple of years before she can do that. Having that sit right, like waiting for me like a little bomb right next to this quote as I went to look it up was like pretty fascinating that that was just sitting there. Yeah. I loved all of this. You know, the additional. insight because like in the game this is very we're experiencing this future days sequence at the beginning of the story so it's before the time jump in the story it's before we lose Joel it's not one of the first things we see yeah yeah it's not presented to us as a flashback so like experiencing it now as a flashback through the lens of loss um really added like just a different like it it made it distinct and then the performances between Troy baker and Pedro Pascal made it distinct

And so it was simultaneously this really beautiful and anticipated rendering of this iconic cherished thing and then something that felt like it existed in this show and its way. I thought that the, like, you know, you can think back even to like test when they're climbing up in the ladder and the bowels of the pleasure done, bells of the building looking for Robert and the battery at the beginning of season one. And it's like, this has been construction corner with Joel Miller. Like the way that he was talking about how he built the guitar here and kind of slipping into that mode. I just like love when we get to glimpse that from Joel. We got all of these different aspects of who Joel is. You mentioned the levity.

It made me think of like the way the damn broke when he couldn't help but crack up at the diary. It runs in your jeans, you know, pun and like the role of the pun book in Will Levinson and they're bonding in season one. And, you know, to think back to like the insight about like, okay, well, if we get through it, it and we could do whatever we wanted to be or do, what would we, what would we be and what would we do? And like the part of that also to like think back on from that stretch of season one episode six was like, oh, it's we. Yeah. You know?

Yeah. Think about how far we've come. What will we do? Yeah. And like, you know, the, oh, it's we? Like, they weren't, they were becoming the us, but they weren't the us yet. And by the time the guitar resurfaces in the season one finale because Joel finds it in the RV and is like, you know, would you like to learn?

I'll teach you one day. Like so much has changed already. In terms of the nature of the performance, well, actually, before we get there, I was so struck by the table. They talked a lot about this on the official pod, about the lighting and everything and how they were really trying to create this sense

of magic, a magical moment. The thing that hit me, the lighting was gorgeous, as it often is on the show. The thing that hit me was just, this is a table for two, right? this is just a table for two because that's their us. Like, it's a place where only they could sit.

And, you know, you have, I think, some beautiful and important insights coming elsewhere in the conversation about like, well, actually, what does it mean if you don't have room for more people than that, right? But like, then there is something that we're remembering that is, like, precious and prized about this space that is small and belongs just to them. So I really just loved all of that. And then in terms of the nature of the singing itself with future days, this thing that we have been waiting for and I was so excited to see. As Neil, you know, has talked about many times and talked about again this week on the on the pod, like the reason that he chose singing for Joel and space for Ellie is because Troy and Ashley had personal passions for music and space. Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson, who played, yeah, Joel and Ellie in the game. and like Troy Baker is a beautiful singer with his rendition of Future Days is gorgeous.

I feel very sure that Future Days will be number one on my Spotify wrapped this year because since playing the game and now with the show I've just been listening to it constantly, the actual Pearl Jam version, but also watching the game scene quite a bit. I loved that it was so different, not only because of everything that I thought Craig beautifully said on the official pod about the comp then to Dina and Ellie with Take On Me and like the vulnerability

for Joel in that moment, the embarrassment where you can't even look at somebody when you're showing them so truly and fully who you are in an episode that is broadly about can you show somebody who you are? What does it mean to do that? This is a different way into that. I thought the fact that the performance was so right for this version of Joel and for the show, it also just like it did make it distinct. It allows us to get the adaptation, and it feels like specific to each of the places that it exists.

I loved that. And like much like when we watched Dina, watch Ellie sing, like the, it's in all directions. We see what this means to Joel to offer this part of himself to Ellie and show her this and share this. And this is a thing he loves that matters to him. And for Ellie, like, what it means for her to receive it and for it to have been. It was just so completely beautiful. Like, I just loved it. I really agree with everything.

I said. I thought it was incredible. And I think, comparing Troy's performance and Pedro's performance and Ashley's performance and Bella's performance. Like, comparing them is sometimes useful, sometimes not. Yep. Or contrasting them rather. But I think this scene and then the porch scene,

the porch scene is something that I like watched the show version then rewatched the game version then watched the show version then rewatched the game version not just to like track the difference in lines like what was added what was what was kept back

etc but to really sort of marinate in my feelings about how they interpreted both are incredible performances from all four from Troy and from Matthew Ashley from Bella from Pedro.

All phenomenal. The amount of emotion and vulnerability that Pedro brings to this version of Joel is just absolutely stunning. And so you're right that this is a much more, like, for a Troy Baker Joel to be like, here's a thing I can do. Want to see? I'll teach you. That's the thing. for Pedro's version of Joel to be like, I'm not great at this, but I will do it to share

it because you've asked and to share it with you and it's your birthday and I love you. And I will show you that I have always, this is my dream and I'm going to share it with you, even if it's never going to become a reality. And later, of course, Ellie will share her dream of going to space with Joel inside this episode. It's very, very beautiful. Anything you want to say about, we've talked a lot, I think, about future days as a song choice when it was the title of a previous episode. We've gone over the lyrics before and sort of how they apply to this story. Anything you want to add that we haven't already talked about in a previous podcast?

I think just on the recontextualization front now having for everybody who's watching the show, whether or not you've played the game, the understanding of what is happening when Ellie finds the guitar at the theater. sings just the one half line and is ported back to this memory, to what it meant to share this with this person, to what Joel meant to her, and to what it means for Joel to have been ripped out of her life. And then nothing for Ellie right now at this moment in time other than vengeance can fill that space. It's obviously something that we, you know, we are thinking back to it from just the recent stretch of seeing that and the like good, the kind of locking into. Terminator mode when Dina says, all right, I found a path, like, let's go.

What that set in and where that comes from. Really great. Just a beautiful song choice. The lyrics are perfect. It's like iconic for a reason. So good. And for this to then be the bridge into Joel saying about the arm, like I do understand. Like for all of that to be together in this moment here is just really perfect.

Really good. He answered the guitar and she cradles it. she treasures it. And we, you know, we're thinking about it discarded on the floor of the garage later. Agony. Neil, Neil describing this was like, this is the happiest we'll ever see them. I feel like one was on the after show and one was on the official podcast, but he used that to describe this scene. And then he later used to describe the museum scene.

And both could be true. These are the peaks of happiness for these, for these two. And I think this, like, I understand about your arm, like, happy birthday kiddo exchange. Again, the way in which this episode, oh, cross these years is tracking this idea of understanding. And it's like, yeah, Joel does mostly, I would say, get it in this moment. And then later we'll presume things and be wrong or later not bother to ask the question, the why. Right. And then later at the end, when we see him on the porch scene, he's asking Ellie questions and not assuming that he knows the answer, not assuming that he understands her because she has become a complicated adult figure.

And he's like, I got to ask questions in order to make sure I understand. I can't just assume the moth means transformation or whatever it is or that Jesse. or some such. Jesse's your boyfriend, like whatever it is. So, yeah. And the, yeah. Okay.

Oh, yeah. And I guess the last thing I want to say about that. This is something I raised. Actually, when we were talking about the take-on-me scene a couple episodes ago, is this idea of like, when Joel looks at her in this scene and says, I understand about your arm.

I believe him and Nellie believes him and we believe that he does and he is and he knows this secret thing about. her that only Tommy knows and now Dina knows, but like that's, he knows this secret thing about her. When you lose the person who understands you that way or knows those things about you, yes. You lose that part of yourself, which is the lyric of the song. But like that, you know, that is part of, you don't just lose the person, you lose the part

of you that was known by that person. Yes. All right. Next, painful lyric from this song. This is just too good to be gone. And here, in contrast to the future day sequence, which is at a kitchen table instead of Ellie's garage room, sung shakily instead of well, like blah, blah, there's a lot of adaptive choices in that scene. This is as carefully a reconstructed sequence as the Dina and Ellie dance scene was, as the take

on me scene was this is like this is something and Neil has told this story on most interviews about this episode, this idea that when Craig came to Naughty Dog, while they were still working on Part 2, but he and Craig were talking about

adapting the first part of the game for HBO. He's like, hey, you want to see part of the game? And he showed him the astronaut L.A. sequence. And Craig said this has to be in the show and this has to be in show precisely like this. So this is a very meticulously recreated sequence. There are differences,

of course. There are things that are changed and missing for sure. But like, when we interviewed the costume designer Anne Foley on the prestige podcast, we didn't include this part in the interview because it was like a spoiler for the next episode. But she talked about the costume moment that she was most excited and proud of, and it was this recreation of Ellie's shirt. It's like a tank top in the game, but it's like the faded rainbow pattern on the shirt is something they, like, recreated exactly, can't buy it. They had to like make it so that they could have this precise look for Ellie in this museum sequence, because this is such a beloved and notable sequence of the game.

Mallory Rubin, what did it feel like to you when we cut to, one year later and you see the chucks and we're in the stream on the way to something. Like, what did that mean for you? Yeah, this was the best. I mean, this was probably the thing that when I was playing the game, I texted you about the most. You did. Like, it just, this is the first time after Joel's death in the chronology and sequencing of the game that you go back.

This is the first memory. And it just hits you so hard. It's, I think, quite fitting that you're going to a science and history museum because it's like it's like a fossil of a different sword. It's a preservation of a different sort, right? A preservation of a memory of your time with somebody. And it is so painful and so sad, but such a like a little treasure to know that you're going to, I mean, just to honestly to know that you're going to be able to like see Joel Nellie together again and have that experience by traveling into the past. But also that you're going to learn something really important in those moments. about what has transpired between them.

