ScreenCrush: The Podcast! - The Last of Us Season 2 Episode 2 BREAKDOWN - Easter Eggs You Missed!

Episode Date: April 21, 2025

Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the Grandview's shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series.

Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. You stupid, old man, you don't get to rush this. Welcome back to Screen Crush. I'm Ryan Erie, and this is all of the Easter eggs references and little things you might have missed in the second episode of The Last of Us season two. So this episode is absolutely monumental for the series, and not just because we lose Joel, but due to everything we learn about the evolution of the cortisone.

As with everything we've seen in the series thus far, this episode stays true to key elements from the game while making minor tweaks to fit the HBO show better. And in this case, that meant throwing in enough frozen undead to make the Night King jealous. That's my thing. And before we get started, don't forget to check out our Last of Us parody merch at our merch store. We have the Outbreak Day and Fireflies look for the light. Or you can become a member of the Alpine Clicker Patrol. Links for all of these are below and now you can become a store member to earn rewards and get free stuff. the comments and we missed a lot of stuff in the last video. Oh, thanks, Doug, I'm just getting to that. So before we dive into this episode, I want to talk about a few things that we missed in last week's breakdown. So in the last episode, when we were introduced to the Salt Lake crew, we forgot to mention that Nora is played by Tate Gabriel, a naughty dog veteran.

Not only did she star as Joe Braddock in the film adaptation of Uncharted, but she also plays the new protagonist and naughty dog's latest game, The Heretic Prophet. We also forgot to talk about Ellie's Fresh Ink, which is not only used to cover up her clicker bite scar and to keep her immunity a secret, but it also holds a lot of symbolism. The plant on her arm is specifically a fern, which symbolizes endurance, renewal, and adaptability, fitting for someone who's going through everything that she has.

It also features a moth, the same moths seen on the guitar neck that Joel gives to Ellie. Now moths are drawn to light, just as Joel and Ellie seek hope through darkness. However, a recent trailer shows how Gail assigns another meaning to it later on. So it's a moth.

Death, if you believe in that ship. And as Andrea Aguyer 5698 pointed out in the comments on our last video, the composer for The Last of Us, Gustavo Santo Alela, actually made a cameo appearance in the last episode, just as he does in game. Now, in episode two, we start off with the dream sequence of Abby reliving the discovery of her father.

Now, in the game, we see this moment fully played out, brains and all. But the show opted to have this future version of her narrate the gruesome details to her younger self and save all the gore for later. In fact, we don't even hear anything as her younger self enters the next room, not even a scream like she does in the game,

as if her subconscious is acting trying to suppress the trauma. Fun fact for you, the actress who played mocap for Abby was actually in that doctor scene in season one, so in a way, Abby's already been in that room. She wakes up at the Salt Lake Crew's new, beautiful skylit cabin in the woods, just overlooking Jackson.

Now, you can tell they're camped out in some sort of family game room due to all the board games and toys on the shelf, including this goofy little toy dinosaur that's just chilling on the planter in the background while Joel's brutally murdered later. The story of this episode, and really of The Last of Us in general,

is about the young inheriting the earth and, you know, what they choose to do with that new blank slate. Ellie gets this through her fresh start in Jackson and a blossoming new relationship, while Abby gets to redefine who the fireflies are in the wake of Joel's actions in Utah. But just like the Cordyceps fungus itself, they choose to go down a path of violence and revenge

that creates an endless cycle between them, arguably destroying the world they inherited, just like the infected destroyed Jackson in this episode. Now, the video game left these Salt Lake Cruise motivations ambiguous at this point in the story, but the HBO series paints a much more humanizing picture of them. Owen tells the crew the real plan. The plan is to convince her to go back.

Because if we don't, the only people getting killed out here are us. It's clear that none of them were actually serious about going through with it. But wait, does he want to go after Joel too? Well, of course, Doug, but he's trying to be pragmatic about it. There's no way they could just walk into Jackson and take out one of their own without losing the whole crew in the process. It's clear that the promise Owen made to Abby was simply to console her, which makes it all the more tragic that she accidentally ends up getting what she wants.

