The Last of Us Season 1 Episode 5 Discussion

[Herbert Playz]

Finally episode 5 has us moving in the right direction. We finally get some pace and I feel like the show greatly benefited from it. 

I'm going to be honest the show just doesn't feel quite as dangerous as it should be. Joel and Ellie seem a little bit more at ease than they should be.

When playing the game, the player is constantly aware of noise. We are careful not to make noise and we create and use noisy distractions to our advantage.

In this episode the characters were far more careful. There was that one scene in the underground bunker where I feel like the kids were making far too much of a ruckus given the circumstances but overall the characters were very careful of their surroundings.

Near the end of the episode everything was awesome. It is very similar to the game, Joel is sneaking around to take out the shooter in the window, Henry, Sam and Ellie are crouched behind a car taking cover. This was almost perfect pacing and captures the atmosphere of the game nicely.

Then of course we get one big showdown with everything being interrupted by infected. Having Joel being separated from Ellie adds an extra level of suspense as although he's not entirely helpless. He is not down on the ground to physically protect Ellie from harm.

You have to think at some point the showrunners thought to have some infected sneak up behind Joel while Ellie was trapped in the car. Having him wrestle against some infected with the rifle out of reach while Ellie is in the car would have added to the tension.

Having the big infected come out of the ground and just start knocking people around was cool to see visually but narrative wise was a big eye roller for me. Didn't the show already establish that the goal of the fungus was not to kill or destroy but to simply infect humans and spread the virus?

Be that as it may everyone gets away and manages to reach a motel outside of town to get some rest and then they discover that Sam is infected.

Seeing everything in live action makes you realize that the first thing everyone should have done was make sure that Ellie, Sam and Henry weren't bitten.

To be honest in this type of situation. Just because Ellie was bitten once and didn't turn, doesn't necessarily mean that if she were bitten again she would be fine. I know I wouldn't just trust her to be 100% okay.

Of course Sam is infected and somehow Ellie, a person who should know better decides not to tell Joel? That was ridiculous. But the way everything happened so suddenly felt a little too rushed. 

Henry shooting Sam and then pointing the gun back on Joel was done well, you could see the confusion in his eyes. That was good but I feel like Sam was shot too quickly. Somehow the scene lacked impact for me because it was so sudden.