So to get that right and right at the beginning to be like to start the way the memory started, they're traveling, they're on this journey. It's a surprise. Ellie's like, is it a dinosaur? Actually, yes. Like, it is. Is it a lotter of kittens? And just delightful and great stuff.

And like I even enjoyed, you know, Ellie's like, because Joel just wants her to, you know, enjoy being a kid, right? Like, she's eager to do patrol. Don't get me wrong. I love canning vegetables and shoveling shit. He's like, you know, enjoy being a kid. Oh, because childhood has been such a joy for me so far, a little bit of the Bucky Barnes, like, oh, I have a great pass.

So I'm fine, energy from Ellie here. Wow, a Thunderbolt's reference. You love it. A Thunderbolt's great film. I hope everybody has seen it. You know, you, this is the stretch where Joel mentions Jesse and Ellie, like, is just chuckling, like, observing how her, her, her, Dad, Joel, who loves her and cares about her and wants her to be happy also is like kind of

clueless as parents often reveal themselves to be as you grow up. And like, you know, all of that is here. And like, it's just such a, it's a capsule of all of these great moments in their relationship and moments and aspects of their bond. And even like when, when they arrive at the dinosaur and Ellie realizes what it is before we get to the space part. And Ellie climbs. Like it made me think back to again episode six of season one where Joel wakes and Ellie's up on the boulder and looking up at the sky and like, you know, he's like come down and you're going to break your neck. But like as when we hear Ellie talk about space and what space means to her, it's like, I grew up in the QZ.

It's like, what are you going to do? Look at the wall. You look up and like thinking about possibility. This is this memory in the game and the show is so much about wonder. And like when we're watching this or playing this or talking about it at home and our real lives here, it's like the last of us is one of many things that we could choose for escape, right? That's what stories are for us. They're portals into a different world and like thinking about, well, what would that be for you in the mushroom apocalypse and like on the paying attention to things front? It's not just that Joel is like you care about space.

You love space. I'm going to give you this gift. But it's like I'm going to give you a gift, like wonder, the gift of wonder, the gift of possibility and imagination and like allowing yourself. to believe that you could be somewhere other than where you are. Incredible. And I was also thinking about Sarah, again, because Joel, one of the things that Joel shares in episode nine in the season one finale when they're walking toward Jackson and he's like comparing them, you know, and he's like talking about how they used to hike a lot. And then shares that Sarah love to climb. So you're like, is he thinking about Sarah here, even in this moment that is

so specific to Ellie, like those ghosts of the past are always present. So it's just, it's just so great. And the actual moment inside, of the shuttle is just sensational. And I felt the performances here and the rendering were like incredible, absolutely incredible. We or I will, I'll just say I and my upbringing, because, you know, I went to the Lawrence Hall of Science and looked at the dinosaurs and I went to the exploratorium and like looked at the, at the stars and stuff like that. Like that this is something that a lot, I guess some of us, I don't know how what the resources

are across the country, but in terms of like the education that I grew up with, this is just sort of like taken for granted. That you will study about dinosaurs and you will study about space and you will get to go to museums and you will get to see these things. And the way that the showrunners talked about this, taking on almost mythic proportions for Ellie, like this idea. We talked about this a lot in season one, this idea of like, what do you mean you went on a plane?

Yeah. What are you talking about? Like, what do you mean people went in a spaceship up to, what do you mean Katie Perry went to space? what are you talking about? Like, what do you mean people went into space? And also, what do you mean there were dinosaurs? Like, what are you talking about? And so this is almost like seeing a dragon.

You know what I mean? And it is for us to a certain degree, but even more so, you know, for someone who didn't grow up with, like, maybe dinosaur action figures to play with or, you know, wasn't, you know, or dressing park to watch or whatever it is, like constantly around you. I just think that that's really interesting and something we take for granted a lot. The fact that she's 16 here and he's like, slow down, be a kid. Yeah. When, of course, that's where we meet Joel at 16 in his like, I'm a man now read a passage moment with his dad, right? These are the things that we hope for our kids is that they get to be kids as long,

longer than we had to be or got to be or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. And but like also I was thinking about this because he's talking about patience and being patient. Yeah. And there are a lot of moments in this episode in the show where the idea of patience is really like centered and important. But I was thinking about the other side of it, too.

Like, if you're Ellie and you've lost as much as you've lost, why would you ever want to wait for anything? Like, nothing is promised. And even, like, when Joel was saying, I was saving it for a special day, I thought that was beautiful because he's trying so hard to make these birthdays memorable and significant. But it was also devastating to be because it's like, well, what happens when the special days run out? Yeah. Like what did he have in mind for her 21st birthday or whatever? Was he planning that he never got to do with her? I also like across these following subsequent vignettes, this pattern of three.

I talked about this a little bit already, but this idea of like from Jesse to Kat to Dina, this idea of Joel's progression through understanding. But also something that Craig raised that I thought was really interesting is this idea of like accepting the intrusion inside of your bubble. To your point, this is a table for. two inside of the Miller family kitchen. And so even though he's like, you and Jesse, huh, I've got a keen eye for these kinds of things. Like, Jesse would be if he were, and something I'd do like about, sorry, quick sidebar. This is several years ago, she and Jesse were that close then.

So this is a nice little, like, just a tiny little marker of like Ellie and Jesse have been quite close for a long time. Okay. But even though she has no interest in him as a boyfriend, has she seen him in the short-sleeved headly? I don't know. But, like, has no interest in him as a boyfriend. It's still a threat to the us that Joel has created with her, this bubble. And this is what Craig is talking about.

Kat is a more direct threat because she's, like, actively inside the heart of the house. She's in Ellie's bedroom. There's drugs. There's tattoos involved. That's, like, even more of a threat. But, like, Jessie, Kat, Dina. This is like a forced, a potential force expansion of the us. And this idea that like, Craig used the word bubble, but I think of it as like a fortress

and the wall that Joel has built around the two of us, you and me against the world, this sort of like Jackson, hopefully stronger than the wood walls of Jackson wall around them. And like, who do you invite in to your fortress? And like we, you know, as you pointed out, we're thinking about Bill and Frank all the time inside of this episode. and this is like, this is the source of the quote that we love to talk about, the paying attention quote, paying attention quote, because in that scene, Bill and Frank's like, we're going to invite Joel. Frank's like, we're going to invite Joel and test to.

We're going to have come over. And Bill's like, I built a fortress for us. It was just for me, but I let you in. You want to let more people in? So like, when do you expand your us? When do you build it out and stuff like that? So I love thinking about that. And I just think that, like, I had this marked later, but I'll just say it now.

Something that Craig said, it had already been like a little bit in my notes, but Craig really illuminated it for me, this idea that like, he was like, Sarah was the perfect daughter. Because Sarah didn't have friends and Sarah didn't have a boyfriend. Sarah was just Joel's and Joel was just Sarah's. And it was just, I mean, and Tommy, but like, it was just a clean us. And there are ways of which that's beautiful and complicated. ways in which that's like very unhealthy, right? And so this idea of like Sarah when we meet her is like not just daughter to Joel, but also like partner to Joel, not in a creepy romantic

sexual way at all, but just sort of like there's like a, there's also like there's like a mothering aspect to Sarah in terms of like the way that she cares for Joel. There's like a chosen life partner aspect to Sarah for Joel. The fact that, like, Joel does not, is not dating anyone when he's Sarah's dad, does not date anyone

when he's Ellie's dad. And the only time he has another partner is when he is Tess, which is between the daughters. There's, like, an interregnum and there's, like, Tess, who he never, you know,

really connects with as deeply as Tess wanted. So, like, he's like, I got room for one. And it's Sarah, Tommy, ish, and then, you know, it's Ellie. And there's no one else here.

And something at Hallie and Neil talked about elsewhere in other interviews over the years. This is this idea, like, there was a time when, like, Joel had a girlfriend in Jackson, like, that was going to be a storyline or something like that. There was going to be more time with Joel and Jackson and stuff like that. But that all went to the side, not necessarily for this reason, but what it creates then inside of Joel is, like,

this is a thing that could happen as single parents, It's not all, hashtag, not all single parents, but like this sort of partification of your, of your child. Like, this is your one person that you lean on. A lot of those times, a lot of times those children, whether it's the oldest in a family or if you're a single parent with one kid, is forced to grow up so much faster because then they become like, yeah, the partner inside of this relationship. And I just think that that's an interesting aspect of the dysfunction of Joel's love, where he's like, slow down, stay a child, but also treats his child as sort of like his life partner at the same time. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, I think it's interesting because then like when Ellie seeks to leverage that, you know,

like I'm your partner. I'm your partner. Yeah. Or you don't own this. They give it to us. Yeah. He's not quite ready to process that. So it's, yeah, the way that that, um.

The way that that is fostered, but then what it means inside of the reality of their relationship moving forward is quite interesting. The fact that, and I swear we're about to go to the museum, this is the last thing I'll say, I think, I think. The fact that Joel does not know Ellie's gay means that he does not know about Riley, which means he does not know, do you disagree? He does not know the full story. He heard a version of the story, but he does not know the full truth of the story. of how Ellie got bit. Yeah, she tells him about the... She tells him about what happened

about them getting bit. We decided to just lose our minds together and she was the first to die, but not about... And I was in love with her in this season. And I was in love with her, right? Yes, correct, yeah. So, yeah, our listener, Adrienne wrote it about this, right?

Like, she never disclosed how she got bit. And by that, I take Adrian to mean, like, the very specifics of it. her relationship with Riley, my heart can't handle that. This is arguably one of the most important relationships of her life, and up to that point, at least he did not know. Also, I could not stop thinking about Riley during the spaceship scene. Like Riley and Joel both planned these, quote, events for Ellie.