Abby suits up in an outfit nearly identical to the one that she wears in-game, but with a bit of added protection against the cold, which makes sense, given the thermometer that we see outside the window, tells us it's minus 20 degrees Celsius or zero degrees Fahrenheit for us Americans. Spelled out for me, impossible. At that temperature, any exposed skin can freeze within as little as 30 minutes, which makes the concerns for hypothermia very real as we see later in this episode. Then we go back to Ellie being woken up by Jesse,

which actually takes us to the very first scene in the game after the title card. And it plays out almost exactly the same way. Even the dialogue is word for word from that opening scene with only a few minor differences, most notably how Ellie reiterates that Dina was high. I heard you had quite a night after I left. Yeah, uh, she kissed me. It was just Dina being Dina. She didn't mean anything by it.

You kissed her. We also see, yet again, just how much Ellie surrounds herself with music. Even the window pane here has music sheets attached to it. As Ellie and Jesse walk through Jackson, however, we get some new insight on the unique aspect that the show is going to bring to the court of steps. threat. He explains. They're using their own dead like insulation. Which is both absolutely horrifying and surprisingly grounded in reality. Right, are you saying the mushrooms hibernate? Well, while they don't necessarily hibernate per se, they do enter a dormant state in unfavorable

conditions. We know from the very first episode that the cordyceps fungus tends to prefer warmer temperatures. What if the world were to get slightly warmer? Well, now there is reason to evolve. Which is why the fungus was able to grow in Jackson's insulated root-filled pie. In the real world, the cordyceps fungus will guide its host underground and emerge in the spring. But the fungus in The Last of Us is much more complex, as we see reiterated when Jesse mentions how the whole town is spooked by Ellie's stalker's story. Also, somebody told the council of a ghost story about the world's smartest infected, and now everybody's spooked out of their mind. Then Jesse starts poking around about what's going on between her and Joel, but Ellie quickly cuts him off. But I'm still me, he's still Joel, and nothing's ever going to change that.

Now, in previous videos, we speculated that the show might change the order in which Ellie learns the truth about what happened in Utah. But this scene seems to confirm that she already knows what happened. After her rant, Ellie mentions wanting to go on patrol with Joel. But Jesse tells her that he went on patrol with Dina instead, a major change from the game. In the game, Joel was on patrol with Tommy when he runs into Abbey. But HBO decided to switch that up so Tommy could stay back for the giant battle with the infected, which we see the town prepping for in the next scene. So this takes us to another new scene introduced in the TV series

where Tommy reviews the emergency game plan with the town in case they become overrun. He says, Stay off the main street, last place you want to be, trust me on that one. Which is the first street that Tommy takes when the infected actually hit. When he mentions the guns, he says, Somebody shot themselves in the leg last week. All right, don't be Earl.

Which could be a reference to a minor character in The Last of His Part 1, who was the technician of Jackson's hydroelectric dam. Or it could even be W. Earl Brown, the voice and body actor for Bill and The Last of us part one. After Tommy finishes his instructions with the town, Maria gives Ellie over to Seth to give him a chance to apologize. So this is another scene taken directly from one of the cut scenes in the game with a few minor visual tweaks to fit the set. When he finally does apologize, he says, I shouldn't have said it. I shouldn't even thought it.

Which takes his apology a bit further than it did in game. I'm trying to say I'm sorry. In the corner is a sign for Red Hook, a beer brewed in Seattle. Seattle, of course, is where the WLF is based. So this, alongside Ellie's love for the Seattle-based grunge scene, continues to show how these communities are subtly connected in ways they may not even understand, despite their later conflicts. After Ellie hands Jesse the sandwiches, they head out together. Now, in the game, Dina and Ellie gets stuck together in a blizzard and take shelter in Eugene's dispensary, which becomes a pivotal moment in their relationship. However, the show puts her with Jesse, likely to slow things down a bit between her and Dina

and to let their relationship develop more gradually. They can also see the storm on the horizon as they head out, but they completely dismiss it as a threat. Now, while the storm doesn't end up being the real danger, it is symbolic of the hidden threats that Jackson faces in both the infected and outsiders like Abby. Remember, Abby is up in those mountains, and Abby's actions directly cause the infected to wake up and attack the town.