Both took the time to carve out and prepare a space. Riley with the mall and Joel with the museum. Okay. We're in the museum. The aurari is here. Somebody must have greased it. Joel. I love this so much.

just thinking about him sneaking away to go do this and prepare this first. Incredible. Every moment inside of it's the dinosaur, it's the ororee, it's the spaceship itself of him being like, he has prepared this and him looking at her and being like, you like it, she likes it. Somebody I must have greased it. I did okay. I did it. You know, and it's just like, oh, devastating.

All right. Anything you want to, what do you want to say about this? Apollo 15 moment. Incredible stuff. You know, to the like, you like it, I did okay. You know, we've talked a lot over our many last of us pods about Joel's like sense of inadequacy and like feeling of not being good enough and the fear of not being good enough. And I, you know, we, Joel is this like strong, accomplished capable person who's lasted

years and years and years in the apocalypse. And like, I love when we get to see that doubt, like that softer side. of him that just like wants the person that he cares about to be like, you made me happy. I think that is just such a relatable, deeply human thing. We both had, we both had in our notes in this, a beautiful sequence that we love. A genuine moment of horror, seeing them smash the case to get the helmet. Because like, pick one is this great little, it's this great moment, like, holy shit, we're going all in. I'm going to grab a helmet and put it on.

It's going to, like, heighten the immersive quality of what unfolds next. But it's like, guys, it's a museum. That's a display that they fill. Go in the back and open it. You're breaking into all these other buildings. Come on. That was very... Were you thinking about the guitar?

The email we got up from Ellie leaving the guitar out. Yeah. The reason you're having a great time of a museum is because all this stuff has been preserved. And then you're just like, let's smash this glass. Ellie. Joel. Incredible stuff. Incredible stuff.

I'm glad you had the same thought. I was like, am I being a tight-ass? I was like, guys, come on. Neil on the official pod described this as the most universally loved. The most universally loved moment across the games. And you really see and feel why when Joel, like the way that they, I just, I love that he goes in with her, right? It is for her, but it is about sharing it with her. It's a team and channel.

It's another table for two. It is about experiencing that joy and showing her that he has been paying attention and knows that she loves this and believes it would make her happy. I like handing her the tape when she plays it, like the look on Ellie's face, the just astonishment that this could be a thing that somebody else did for her and that she gets to experience. You know, in both the game and the show, one of the little moments I love is when you're listening to the whole like countdown and heading to lift off. And there's that one line guidance is internal. and like obviously it's a space thing, but it feels very applicable to... I mean, we're not astronauts, but we're not astronauts. Add it to the list, guys.

We are not astronauts. But yeah, like for Joel, for Ellie, guidance is internal and when is that a good thing and when is it a limitation? And the filmmaking here and the way that this is crafted in the game, like, where you just lose yourself in Ellie's experience. And in a world that is like full of... horror and loss, not only the gift of someone you love, like, forging this moment of happiness for you and just knowing that you have a person who cares about you that much, which is, of course,

like the most precious thing in the world, but, you know, really feeling how rare something like that would be. Like, that's just not the kind of thing that is on offer. It had to, just like that guitar be crafted. It had to be sought and made with care, pursued with intention, you know? And I just like, we want that. First of the team. I know. He thought the Legos were tough. Like, God.

And then just the, like, the tear, like, just leaking out of the crinkle in the corner of Joel's eyes. I just, it's overwhelming. I just want to read you a text to my friend sent me. I'm not going to say her name in case she does not want me to share this. But she said, I didn't know she's listening. She says, LMAO, huge night for lesbians with dead dads. They had strained relationships with. My God.

here I was just trying to watch my little mushroom show. The single tear from Pedro in the space capsule I telephine the police. Like, that's just like, the single tier, I rewatched

that five times. Oh, yeah. You, like, source the origin of the tear. I was like, when did he start crying? Um, and the thing is, we don't see,

we see him, him looking at her. And again, also, Troy's performance inside of the video game and this segment is amazing. The way that he looks at Ellie as she's experiencing this. The heightened reality of it, the way that the light cues take us to space, which is just an unusual moment of fantasy sort of inside of this space. So we are so inside of Ellie's head and that makes so much more sense in an Ellie memory.

But the fact that this is like a Joel P.O.V. episode that means that like Joel is, inside of Ellie's dream here, a dream that he created for her lovingly and watching her. And something that Pedro said in the post-episode interview was creating happiness for someone you love. There's nothing more important to him than Ellie's happiness. So this idea of him just sort of like drafting off of, you know, her joy is just absolutely beautiful and devastating and upsetting and terrible and wonderful and all the things together at once. this was just exquisite. And then it all comes crashing to a halt

because there's just this beautiful we're walking through the woods. In the game, Ellie sees this mural on the wall of the museum, right? That says the fireflies lie to us, right? In this, she sees fireflies in the forest so we can extrapolate that she's thinking about the fireflies and thinking about what happened to them

has this sort of like niggling sense of doubt in her mind. And then she just masks it entirely and doesn't confront it and just says, everything's fine. This is like the masking quality that Ellie has that we've been talking about all season, etc. So, Mallory, other than putting hats on dino heads, anything you missed from this museum section that you wanted to talk about? No, I, you know, I do love in the game getting to learn about all the dinosaurs and put the hats on their heads and sit in the rover and all that. I thought this was beautiful, and I thought the switch from the mural that they're both looking at into like us realizing on the walk back what Ellie has seen, but Joel not glimpsing it was a nice way to kind of continue to, to heighten that tension, especially because, you know, we'll talk about this more over the next couple of flashbacks, but the distinctions start to set in here and the memories moving forward. Like, we don't get, the second memory in the game is Tommy teaching Ellie to shoot. So like a connection to the open, what was seen from the. opening of this season, even though it's set in a different period of time in the memory.

And then Joel and Ellie, like, going, seeking out this music store, but they have to, like, clear an area first, and they stumble upon a couple of law citizens of Jackson in this letter. And it's like, okay, we wanted to help people, but, like, we got bit. We got affected. It's horrible, right? And it kind of unearths for Ellie that seed of doubt again. Again, this is a separate memory from the museum, but it's not in the show. And, like, Ellie asks him again.

and he lies again. Yeah. And that, I thought that was a really interesting, adaptive choice to not have like that second, to change. The re-up. Yeah.

Like we're getting a lie of a different sort, obviously with Eugene and the parallels there would unlock something. But I thought that like, because some of that is different before we get to the distinction of Ellie not making the excursion to St. Mary's to find the brain drawings

and tape recorder and everything. It was interesting for like Elliot have this private moment where the doubt kind of bubbles to the four again. I thought that was, yeah, that was interesting. But, you know, we did learn from Hallie on the official pod that they had all the dinosaurs and the hat. So like release the dino hat cut. I assume it's possible.

But also this is perfect. We deserve it. We deserve this. Okay. One year later, here is the future days lyrics I have dropped here when the hurricanes and cyclones rage because it's a dark and stormy day. And even though it has been bright and sunny for previous Ellie birthdays, it is a rainy day matching what's about the storm that's about to come for this. Happy 17th birthday alley.

They got the name right this time. And then we get the Cat and Ellie, you know, interruptus moment from Joel contrasting this intrusion. This unwelcome intrusion with like the moment we got at the end of last week's episode, this sort of like Ellie waking up safe and secure in her bed quite younger. And Joel just being at her door and that being just the most welcome golden safe sight and this being this like unwelcome intrusion. This is growing up. Okay. Shout out Kat who's like, I'm 19 by the way. Fuck you.

Not being a creep. Cat, a lot cooler than she comes off in the previous episode, I think. So, justice for cat. Okay. Anyway. He says, all the teenage shit at once, drugs, tattoos, sex, experimenting with girls, and then Ellie's face when he says experiment. And she says, it wasn't sex and it wasn't an experiment.

And then he says, we'll discuss this later when you're yourself. Yeah. And that is just such. a tough contrast to, I understand your arm. I understand it. Happy birthday kiddo. Like, when you're yourself. He's not even trying to understand her in this moment.

And the pain of the person that you love most in your life, not seeing you, not seeing the real you in this case, Ellie's queerness, and saying essentially this isn't you is devastating. And Ellie is not just devastated by this. She is furious about this. And I don't know, kind of as well she should be to a certain degree. Not that like, you know, a dad coming home to find weed, a 19-year-old and a tattoo gun and all the trifecta in the bedroom is not something that like any parent might not have some words about. But this like, I think this frustration, these years of not feeling seen. by Joel around this key aspect of who she is coming up, exploding in this moment.

I really felt for Ellie here. Yeah, this was, this was, boy, this was intense. And just deeply relatable content, you know, truly. Like, I think as you have noted, you know, with the Jesse conversation and then this cat scene and then building toward the not only defense of Ellie and Dino when Joel attacks Seth at the dance, but what Joel will say about Dina to Ellie on the porch and the way that he asks and embraces and wants to make sure that she understands that, like, Dina would be lucky to have her. Obviously, there's a progression there in terms of how Joel recognizes, processes, understands, accepts, embraces Ellie's

identity, unquestionably. Yeah. Beyond that, though, like, that is our lens in this scene into understanding an even larger thing that which is change more broadly like all aspects of who you are and all aspects of what somebody else understands about you and this has just absolutely nothing to do with growing up in the cordisops apocalypse like nothing right this is just like no matter who you are in your life like when you grow up and you change like you're going to whatever it is about you like you're going to confront a moment and your parents or the people who know you or have been a part of your life are going to confront a moment

where like, what's happening here is that Joel is coming to terms of the fact that he doesn't know who Ellie is anymore. And if Ellie is the way that Joel defines everything about his life, then he doesn't know who he is anymore.

And he is not responding well to having to confront that reality, undeniably. But it is something that he is confronting in this question of just like, okay, Ellie is becoming her own person, and part of what that means is I don't have as much access to that. And part of what that means is she doesn't need me as much anymore or she needs me maybe in

different ways. And I think what Ellie would say is like, well, part of what I need is for you to accept who I am and understand who I am and ask me questions, but they're not at a point right now where they're able to like be themselves fully with each other. And Joel being forced because Ellie just sort of like rips, like holds herself away from Joel, which again, individuation as like a teenager is normal. And then inside of this relationship that has this like wound at the center of it, this betrayal is quite understandable. But it forces Joel when we meet him in episode one to have opened up the gate on his little wall around himself.

And he's in therapy with Gail. And he's talking to Maria and Tommy and Benji and Dina. You know what I mean? Like he is like sort of reaching out to other people and I think a way that's healthier than just sort of like it's you and me. It's you and me. It's just us. You know, sort of thing. They have this fight and then later she tries to like move out, which we know she will successfully do. And he's like, hey, hey, that's a fucking dark and dang place with like paint thinner and no watering water or electricity. Yes. Also, don't move the mattress in the middle of the rainy night, I think was a good note. I do. It's pissing rage. Yeah.

Imagine her dragging that on the muddy ground. We still have something to learn from Joel. I have moved, like, heavy thing. Yeah, there are times in your life when you're alone and you're having to move everything and you're just like, this is just going on the ground and that's just what's happening here. Okay. So he's like, contractor Joel, protector Joel is like, let me put electricity in there. Let me put running water in there.

I can make it, you know, I understand. You need space. maybe that's better. He's like, I'm trying, man. Like, okay, let's do that. But let me make it habitable for you. That would be nice. And then he asks to see the tattoo.

And then we get them off conversation. I mean, is there anything you want to add to this before we get to spend some time with Gail at the diner? Which is maybe one of the best things I've ever seen in my entire life. Yes, I'm eager to get to book club with Gail as well. Astonishing stuff, as always from Catherine O'Hara. this legend icon queen. I think just, you know, that the, it's like this gesture of I recognize telling her,

okay, I'll help you, but like, yeah, I get it. You need your own space. It's the attempt to say, I understand that things are changing too, and I maybe am not prepared for it or ready for it, but I'll try. And then so I think it's really fascinating to remember that in the therapy scene with Gail

the beginning of the season, he's like, which I should have never allowed her to move into and, like, still working through. You know, the physical manifestation of the fact that Ellie is growing and changing and forming, you know, new uses that are independent of the us that she has with Joel. I thought that the, we don't have to linger on this because we hit it already, but I thought that the, like, you know, you may not like the rules, but this is my house. No, it isn't. A stunning. was, as is so often the case with the show when it's at its best, like I'm so conflicted about how I'm processing what I'm hearing. Because like, honestly, I feel my gut reaction to that was like,

God, that's a hurtful thing for Ellie to say. But then when I stopped to think about it, I was sort of like, well, there's this actually kind of like intellectually interesting exercise of like ownership and property. Who owns anything right now. But like also just that she is making a really concerted effort to say, to this gets back to what you're saying earlier about partners, like, you know, they gave it to us.

This is this place that we share in a life that we're sharing and have chosen to share. We chose to share this life together. We were put together, but then we chose to stay together. But it was still, it is so agonizing across this episode, even as Joel is making mistakes and airing to watch him, like, be wounded by something that comes his way. That's just the sign of a great, a great performance and a great character, like where the flaws are what in some ways make us love them more. The downside to how good Pedro is in this is that, like, I think in this story where we're meant to feel conflicted about what Joel did, conflicted about how Ellie feels, conflicted about Abby, like there's supposed to be, you're constantly like seraphite wolves, like, where am I supposed, where is my sympathy, where is my empathy supposed to be? That is the point of the game, as the point of the story, as you're supposed to constantly feel muddled.

It is hard when Pedro Pascal is so good at looking so sad. hurt to not be just like, oh, poor Joel. And I'm like, no, did a thing. Ellie's right to like need her independence. Ellie's right to be upset about this, like all this sort of stuff. So like he's, he's too good. It's tough at times. He's unbelievable. He's like even when he's asking about the boss here and it's like clearly the takeaway heading into the conversation with Gail is like he actually doesn't understand anymore. Like you've said, he doesn't quite know how to reach Ellie anymore. But I'm so moved by watching him like bumble his way through trying. He's trying to like a change. He's trying to like a change. change and growing and such.

It's just, it's just as magnetic, truly. It's a guitar. Truly. Take me to Earth Abide's book club, please. Last thing I'll say on that ownership front, because I did find that conversation kind of stunning, you know, we are, as we mentioned before, inside of a communist. Yeah. Like, we're in a commune, you know.

They say, like, Joel, who was born in the 60s in Texas to confront a queer daughter and a challenge to the very notion of capitalism and ownership of houses and, you know, stay underground and all these other things is, I think, a pretty interesting part of this story. Okay. The future day's lyric that I pulled out for this section is, I'm grateful now they've left,

which I think exemplifies our queen, Gail, who was just trying to eat her breakfast and read Earth Abides. Earth abides. What I love about this, so this is a 1940s dystopian sci-fi book that serves as an inspiration for the last one of this part one. There's a character-ish in the game who was sort of like in the periphery of the Kansas City storyline in the show is a character of note in the game was drawn from this book. What I love about the Last of Us nut jobs on the subreddit. And I said that with genuine affection of my heart.

Is when the promo photos for this episode were released and there was a photo of Gail with this book at the table, there were like 20 posts on the subreddit being like, oh, did you know that the Earth abides? It was like so great. I love it. You guys are the best. I love you all so much. Okay. Gail saying, is there a doctor's sign in, doctor's in sign on me like Lucy from fucking peanuts when he starts talking to her is so good. Her entire delivery here. What I love learning about Gail here is that losing Eugene did absolutely unmoor her, but she was always. Tough cookie.

A tough cookie. Yeah, I get it. Yes. Some doctors study dreams the double. ones mostly. Incredible. Death, if you believe that in that shit about the moth. But then it's the way, and I hope someone is gift to this, it's the way in which she says, without one single solitary shit to give in her soul. Yeah.

Why? Impatient insincerity losing out of every poor. Why? He just leaves. Oh, man. I needed that laugh. Thank you so much. Catherine Herrera, you're the best. They should probably.

I guess it's, I mean, you know, not fit for all ages, but should they get Silence of the Lambs into the rotation at Jackson family movie night? Like, I think it's, it would be beneficial. Yeah, this was everything from Gail hysterical, really fun to see, and interesting to see Gail and Joel in a different context before Eugene and outside of the therapy session. Joel having to confront like, oh my God, Ellie is papering her room and covering her body in a symbol of death. I put it on the guitar. Yeah, I wonder. You know, it would be like a thing to reflect on and wonder about regardless. But then without question, he's making a connection here, right?

To what level of, oh, boy, I wonder if she's suspicious of me and what happened in Salt Lake City there is. Even beyond that, when we will hear Ellie, you know, talk about this very beautifully and powerfully on the porch, like Ellie in season one talked very clearly with Joel about her purpose, right? Like when he said, we don't have to do this. Like we can just go back to Jackson and she said after all we've been through everything I've done, it can't be for nothing. I know you mean well. I know you want to protect me. You have. And when we're done, we'll go wherever you want. Tommy's Sheep Branch, the Moon, I'll follow you anywhere you go. But there's no halfway with this. We finish what we started.

We see the purpose scrawl. I mean, Joel, you know, presumably has like looked at those drawings in more detail. Maybe not, but we get to see, like, you have a greater purpose. Ellie's like, did you not rewatch season one? Don't worry. I've scrawled it on a piece of paper for you. And I will pack it on my way out the door. Exactly. Yeah. This idea of purpose, this idea of all of it meaning something, Riley's death, test, death, Henry and Sam, all of it is for something and that something is saving the world. Which is, you know, again, consent questions all around.

The fireflies didn't give her all the information and Joel didn't give her all the information. Quick question about silence the limbs, actually. Do you remember how old you were when you saw that movie? Older, because I was scared when I was a kid to see it. So I didn't see that when I was like a teenager. I was an adult, yeah. I was 10 when I saw that movie. Because it came out in 91.

I was 10. And I think about that all the time because I'll look up like how old I was when I saw a movie. And I'm like, and I think about like my nephews or whatever. And I was like, when I show a 10-year-olds, I was a little lips? Certainly not. No. Am I okay? No? Okay. It's two years later. Here's the Future Days quote, all the complexities and games. Ellie's 19. Her garage room is now, you know, looks warm. Looks nice. There's some furniture in it.

And in the pre-dawn hours, she's practicing asking Joel about Salt Lake City. And this is a good, this serves another cronutty lake. of a scene, honestly. Because, you know, it's a great mood setter. She and Joel are in, like, not a terrible place. Right. If she's, like, gearing up to ask him this question,

he has, like, made this room for her. They're separate, but, like, you know, he's about to take her on patrol. You know, there's unease, but there's not this, like, roiling anger, I think, is what we're supposed to sense here. And then it's just, like, a really handy, expositional recap for again

the listeners that the watchers at home who did not rewatch season one. What was it, Joel did? Again, in Salt Lake City. If the Firefly spotted us a mile from the hospital, how were they surprised by the Raiders that the Raiders could kill all the soldiers and Marlene and you had to carry me the whole time, how do we get away? If there are dozens of immune people, why hasn't anyone heard?