So, by dismissing the threat as something just up in the mountains, what they're really dismissing is the very real threat of the corticeps fungus evolving and actually growing under their feet through the roots in the pipes. In the same way, Joel ignored this threat. He thought he could walk away from Salt Lake City without consequences. So the storm and the swarm of infected are both indicative of how comfortable people in Jackson are and they're ignoring the existential threats that are literally outside their gates. They feed the horses and then head into a grow house, a welcome change from the game,

where the horses were left hungry and cold in the store lobby. Now, in the game, the grow house was tucked away in the supermarket basement. But here, it's moved across the street to a new, location entirely. In the game, Dina and Ellie joke about how they wish they'd known about Eugene's dispensary. I wish he'd told me about this. Could have helped him out. But here we learned that Jesse, in fact, did. Or at least, he turned a blind eye to Eugene's operation. Fucking whiz-nating. You're 7-11 full of weed? Then no.

We later see Ellie find other Easter eggs from the dispensary scene, such as the gas mask bong. We also see a stack of videotapes next to the TV, which were bootleg porno tapes in the game, but in the show, these are tapes of your mom. We also see a book full of military patches, likely Eugene's from his years when he served in Vietnam. This is also where Ellie finds Eugene's Firefly Dog Tag, just like in the game, but the changes in the show give the revelation a fresh layer of context. Now, while Eugene supposedly died of old age in the games, the show has changed this so that he was killed by Joel.

You shot and killed my husband. Jesse even reiterates that again in the grow house. Raw deal, Joel having to put him down. But we know that Joel hasn't been honest with everyone, and so does Ellie. Now, while she is clearly aware of what happened to Eugene, the fact that he was a firefly was news to her. So her reaction could be her putting together the pieces as to why Joel did this without giving too much away to Jesse. Meanwhile, Abby has been tracking down Dina and Joel from afar. In the game, she follows their footprints in the snow, which leads her to a road with a single infected frozen to the ground.

However, the show changes things up a bit to trigger the massive avalanche of icy infected. In the opening shot, she carries an AR-15-style rifle but immediately loses it. literally in the first frame as she slides down the hill. The clickers on top turn toward her and alert the infected below them, showing a whole new level of coordination between the infected. As the horde emerges, we even see a clicker with fresh blood on his face, which insinuates that they may even feed off other infected while in that semi-dormant state. I also love how in every single shot of the infected running,

there's always one guy out front falling face first, which of course makes total sense in a horde of infected, but you've got to appreciate that consistency. Of course, Abby's escape from the horde was altered a bit to match the same, the size in the show. But it lines back up with the game when Abby gets pinned to the wall through the chain link fence. We even see some of the infected pushing their hand through the gate, which is one of the brutal details the show adds to the scene that the game just couldn't. After one of the clickers breaks through and grabs Abby, her massive plot armor pulls through

and Joel saves her with a nearly one-to-one shot of how they meet in game. Yeah, but person, I thought you said Joel was a Zedomorph. Didn't that mean he hates outsiders? Fair point, Doug, and no, actually, Joel's a xenophob, not a xenomorph. Now, as concerned as Joel is about letting people into Jackson, he doesn't hesitate to save Abby, and tragically, that choice ends up costing him his life. The show does a great job of showing just how circumstantial the events around Joel's death are. Not only were most of the Salt Lake crew not fully committed to the cause, but had Joel not saved her and believed her enough to head back to her cabin for supplies,

he'd still be alive. Then we cut back to the Jackson Radio Tower, where we meet Amy, played by Reed and Elizabeth. She is an actress who actually used a wheelchair for many years when she was recovering from Spina Bifida. Her character's name seems to be a reference to former naughty dog writer Amy Henning, known for her work on the Uncharted series. So in the background, we see some fake band posters including Gold Drifters, Deer Walker, and Killer Against, which seems to be parody-safe rip-offs of bands like Rise Against, the Killers and the Drifters. And then we hear Amy call Joel on the radio. Remind, this is Jackson. Come in.