Loved. I loved this. I also thought just like skipping the 18th birthday was really interesting to me to go right to 19 because it's just like another little reminder. Apocalypse shorthand, the milestones are different. This is patrol day. This is the moment of note. Ellie, you can vote. Doesn't matter.

You will one day be able to write a letter of a different sort when Jesse reminds you that you should collect your thoughts for the council. That was interesting to think about too, because it seemed like Jesse was really saying, like, this is not, you know, this would not be your inclination. And Ellie even says, like, I speak and it gets me in trouble. And like to see that in Ellie's private space,

this was the way that... Try to write a list. Yeah. Yeah. organized our thoughts that kind of like helps us. I mean, of course, we already understand the magnitude of it, but it's one more way to reinforce it. I was like really, because again, because of this difference in the game where we have the additional challenge, Joel denying it again, and then we go to this Salt Lake City sequence, which is also in the two years earlier flashback time frame, which is when Joel will follow,

quickly your count follows Ellie to Salt Lake City. Ellie, has found the recorder, has pieced it together. That's where we get basically what becomes in the show. show the beginning of the porch conversation. It's just much earlier. So, like, I was really struck by what it means that they have carried these things inside of them individually for this long. Like, when we get to the porch scene, Joel has been holding this inside of him for five

years, has not told a person, which is different both in terms of the Ellie time frame and, like, the fact that Ellie has been. sitting here for this, because we still have the nine months later time jump, four and a half years with this kind of like festering kernel of doubt, this intuition will hear Ellie say later. Like I always knew. And so it's like, it's less that there was a period where Ellie didn't think this is what happened and more the kind of constant cycle of talking yourself out of something and then a reminder, a trigger. The truth that that voice in your head is an incursion. The tip of the knife blade. again, like penetrating this beautiful thing that they were otherwise building with each other. And to think of how long, how many nights did Ellie sit there and rehearse this?

You know, it's just like really, you feel the loneliness and the heaviness of that inside of the companionship that they otherwise provide each other. I was really struck by that. Yeah, the way in which you hide away a part of yourself from someone and that can just like that gap becomes, the Grand Canyon between the two of you. I love, as we track the nature of the gifts over, you know, it's like, it's a guitar, it's cake, it's astronauts, it's museums, it's dinosaurs, it's get your good, we're going. It's violent. Yeah.

Yep. Get your gun. And, you know, we talked about this a lot, this progression over season one in terms of like Ellie wanting the gun and Jolbing like no guns for you. And so this idea of like, get your gun. You're 19. Get your gun. Let's go.

Joel just rides into frame. Pedger looking great on a horse. Always. Right behind Joel on his horse comes the star of the show Shimmer. Hello, Shimmer. It's a thrill. I hope you're enjoying your musical diversion in Seattle. That you are fine.

Okay. I need to tell you, when Ellie is looking from an auction and goes, Oh my God. It's a little squirrel. Yeah. Fucking a big school. Yeah. One time when I was in high school, I was like probably 17.

Maybe younger, actually, because my mom was driving me. So like, my mom was dropping me off at school. I was late to school. I don't know why. Drop me off, pulled up and stopped right next to like a tree. And I got out and I got out of the car and I stood up. And I turn around and right here, and this is for the video list, it's right here in front of my face on the tree. Like, I just turn around right here where was smaller squirrel.

Fucking a big squirrel. Yeah. In a quite energetic way, like just mere inches from my face. No binoculars needed. Objects in the rear view mirror, maybe you're closer than they are. Like, it was just right there. And I laughed until I cried.

It was just one of the most Ah nature moments I've ever experienced. Nature. I love nature. Reminds me when I saw the pigeon with you in the streets of Chicago. And I said nature. Okay, with love and respect to Chicago,

which is just like a very beautiful city. It is also a city and we were on like a very city street that was like strewn with garbage and a pigeon walked by and Mallory said, is this nature? You know, I love my sense. So I love when I, those rare moments when I make my way out to the natural world, I'm sure I would have reacted similarly to seeing the squirrels fucking. It's this stage.

Okay. As you mentioned, Ellie Weaponizes is sort of like, I'm your partner. We stick together. Yeah. I've got your back. You've got. I'm your back. You are mine.

Not I've got your back. I am your back. You are mine. As they go off to save you. Eugene, except they can't save Eugene is too late. Eugene has already been bitten. All of the harbingers before we get to Eugene, the person being dragged on a horse, presumably someone they know quite well, like someone from Jackson, right, who's on patrol with Eugene.

Yes. So it's not an infected on horseback. So like someone they know, a citizen of Jackson goes to drive by. We hear very quickly on the radio when Joel gets the call, Eugene, an accident. Adam. So my assumption is that that's Adam. Poor Adam. But what I liked about that is I was wondering if it was a small little wink to the removed scene because the

letter that they find that leads Ellie to being like, did you do this thing? Was from Adam. Oh, nice. cute. As cute as dragging a person I don't know what anybody could be. Darling. Adorable. And there's just like a really quaint, picturesque,

very sweet little infected corpse on the ground. Yes. Yeah. You know, she's got Shelds of mushrooms on her. And here we go. Joey pants. Good.

Fuck. Of memento fame. And something I love is that Eugene is just like immediately admits to being bitten. Is not trying to pull the classic, what me? Zombie bite. No, immediately he's like, they got me. Yeah. But he thinks he has an hour and wants to see Gail from a distance before he dies.

Hmm. And he's desperate enough that he does pull a gun on them, but, like, confused enough that even I at home, who knows nothing about gun was like, looks out. I know what it looks like when a gun is out and that gun is empty. This is absolutely devastating. Really good stuff from Joey Pants here. Something I was talking to Alan about his conversation with Neil, Alan's up and also, like, I haven't had a chance to read his write-up,

but something that he told me that I thought was so fascinating is, like, when they cast, Catherine Hara and Joe Panteliano, they were like, here are two really funny people. Gail and Eugene are going to be funny. And Joey Pance shows up and does this with Eugene. Devastating. Yeah. Oh, okay. Gudding instead.

All right. So absolutely devastating when, the way they described in the official podcast his idea that he portrayed Eugene as if he was reverting to a childlike space and like Gil was his mother and needed to see his mother. Again, a lot of really ooey-gooey parent-child partner stuff going on here.

But like this is so good. This time spent with someone who we don't really know but we kind of know but someone who has been bit and time sent with them. Correct me. if I'm missing anyone, but the people we've spent time with who have been are Riley and then Tess.

Anyone else that I'm missing? Let's see. Sam. Sam? Yep. Sally trying to rub her blood into the wound. Sam. Yeah, so it's a lot of season one.

Yeah. Yeah. This idea of like Eugene articulating like what it feels like. Cold. Yeah. It's cold. Yeah. This idea of like when he's looking out at this beautiful

Vista, you know, because, okay, Joel, once again, it's talking about re-up of a lie. Okay, Joel lies to L.A. is like, go get the horse. I promise. I promise. We'll take it back together. It'll be fine. And then death marches Eugene down to the beautiful lake. Gorgeous.

Beautiful, one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. Gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful. Yeah. But there are ways of which, like, I was almost expecting we might get like a Eugene POV of like, does your, do you? start to see things as the quartersteps take over you? Right.

You know, he says, I can see her. When Joel says, if you really love someone, you see their face everywhere, right? We assume that he's thinking about Sarah when he says that. And then Eugene says, I see her. Now, there are ways in which this is entirely figurative. But I was wondering if there's any ways in which, like, the quarter steps taking over your brain starts to, like, interfere. Like, you get cold. And then do you start to see things?

I don't know. It's just something I was thinking about. But mainly I was in Book Club Corner with Sawyer because this is some of the most of my sin-men's share I've ever seen in my entire life where

I don't know if I've read a really disturbing Atlantic article about the fact that children aren't reading books anymore so okay in case you're listening this podcast and you did not read like that they're going to college and they've only read excerpts and not entire books and that's just like probably not their fault, but also that's terrible.

Mice and Men, Lenny and George, Lenny takes George out because he, George takes Lenny out because he needs to, you know, kill him. Mercy, mercy kill him sort of, ish. And he tells him to like imagine the rabbits, the rabbit farm that they will have together, right? And so anytime you like take a character out and you're going to kill them and you tell them to like imagine something that is like hopeful and happy. This is a clear of my said men moment.

And so, yeah, think of Gail. But the killer, of course. And they talked about this at length of the official pod. The killer line of this episode is not, you know, Joel's like, if you need to tell her something, tell me, I'll tell her. And he's like, I need her last words for me. Killed me. Destroyed me.

And the way that Joe Penthouse. Leano, I'm going to give him his like full name in this Thespian moment delivered this with anger and desperation and pain and fear and hopelessness astonishing stuff.

This is of course all show additive. This is not a game. Eugene is in a letter in the game but not this character in the game. Yes, yes. We've mentioned. Like they, when Ellie and Dina in the game find the weed palace at the library, it's like, you know, one of the things that you learn is that Eugene died of natural causes. What a rare thing. What a gift in the mushroom apocalypse to just get old and have a stroke, right? So a fascinating character to make this choice for. And that was one of the things that kind of like heightened our ability to theorize and speculate. I thought everything about this was amazing. Like the, you know, beyond even just Ellie sitting alone with the letter to prep, like in terms of what leads us into this Eugene moment and the. the mirror lie and then the mirror facial expression and everything. Like, just when they're riding together and Joel's like, reminds me of the good old days, you know, just you and me on the trail.