So those call signs refer to what route they are on. And the mine in particular could also be a reference to the coal mine DLC map from the last of his faction's multiplayer. After Ellie and Jesse head out to find Joel, one of the construction workers renovating the pipes in Jackson strikes the cordisept fungus, redirecting the massive horde straight for Jackson and even waking up more infected along the way. The way the infected moved together like a school of fish shows that the fungus is connected far beyond the roots, possibly sharing some sort of telepathic link. And we even get more evidence of this as the episode progresses. As the town begins to execute the battle plan, we see everyone take their posts, including Seth the homophob,

showing just how truly dependent everyone in Jackson is on one another, even with their differences. While this entire battle is completely HBO's addition to the story, the way they defend the front gate by walling them and lighting them on fire is similar to the way the Salt Lake crew defends their cabin in the game when they run into Joel and Tommy, but obviously on a much bigger scale. It's also interesting to see humans in modern day be reduced to medieval tactics like this. The fires also signal to Joel from afar about the chaos in Jackson, which adds a new layer of heartbreak to his final moments, as he's torn between what to prioritize,

and he ends up making a fatally wrong decision. Now at first, the plan with the barrel seems to work, but then we get more evidence of the Cordyceps hive mind getting stronger. Tommy notices some of the infected swarming toward a bloater and immediately recognizes that they are going to breach the gate. The fact that the swarm reinforced the bloater and congregate around it before the breach means that not only are the infected communicating with each other telepathically, but they're also smart enough to make strategic battlefield decisions.

As they breach, Tommy suits up with the flamethrower, which is one of the last weapons you obtain in the game as Joel in part one and as Abby in part two. However, unlike the game, these flamethrowers have a full tank strapped to their back, unlike the smaller handheld campfire propane tanks that you get in game. After Maria gets the bloater's attention, Tommy tries to lure them into an alley for a one versus one. And when he reaches the dead end,

we can see the bloater coming around the corner in the glass just before Tommy lights him up. Now, in the game, a flamethrower is one of the best weapons you can use against bloaters, since the matured fungus is flammable and makes their armor much more brittle. However, yet again, we see more evidence of the fungus evolving. It's shockingly resistant to the flames. And rather than recoiling in pain as they do in the games, this one seems almost immune to the heat. Now, while it finally dies at the last second,

it certainly seems like the fungus is adapting to human defenses. Well, fire is just less effective in the cold snow. I mean, that's possible, but it's not nearly as fun. Finally, Maria is able to get to the kennels and lets the dogs out on the remaining infected. Wait, what? Or weren't the doggies get infected? Not at all.

Just like how the real world cordyceps fungus is limited to a certain species of ants, the fungus in The Last of Us is exclusive to humans. This is why horses don't become infected after riding through a horde. In fact, if the people of Jackson wanted to make use of these dead infected bodies after the invasion, grinding them up and making them into dog food isn't the worst idea. What the fuck starts a conversation like that? I just sat down.

Hello, yes, police? Yeah, he's talking about feeding me to zombies. No, other way around. So then we turn back to the Salt Lake crew as Dina, Joel, and Abby arrive at their cabin. Dina is in bad shape when we get there. The black patches on her hand are fourth degree frostbite, which can take several weeks or even months to heal, and that's if it doesn't cause permanent nerve damage.

In the game, the players have no idea what's about to happen when Joel arrives at the cabin. But in the show, the scene feels so different given that we already know Abby's intentions. Now, while this certainly gives the scene more attention, it loses some of the shock value the game had by keeping the twist a surprise. So when Abby finally says Joel's name out loud, the entire Salt Lake crew locks eyes on him, just like they do in the game. Even the score changes to the same constant screeching sound heard during the game's cutscene. Dina's presence at Joel's death complicates things as well. Since Tommy was his patrol partner in the game, there was no need to be shy about why Abby would want to kill Joel,

which she doesn't really do in the game anyways. However, here it seems like HBO wanted to stretch this moment but didn't want to let Dina in on Joel's secret yet, so they knock her out. When they do, we can see that she is wearing a specific bracelet that gamers should recognize. This bracelet is a Jewish Homsa bracelet, worn to prevent harm and bring good fortune. Now, Dina eventually gives this bracelet to Ellie for good luck later in the game, but here it seems like that its luck has run out. In the game, Joel responds to Abby's very first question with, why don't you say whatever speech you got rehearsed? Which leads Abby to get straight to business, but here, it seems she actually gets a chance to say