And this is like real Bill Frank, you were my purpose. Like, you know, this is like the way I understand my life on the verge, on the precipice of that falling apart. And on the like, you know, for L.E.2, when this is the realization, the revelation is about to kind of close. into place in a fashion that feels undeniable. I thought putting all the partner stuff that close to that was really smart because it reminds us of like, from Ellie's perspective, it's, I don't, not in the cruel, like, I don't

need your fucking help way at the dance, but it's like, you don't just need to think of me as someone who needs you to save them. Yeah. You know, I am, look at all of these things that I can do. look at how I can help you on your back. And then when we get to like, I mean, yeah, the horse, I mean, that just felt like biblical, seeing the horse charge through. Like, I thought that was really like a powerful image.

And I thought, too, like the way that Joel's on the images front, like, when they're climbing down because they have to leave the horses, first of all, just like, smart, give us a reason to split them apart so that Joel can lie again, right? and then Ellie can like stumble upon the lie in an undeniable fashion. Also, I love to identify moments in a story where I would die. I'm like, oh, this is where I die. The part where you have to scale down a sheer cliff face. Toast. Dead. And I'm taking you with me.

If you're climbing down below me, I'm going down and you're coming with me. It's flattered. So it's flattered. I thought that the way that Joel's boot, like, hit the ground was, very reminiscent of the St. Mary's sequence and the focusing on the heavy plotting of the boot as the bullet casings are like cascading down, this kind of like a march of death and destruction

and Joel is a harbinger of that as well as of love and care and protection, striking. I meant to note this in the intro sequence, Javier's, the sound design in Javier's boots are quite ringing and loud and extra stompy. Okay. Yes, yes. Extra stompy, yes.

The technical term. And on the, when Ellie asks Eugene to stick out his hand, first of all, this is like just genius because it calls back on so many prior moments. We have just kind of core mythology in canon. We saw in the Boston QZ the sign of the infection timing, And it's like neck, face, head, five to 15 minutes, torso, arm, shoulder, two to eight hours. We're like, he probably does actually have enough time.

You know, God, at least someone boot up a fucking walkie. Get gale on the line. Like, we could do something. Like, you're so, I think, inclined to agree with Eugene and Ellie in just such a powerful way. But then also, and this is, I think, the real kind of magic of somehow achieving, like, the ability for the viewer to understand where everyone is coming from. in that scene, like, you understand what Eugene wants and why you understand what Ellie is calling back upon and why you understand why Joel is doing what he's doing. Like, Joel kind of is being responsible. These are the rules. We have rules for a reason and it's to keep us safe. You

think you have time. But what if you don't? And then you bite someone and then they die or the infection gets inside the gates. It's like a risk that you can't take. But like that's where the lie then becomes such a genius way to unlock all of this and bring our story strands together because it's the like the hubris of making that decision alone, you know, that feels like the great sin. But like Ellie doing the hand thing, I'm so I sound like grief cargo with like Grogo like the baby do the magic hand thing. I don't know. Why I said it that way? Do the magic hand thing. Um, what when did Ellie learn that? Like when Marlene and Marlene's fireflies would put Ellie through that test?

it's a connection to Ellie's immunity, so then of course that's on Ellie's mind, and of course it's on our mind, and of course then the connection is more heightened before we make it. Just like such a brilliant bit of structuring and introducing all of these elements in new story in the show.

Really, really, really, really smart. I thought that was great. And like, I thought last words for her, no, no, I need her last. words for me. I'm dying. I'm terrified. Was just shattering. Devastating. And I agree with you. I had the same like when Joel says if you love someone, like you, you see them all the time that he's thinking of Sarah. But then I was thinking also, I think we're all thinking also of Joel

and Ellie, the idea that in your final moments you just want to see the person you love and have them comfort you, you know, we talked a lot in our second episode of the season in the Joel death episode about, you know, Joel's fear of failure and his deep anxieties and insecurities surfacing at this moment, like when he tries to get up and can't, will Ellie be okay? But like the other thing we talked about, and I felt really powerfully here then, is like the gratitude inside of the horror. He got to see her and see how much she cared, you know? It's a, it's a too, I was going back and forth on this because like, as I was trying to extrapolate, okay, Eugene wants Gail's last words for him.

Are Joel's last words for him from Ellie, get up, Joel? Like, get up. Yes. But also, the showrunners, when talking about the porch, called that their final conversation. Because that's a conversation versus gurgles and grunts and get up and stuff like that, which is like, whatever. So, like, the gift that Joel got that Eugene doesn't get is Ellie saying, I want to try. You know, like,

yes. These are, there's the, the seeing that Ellie is, cares so much for him on the ground of the lodge when he's about to die, but also, also gets to cherish

the memory of the conversation the night before on the porch. Yes. And Eugene does not get any version of that because Joel made a decision on his own to your point. Right. And I think what's so fascinating about that is, Like, when Ellie shows, this is certainly not the only member of the Jackson community that Joel has had to kill.

This is something that Gil sort of says in the first episode. She's like, I understand you had to kill him. It was the way you did it. Yep. That enrages me. Yeah. So Joel has certainly had to kill a spare share of Jackson citizens who are out of patrol here. But when Ellie rides up and Joel is.

is standing there. He's like disassociated. He looks traumatized. No question. By what he had to do here. This was not just like casually done. This was like a really tough thing for him to have to do. We didn't have to see it. The birds

fly off of the tree and we know that the shot happened and we didn't have to watch it. But Joel did. And he has to live with the fact that he did that. And that is just an element inside of all of this. Is it wrong to have lied to Ellie yet again? Is it wrong to have not even tried to your point to get Gail on the fucking walkie?

Yeah, I think so. But it doesn't mean that it was like easy or thought or entirely thoughtlessly or unfeelingly done, you know? Right. It like reminded me a little bit of John, you know, from Thrones. It's like, yeah, like everybody like loves what they're good at. It's like, I don't. You know, this idea that Joel is like in this role that often fills him with pride, but also often is a source of anguish for him. And the look, the way he lowered his gun and the look of pain on his face when Eugene was pleading.

And then the way that he says, I'm sorry to Ellie, it's like, it brings him no pleasure. It is not something he's relishing in. It is a responsibility that he believes is his to bear. And like, for that to then be the thing that cracks open this reveal, the ride back, the way that's filmed, like for us to be just lingering. up close on Ellie's devastation and the clear comprehension, right, the recognition of what has happened, undeniable now to Ellie here, the tears. The way that Joel was describing, like, the why he did this thing. I mean, we're seeing, first of all, just the sled with the body wrapped in the sheet,

which makes us think of Joel's body at the end of the second episode in that way. And so all of this is, like, again, the time travel, we're moving in and out past future present, all of it. This is not a fun fact, but Neil did share some interesting about the corpse. Corpse carries.

Corpse wrapping. Yeah, corpse wrapping. It's not a fun fact. The like, when we get there, I'll tell Gail what she needs to know and nothing more. It's the right thing to do.

Ellie, I had no choice. The part that I was most struck by there was what she needs to know and nothing more. because Ellie is hearing that and thinking, oh, well, that's what, that's the decision. All of this. What I need to know. I had no choice.

It was the right thing to do. All of that is so deeply SLC. Fucked. Okay. We're running a little low on time, and I want to make sure we have time for everything. So I will just say, when the wind turned dirt to dust is our section where Gail finds out.

anything you want to say but i mean katherine hara is wonderful in this the slap is really good joel's wounded face i think her turning to to tommy for comfort and then so just like recontextualizing gale's hatred of joel gail's shitty feelings towards ellie yeah and then her warmth to tommy you know like tommy is she's she's wrapped up in joel's embrace right he tells her a kind lie he does absolutely um and then she's She gets the harsh truth from Ellie. And then she takes comfort in Tommy. And so, like, thinking about Gail's, the way that Gail thinks about all three of those people going forward is interesting.

I thought it was pretty amazing listening to Joel tell this lie about what happened with Eugene that every single word uttered after he was bit was a lie. Every single word. And how striking that was. And that, like, he is doing it to be kind and because he thinks it's right. And I don't, I'm with you. I don't actually disagree with. that. But it gets us into this larger question of very like, you know, Gandalf, Frodo, Gallum, like, is that up to you? And then what I think is so interesting about that is like,

Ellie, who is behaving in the way that she is behaving for ways we understand, has made this connection and is so deeply hurt and feels so betrayed. But does a version of the same thing, like decides to, I will be the one who decides what is right for another. person and what they deserve to know. And so this, like, ability for Ellie and Joel to hurt each other and wound each other while being the same person, but in a way that is specific to each of them was, I thought really, like, effectively captured here, the look of, because this is a moment about Ellie's betrayal, Ellie feeling betrayed.

So to hit us as hard as this scene did with the look of betrayal on Joel's face when he's like, wait, what about our us? Like, what are you doing? You did. What are you doing to me right now? A tough part of Pedro being as good as he is. It's just really, really tough. You feel for Joel, but also he's lying.

He's doing shit that, like, I don't agree with. It's very complicated. And then I think the last thing is just the specific language of when Ellie says, you swore. Not you promised, which is what he said, but you swore, which is what he said at the end of season one. Unmistakable for us at home and for Joel in that moment. What Ellie is talking about. This was a key trailer line. Yes.

That we heard a lot. You swore. Okay. All right. Our next section is the dance from a different point of view. All the missing crooked hearts nine months later. Joel sitting with Maria and Tommy watching, Ellie and Jesse, Dina, you know, getting twirled a dip. All the Uncle grumpy stuff is extremely cute.

We watch, devastatingly, we watch the last words between Tommy and Joel, right? See you next year. And it's just kind of thrown away as a little joke. But it's the last time these two will talk to each other. Yeah. I really love that. I really, really love that because, first of all, we do, we just linger on Joel's face for a minute to give us that extra fucking punch in the gut. Did you notice?

This is it. Yeah. But, like, the fact that it wasn't grand. You know, that there was nothing remarkable about that parting at all felt so important and true. It's like, you don't always, I mean, of course, that's the other thing about Eugene. It's like the rare opportunity to get to say goodbye when you know the end is coming and to be denied that. But like, most people don't know when it's their last moment with somebody, right? And so like to just see that it would be a good night.

I'm going to go tuck my kid in and I'll see you're going to miss the countdown. I'll see you tomorrow. Like I'll see you next year. I don't know. It's just like that's how it goes. That's painful. Truly. I think it was a really fine calibration of making sure we noticed what this was without like really good night, brother, you know, sort of like moment.

Okay. And then we get a nice Maria and Joel moment. And the Maria and Joel relationship is like, you know, it's been pretty thin on the ground. We got it at the beginning of the season. We get some of it in season one. But like, you know, there was resentment. There was all this bad blood between the two of them. And then she has this, like, moment of all of Branchy reconciliation for him here on the last night of his life.

And she calls him family. She's like, you're in our us. You know that? Like, Tommy, Benji, like me, you're in here with us. And family helps each other out if you need it. She's like, you're a family. That's what we do, right? And then Joel gets up and he pushes Seth over.

And mere seconds after Maria says family helps. helps each other out if you need it. We hear Ellie say, I don't need your fucking help. Which might to Joel in that moment sound like, you're not my fucking family. Right. And, you know, Maria is helping, by the moment. We're moving Seth. Yeah.

And then, yeah, Joel, again, Petra's really good at his job. So watching Joel embarrassed and devastated walking out of that dance is. is one of the saddest things I've ever seen. It's very, very tough. I thought this was even more agonizing to watch this time around. Always love getting to revisit the same moment in time from a different perspective, but just the way that... From a certain point of you. But the way that this has then been enriched by everything that we just watched inside of this episode

and also like the point that we have seen Ellie get to, all of it, the look on Ellie's face here, this just almost urgency, right? not just the severity, but the urgency. Like, stop hurting other people for me. I know what you did. What did you do? I know what you did. And then the look on Joel's face, that shame, but then also that inadequacy that we

are always tracking. And just even something more bone and soul deep, I think we're about to go to the port to see where he does try to say, like, let me try to be better, right? So it's not like he is not ready to do that. He actually recognizes that he must. But that is entwined, I think, with him, like, facing, staring down this, like, oh, my God, the person who I care most about in the world, like, the way that I love them is not what they want. Yeah. And, like, it's not just kind of your typical teenage rejection, right?

It is, like, a more fundamental reckoning of who they are to each other and how they move through the world. really just like extraordinary as a final harrowing source of pain before we go to the porch. Yeah, gladly. Thankfully, not the last. Oh, my God. So here we go. This last section I'm citing these, Future Days lyrics, all the promises at sundown. And Joel is here.

We have already seen this from Ellie's perspective. here it is from Joel's respective. Joel in the porch. We already noted the first time we saw this how, like, again, unbearably painful it was to watch Joel look so wounded and sad alone on the porch here. Playing the guitar. Hobbits and dragons to Gmail.com, if you know what Joel is playing here. I wrote Future Days in the Notes with, like, strong doubt in my heart. And then Malibu, Rubin was like, I don't think somebody.

So Hobbiton's the Dragon's Gmail. If he's just like strumming random chords, that's okay, too. Again, if you're curious whose POV this is, the camera's on Joel's profile, and Ellie, and we're just sitting there. And again, if you've not played the game, you're like, sadness, devastation, heartbreak. They'll never see each other again until they're down on the ground. Like, oh, my God. And then she comes in out of focus. So I hope that there are people at home going, oh, my God, Ellie's here.

Yeah. She came back. She came back. All right. So Ellie walked out. I know why Ellie said what she said to Jesse. Now I know why that guitar was returned to a position. Yeah. Now why that guitar is no longer on the ground.

Okay. So we get this scene. And this is, again, a scene directly out of the game. Yeah. The way that they're standing facing camera. But there's some added information as we've been outlining this like, this confrontation of like what you did. Yes. Which I love that we go through it with just like shaking the head and nodding the head.

Like he says, he says he will say something through choking tears in a little bit. But in terms of like the actual thing that he did, can only bring himself to shake his head or nod like as she's asking. And some of the questions she doesn't even have to finish. Yeah. Because he knows what, yeah. Did you kill everyone? Yeah, I did. I did.

I, uh, I, before we even get to. to that though. I am like upset. Like the way that he, the very ginger way that he puts the guitar down. Yeah. And like walks over to her with the coffee in his hand. It takes a sip and she says something and he like sort of sputters it out because he's like startled because she's talking to him. Like she's this woodland critter that he does not want to scare away. He's just being so careful and slow and uncertain and like, oh my God, it's just absolutely so nervous. It's just like absolutely devastating. It's like you've, you've returned to me. There is

a chance. Yeah. This is the chance. This is it. And like you know, so the second part of this scene is the very faithful like recreation and the framing all of it, the coffee, the conversation about the coffee beans. How can we not be thinking that of Ellie putting

the coffee beads on Joel's grave? It was like a very recent conversation they had. Yes. Yeah. Three months ago, recent conversation that they had about like, what he did to get those. Yeah. And it's like, okay, it's not,

smells like burnt shit from season one. It's like this thing that you love, I will put into the earth so that like what can grow from it. It's a way of saying, I am carrying that last conversation with us. That is the thing I will take forward. And so like, why move this up?

You know, here's what Neil said on the official pod. I was so nervous about that. That scene to me is the most important scene in the entire story. which is why in the game it's at the very end. One of the choices we made was to bring it up. And the reason we brought it up is because we worried it wouldn't work if you had to wait years to get this payoff. And I think that's correct.

Very fair. It's a long time to wait to get this clarity and this emotional clarity, not just the specifics of like they spoke. What did they say? What was revealed? Okay, the earlier moment in Salt Lake and the game of like the challenge and the admission, the confession at long last, the rupture that springs up in its wake, that happened here, the timeline clarity of that in Showland. Much more important than that is just like this beautiful unvarnished cracking open of the whole truth and what will the price of sharing it and revealing it and

denying it no longer be. And then what does that allow? It allows us to understand something that we have been, I think, like talking about, but with care and caution because we hadn't got to this moment yet this season. This is not just a story that is interested in exploring revenge. This is a story about empathy and forgiveness, right? In the path to forgiveness. And so to understand here that this is something Ellie at least wants. All of that is true and it is all, there's like uplifted hope inside of this,

which is why it's such a bomb at the end of the game. But I thought what Hallie said in the official pod and like, something I'm really grateful to Hallie and Neil for is like, I will say the interview that I did with them, prestige, you know, a lot of the questions I asked are similar to what Troy asked in the official pod. They gave different, not conflicting answers, but different answers, which is not often the case when you have, when you're on the like junket circuit again and again giving interviews. And so Neil talking about why they put the scene here when he was talking to me, I thought was like putting those two answers together was really illuminating to me. Hallie talking the official pod about what this then allows Ellie to justify. Yeah, sure. Is a darker cast to this scene because there is upless, there's hope, there is coffee beans, there's Dino would be lucky to have you. There's, you know, what are her intended?

I don't know what her intentions are. I'm very old-fashioned dad stuff. All this is sweet, him giving the guitar back to her, Shirley. All this sort of stuff is so beautiful and lovely. And then also, what does it allow Ellie to say is okay to do as she goes, makes her way through Seattle? So, contrasting, having this entire episode drop between Ellie massacring Nora and then walking back to the theater at the end of the episode with trembling hands of like

what she has done well here's here's her justification inside of this episode and this is of course exactly what you know this idea of like actually that's a daredevil idea looking justify it looking for justification of what you do but yeah just this idea of like you know justifying your violence in the name of love

and this is this is the thing that I am protecting, defending, avenging, revenging, all sorts of stuff like that. So I agree with everything you're saying about, like, this idea of forgiveness, empathy, passed down through the watch, all of this stuff is here. And there is this darker note to it. Absolutely. Absolutely. And that complexity is like what makes this story and these characters so indelible.

And like even thinking back to the L.A. Norris scene then, do you know what he did? I don't care. Yes, she does. Like, look at it. We see right here how badly and desperately Ellie cares. She does, but she doesn't in the calculus, like in the equation, like the math that she's doing there. Do you know what I mean?

What does that matter? That matters so much to her here. What does it matter to her in the later calculation? Right. Yeah. The way the calculus is changing and the way the calculus is informed then by like, well, what is the latest loss? It's the loss of Joel.

But it's also the loss of being able to work together toward that. point of forgiveness and understanding. Like, what is it? What, it's not okay, I get it. We're good. It's like, I don't know, actually, if I can forgive you, but I want to try. And so this gets, again, to that's that larger, like, I think very honest and true and potent, like, acknowledgement that the stuff, even in a heightened circumstance, like, the world of The Last of Us is not linear that, like, any reminder of what you lost, any confrontation with the people you blame for taking it away from you would pull you back in. If I were to lose you, I would surely lose myself to, like, decoupling from your own humanity.

And the thing that is so palpable from both of them here in this moment is their humanity. And the humanity that they have both been able to, like, preserve and foster in each other, right? The desire to, like, what is being a human? It's like, I built a life with you, you know? Only connect. Only connect. As the enforcer says, yeah. I want to say we've been praising, as we should, Pedro Pascal through this whole episode.