the speech she has rehearsed. Before she starts pulling out putters, she asked Joel to tell the truth, which is a direct parallel to his failure to do so with Gail in the first episode. This gives Joel a chance to make a point that he never made in the game when he says, I've saved your life. Right before Abby takes his leg out with a shotgun, which, as brutal as it was, was still much tamer than it was in the game. Abby then forces Mel to tourniquet Joel's leg to ensure he doesn't bleed out and she can torture him even longer. She tells Joel she was 19 when she found her dad's body, the same age that Ellie is now. And when he hears that, he can't even look her in the eye anymore. Abby then mentions her new mentor in Seattle, referring to Isaac Dixon, the leader

of the WLF. She talks about their code of ethics. We don't kill people that can't defend themselves. Now that seems to be a shift from the ruthless leader we see in the game, who is more than willing to shoot children and torture naked people. Eventually, she locks eyes with the golf club and grabs it after Joel tells her to... I have waited it so... Just shut the fuck up and do it already. Echoing his initial response from the game when Abby hits him back with her most iconic line.

You don't get to rush this. You don't get to rush this. And then she starts swinging at the open shotgun wound on his knee rather than at his face like she does in the game. Now, by the time Ellie stumbles upon Joel's tracks, it's already far too late. Ironically, she enters through the basement in the show to find Joel upstairs,

which is the opposite of how it happens in the game. As Ellie heads back into the room, she's blocked off by Manny, who she slices in the face. Now, in the games, she sliced Jordan, another crew member absent from the show, so it looks like HBO is making Manny take that hit instead. Specifically, she cuts him over the eye, rather than across the cheek like she does to Jordan in the game. Ellie's heartbreaking dialogue as she cries on the floor

is replicated nearly word for word from the scene of the game. End it now. Joel, get up. Joel, get up. Joel, f*** get up. We even hear the same score replicated again with a loud, isolating, ear-piercing ring as Abby delivers the final blow, just like it does in the game. For a person, I've seen a lot more shots of Pedro Pascal and Traders. Is he really dead?

Look, Doug, the only way Joel is coming back at this point is if he's a clicker, but you're definitely right that we are going to see Pedro Pascal again this season. The game, Last of His Part 2, loves a good flashback, and there are still many unanswered questions about what happened in the four years between seasons one and two. So immediately, Ellie vows to kill Abby, resetting the vicious cycle of revenge that these two have found themselves in. Gives them with you to the end of the line. However, after the Salt Lake crew leaves, Ellie isn't knocked out like she is in the game,

which gives her this incredibly emotional moment to grieve on top of Joel's body. Now, as the episode closes out, we hear Through the Valley by Sean James, covered by Ashley Johnson, who is the voice of Ellie. She also played Ellie's mother in a flashback scene in season one. And this has bothered me for a long time. She wore the same coat that Ellie wears in the present day. Shout out to heavy spoilers for catching that reference. Now, this song that Ashley Johnson sings was also the song used in the initial reveal trailer

for The Last of Us Part 2 at PlayStation Experience in 2016. However, while that initial reveal trailer focused this song on Ellie, the show seems to refocus it on Abby instead. The opening lyric is the Bible verse Psalm 234, and it's about. standing with your conviction in your faith. And with Abby, walking away successful, she certainly has remained solid in her convictions. It also mentions how the singer is blind to it all. And how her mind and her gun is the only thing that brings her comfort, echoing the assumed relief that Abby must feel after finally accomplishing her mission.

The final lyrics of the song are, but I know when I die, my soul is damned, which is a fitting note for the episode to end on. Abby knows that she cannot be redeemed for her actions any more than Joel could. She even broke her own code to do this. And on top of it all, she has made Ellie into the same monster that she has become. Now, with the town in complete disarray, the impact of Joel's death could have an even bigger impact on the show than it did in the game, which is saying a lot, given that Joel's early death was one of the central controversies of Last of Us 2. For instance, the people of Jackson now have to rebuild without their chief builder.

Now, with all that said, naughty dog's willingness to take narrative risks is what makes the Last of Us so great. So we cannot wait to see what's in store for the next episode. Well, guys, that's everything we've caught in the second episode of Last of Season 2. Big shout out to Dodd Sites for right in this video. find his social links below. So what did you guys think of the episode? Was Joel's death overshadowed by the massive fight with the infected? Are there any details we missed? Let me know in the comments or at me on Twitter at Ryan Erie. And if it's your first time here, welcome to the channel. Please subscribe and smash that bell for alerts. For Screen Crush,

I'm Ryan Erie. Thank you.