Incredible again in the scene. Bella Ramsey, they just absolutely decimated me in this scene. I just thought they were incredible. And Pedro and Bella together is just something astounding. Our listener John wrote in with this really beautiful insight inside of a larger email, John wrote, Ellie, Ellie is driven by the most painful thing possible. Stolen hope.

The cusp of rebuilding something that had come undone, something that had that a long-held secret had eroded over time. The secret, the disease had been cured, and they could finally start healing. And then taken from them. Anything else you want to say before we get, I mean, other than this is a masterpiece, as you said, at the top of the episode,

and we are forever changed, and I'll be thinking about the way that Peter Pascal strangled out. like yes, and I'll pay the price because you're going to turn away for me. But if somehow I had a second chance at that moment, I would do it all over again. Because I love you. Okay. I love you. Sorry, something we didn't say.

This is the first time that Joel has said, I love you. Absolutely wrecked me. Oh, my God. And then thinking about Dina saying, I love you so easily to Ellie later and Ellie not being able to respond. And Dina just being like, I know. Don't worry. I know. Yeah.

It's like, you know, what was one of the main things we talked about? throughout season one. And of course, now into season two, it's like the fear of opening yourself up to somebody else because then you could be hurt in the same way and how Joel would not have been able to... The part of the reason he does what he does at the end of season one is because he could not lose Ellie the way that he lost Sarah.

Like, literally could not. I thought that having had the Gail Joel therapy scene at the beginning of this season, where we have a very similar... a conversation that takes place with one person speaking a lot and the other person shaking their head, right, or nodding. Oh, I love that. Really primed us for not only the parallel and the emotion, obviously, on Joel's face, but then what is ultimately the distinction? That Ellie is the person Joel will tell the truth to at the end of the day.

But that there is a distinction in what Joel is offering, which is the shift from, you know, defiance to submission. like finally, right? To not carry this secret on his own anymore to risk the exact thing that he did what he did in season one to try to avoid, which was losing Ellie. Now it would be losing her in a different form. She would not be dead. But the risk that she would not want to be a part of his life anymore, what a painful thing. But he knows. I thought, like I loved the way that Pedro put it on inside the episode, his final act of love is telling her.

the truth, like that that was the gift that he gave her. And to see the way that Ellie was struggling with like, you took that for me, you took it from everyone. And to have to face that, like, that he hurt this person that he loves and wanted to help. And that like this, as we've talked about many times, dating back to season one, like, is not what she would have ultimately wanted. And I think that that comp is really interesting too. Like, we talk a lot about protector Joel and like Joel's savior complex, but like this is Ellie's version of that. Like, I could have been the one to save everyone. I wanted to save everyone. That's how my life would have had meaning. I love that that is like such a wedge and also then such a bridge back to each other. I thought that was like incredibly

powerful. I'll pay the price because you're going to turn away from me. Just absolutely fucking destroyed me because I love you in a way you can't understand. And then of course, to build toward I hope you do a little better than me, this bookend to the message from his father and this idea of like just the things that they have passed down and shared and inherited from each other are in many ways damaging and harmful. And in other ways, it's like the belief that you can try to be better and also that you can find a little bit of the capacity inside of you to understand and forgive a person who harmed you but also loved you.

And that Joel was not his father at the end. of the day, but, like, worried that he might be and that Ellie is not Joel, but also carries a lot of the darker parts of Joel inside of her, too. And, like, can this message then that he shares with her and that she offers back to him, but I would like to try, can that be enough to kind of combat and challenge this thing that Gail said that, like, some people can't be saved? Like, when we talk a lot in this story about save who you can save, like what does it mean to try to save yourself then and to try to save yourself

for the other people who you might try to form an us with moving forward? The scene, and there's a reason that it's, you know, so close to the end of the game, it's because everything is tied together here. And so I love the way it has been kind of redeployed in the show to simultaneously give us a lot of emotional catharsis and clarity, but also then propel us forward into this next stage of great discovery

and of a reckoning and of all of the things that the characters still have. have to discover and learn about themselves and the new trials that await. It's not the end. It's just a bridge into the next trial. And I can't wait to watch the finale and see how that goes. I thought this was just really, really, really beautiful. The other devastation that comes along with it is like when he says, in a way you can't understand, maybe you never will, but if that day should come, you should ever have one of your own, well, then I hope you do a little better than me. Inside of specifically, like, a queer child to parent relationship, this idea earlier

sort of jokingly when talking about going up a troll and having a crush on Jesse, Ellie's like, if I promise not to get pregnant, you know, sort of jokingly to herself, like, there's no way I'm going to get pregnant because they only like to have sex with women. So that's not, you know, happening for me. The fact that, you know, Dina is pregnant and both Ellie and Dina are immediately inside the context of the show are immediately thinking of this as their baby. Yeah. And this is their future. And Joel does not get to see that or know that. And Joel considered maybe this is not something that will, you know, And that, you know, it's fine. Mallory and I don't have kids.

Plenty of people don't have kids. But Joel was like, I'm not sure this is something you're going to have because, you're, you know, who knows, we're in the mushroom apocalypse. And there's, as far as we know, there's only other cat in town. Like, we don't know what's going on. So, like, the fact that this is a future for Ellie that Joel was deeply unsure would ever even be a thing. And then the question that Craig has been wanting us to consider from the start of the season, and I'm sure Neil and Halley too, is like, to your point about empathy and forgiveness, like, that Joel can only understand his father once he became a parent. And does that make everything that every blow that Javier landed, okay, no. but does it help add dimension to it in the way that knowing that Abby lost her father

or Seth is worried about his grandkids or all these other things just adds dimension and depth to a character. It's out of a story that, again, the entire engine of the story is empathy. Can we create empathy for people who have both? wronged us, people who have hurt us, people who have hurt people that we care about, is that available? And I think what's interesting about the game is I think it is much more interested in that question than preaching an answer to you. Because it's a very complicated question. Absolutely. And I think that's why it's the story is so powerful because, like, a story that makes you think and ask questions and interrogate yourself and interrogate your own worldview

is so much more powerful than a story that's just like, this is what you should think, and this is the right answer. And so that's with this opportunity. And, you know, again, it's a different medium TV to a game. You don't get to play these characters. It's a different experience of story. But like, my hope is that at the end of all of this, once you get through season three,

we will be in a place where people have a similar, takeaway from this story because I know that's the intention of the writers, of the creators of this. Mali Rubin, how long will you be thinking about the whimper sound that Joel makes

in between some of these strangled out lines that he says on the porch chair? Until I'm sipping my final cup of coffee on a porch one day. Well, I hope I'm there. Okay. We're going to go now into our spoiler section. It's going to be a real

brief one, but we're going to give you that warning nonetheless. Okay, really just two things I want to hit. Number one is this, just to revisit that idea. The guitar is the physical embodiment of Joel and Ellie leaving that guitar behind at the end of the game. Yeah. Not as a rebuke of Joel, but just a sort of like, I don't get to have this. Or however you decide to interpret it, hobbits and drag us to email.com, if you disagree. And then the other is

in a way you can't understand maybe you never will, but if the day should come, if you'd ever have one of your own well, then I hope you do a little better than me. And I think what's really interesting about that line is as we've been talking in the spoiler section about Ellie's decision, the end of Ellie and Dina's relationship, the end of Ellie is part of this little family with Dina and her kiddo is is what Ellie is doing here in that decision to, in not being part of that anymore, a brave thing to do, the right thing to do, or a tragic sort of regressive thing to do. And I think we've gotten at least emails from game players on both sides of that conversation. So again, I think that feeds into sort of what

the game has to say about posing questions more than spoon-feeding you answers. But what's your interpretation of, like, what Ellie loses at the end of this story and how you were thinking about it when you heard this, a quote from Joel? Yeah, I view Ellie choosing to go back out after Abby again instead of heeding Dina's outright plea to put that down, to put that need for vengeance down and live a life with Dina and JJ and their family on the farm, it's like an outright tragedy. I mean, I think it's tragic no matter what. I just think some people interpret it as,

and my understanding is that this has something to do with like the deletency with the board and stuff like that, that there is like there is a violence in Ellie that Ellie feels like she needs to remove. Yeah, I think like when Ellie is after putting the guitar down, setting back out through the field and, you know, we assume pursuit of Dina and JJ setting out to find them, that she is then able to do that as a better version of herself. So I think it is all in the mix there. And yeah, I'm so, I'm like so curious now. I am so curious what moving this up kind of means for like how the end of the show ultimately will go. You know, season three, like now that the Portina is not there for the end, we'll find out. But yeah, no, I just, yeah, I can't wait to see how they continue to explore these moments.

But yeah, it's just like obviously impossible not to be thinking of JJ and Dina when hearing this. So your interpretation is that Ellie and Dina will reunite off screen in the game. I think that Ellie's trying to find her, yeah, going after her. I mean, we have the letter. There's the letter from Jessie's family. So, like, my assumption is that Ellie kind of knows that that would be where Dina had gone and would go seek her there. So that's my hope. You know, that's my little kernel of hope at the end is that she tries to go build a life with them again.

And I hope you enjoy that warm cup of coffee that is the hope that you have of this happy ending. And I love that for you. Okay. This is it. We did it. What a devastating, beautiful hour of television that we exist. experience one more episode of The Last of Us to come. We will, as we mentioned, be discussing Rogue One later this week on the feed.

I cannot wait to spend some more time with Cassie and Andor and K2 and Mel She and the rest with you. Hobbes and Dragons to Gmail.com, if you have some spring mailbag questions you would like to send us. Thank you so much to the entire team today. It is Steve Allman, Carlos Chiroboga, John Richter. Richterino. Victorino. Our dinner rungapal who answers our texts

even when he's sick and joe me at dinner and on the social We'll see you soon. Bye.