Well, hey, everybody. It's me, Dr. Walking Dead, and I am here with the illustrious Day of the Dead. Hey, Jay, how are you? Hi, buddy. I'm good. Thanks for having me back. Thanks for having me back. So I just want to share some information with the listeners. So we are, yes, we are behind. This is our coverage of Season 2, Episode 6, The Price.
And episode seven has already come out, which I have not watched yet. Same. Because I wanted to talk about episode six clean. Same. But I wanted to share with everybody why we are behind. It's because I fell out of a tree. Now, that sounds like the setup to a joke, but it sadly is not. I am an English professor who fancies himself a manly man.
And so I climbed up a ladder to cut a dead limb out of a cottonwood tree with a chainsaw. And I got it cut, feeling pretty good about myself. And then all the dried limbs. were very springy so as far as i can tell the branch fell hit the ground and bounced back up just enough to knock me off the ladder
I've done this kind of thing enough to know that when you start falling out of a tree, you immediately throw the chainsaw as hard as you can in the opposite direction. Very good. I was going to ask if that thing was still running. Was it running? It was still running. Oh, yeah, it was running. Oh, my goodness. But I threw it as far as I could as I was going down the other direction. Now, I've done this before, sadly. I have fallen off ladders before.
So I'm going down and I'm conscious enough to say, okay, I've got to keep my head up. I don't want a head injury. Yeah. And I don't want to land right on my back because I have back problems enough. Right. So I'm going down kind of sideways. And that was when I landed on the two by 10 board. it demarcates the edge of the sandbox oh no and so i landed on that right on my right rib cage brother i would have rather landed on the chainsaw than that that sounds so painful
So it really, really, really hurt. So I went to the emergency room. My initial instinct was to not, in case there's any doubt as to my masculine virility. it hurts so bad that i i went in and got it checked out and i have broken two ribs uh and technically technically i broke my back now
Your vertebra have to be pretty severely damaged to get to the spinal cord. I don't have anything like that. My spinal cord's fine. Thank heavens. But some of the vertebra have these little wings, these little like... yes pokey bits of bone yeah and i snapped two of those off oh geez did you need those do you need those or not i don't i don't think you'd need them okay they're just for god put them there for a reason so
All those bones are like packed together with meat and other things. So the bones aren't moving, which means they will heal naturally. But unfortunately, it really, really hurts. to get up, to sit down, to cough, to sneeze, and to breathe. To breathe. Now, what I really wanted to share is that my saintly buddy here... upon hearing about my accident kick a man when he's down sent me a t-shirt that says gravity my only weakness yes
And so this is the kind-hearted, loving mockery that we sometimes get into. But to add insult to injury, it has a logo that is in the shape of horror. That's right. It is a hexagon. framing a figure with a broken arm. Yes. So thank you very much, Jay, for thinking of me. You're welcome. You're welcome. I will wear this.
shirt proudly to every follow-up appointment and to physical therapy if it comes to that. So the moral of the story, well, the moral of the story is, and I learned this from the ER nurse. It might actually be cheaper to pay someone else to limb your trees than to do it yourself and pay for the ER visit. The other moral of the story is that Jay is just one hell of a dude.
Who has a thick, thick sense of humor. But he's very kind and sensitive at the same time. Yeah. Well, the truth is, I actually... You know, cause I wanted to find something to try to make you smile thematic. Cause I knew you were in a lot of pain and I'm like, okay, I wonder if there's any sort of a zombie.
with the broken parts. I mean, obviously there should be. So I looked for zombie figurines. And the thing is, when I saw that hexagonal shape behind that, you know it was just like i couldn't resist it plus perfect man you're a superhero to me and every superhero has Some weakness. And I think that's, I think that's cool. Gravity is your only weakness. Yep. Well, gravity and the 250 pounds of my body fell upon myself, I guess.
So, yeah, we're just hanging in there. But thanks, listeners, for your patience. We're really excited to talk about this episode, which is, Jay, this is the second to the last episode of this season already. It is, and I'm grateful. I mean, I hate that that happened to you, but I'm grateful that I guess that you prefaced with your story because that was actually even sadder than the episode. So I needed.
yes yeah maybe put it in perspective okay so listeners i uh i contacted jay about this episode and i called it a very special the last of us Sorry, that pause was too long. This week on a very special episode of The Last of Us. Yes. Called The Price. We get a series of flashbacks showing the development of Joel and Ellie's relationship since coming to...
Boulder? Where are we? Grand Junction? Well, I'm on pain pills. Yeah, no, that's fine. So you mean when they're, yeah, back in, sorry. Jackson Hole. Jackson Hole. That's right. That's right. Sorry. So we're at Jackson Hole.
and we're gonna we're gonna move through time marking the developments in their relationship as they coincide with ellie's birthdays now structurally this is cool gives us a nice framework then we get to be like one one year later one year later we use the birthday to kind of unite the thematics from a realistic point of view it's completely absurd it's like what the only important things on your relationship happen on your birthday
But we're going to suspend disbelief, and we're going to go with this flashback. Now, the best part of the flashback, Joel, I ruined it. What is the best part of the flashback, Jay? It has Joel in it. Thank you very much. You're very astute. We get to see Pedro Pascal. And so we get to see Joel again and remember how awesome he is and what a great actor he is. And he sounds just like the Mandalorian for some reason.
I enjoy that. And we're going to track out how the secrets come to light. Man, honestly, I'm only on ibuprofen, but I still can't talk. so we're going to jump through time and we're going to get these key moments in the relationship and it's ultimately going to be very sad and touching uh jay what did you think of this
Putting this episode kind of right at the height of Ellie's monstrous turn. Well, do you want the positives or the negatives? Or do you just want... Let's do the positives first. Okay. What do you like about it? Positive, I mean... It is beautiful. I mean, for characters that you care about, I mean, if this were a drama that we're watching, you know, this would be, as you said, a very special.
You know, it's moving and it's, you know, there's lots to admire. And we had a couple of cameos that I appreciated from... other actors that we both like from other things, which maybe you're going to get to that. But I love the cameos as well. So, I mean, there was so much heart in this. And to be honest, except for like something like.
28 Days Later, which has some great heart to it. There aren't a lot of zombie movies like off top of my head that I could think of that have a lot of good heart. So this has tremendous heart, but it's just almost like... Too much heart, not enough brains, right? Well, this is a pretty zombie light episode. Yes. And I know that given a choice, you would always take brains over heart. Yes.
Although, please quit doing that in your actual physical life. You got to love your heart, man. Right. Love your heart, Jay. That's right. So the episode starts with a disorienting flashback that's actually pretty cool. It's Joel and Tommy as boys, and we are introduced to their dad, Javier. Now, Javier Miller is played by Tony Dalton. I freaking love Tony Dalton. Yes, yes. And I didn't even know who he was.
10 years ago he's my guy from the reason i know him best is better call saul he was lalo salamanca He is terrifying in Better Call Saul. Agreed. And he actually, he has a very cool role in the Marvel series about Hawkeye. I heard that, but I haven't seen him in that. Well, he's really cool because they manipulate the audience a little bit because Mr. Dalton is an attractive Hispanic man.
but his affected mannerisms are also simultaneously terrifying. And I think we get a little bit of this when he's talking to Joel and Tommy, because we learned that their dad is abusive because his dad was abusive. And so we get the cycle of abuse. Yes. And he and Joel are having this heart-to-heart. And honestly, man, I wasn't sure if Javier was going to beat Joel to a pope or give him a big hug. It's a great sequence. It's really tight.
just the two of them at a table sharing a beer and uh it it has the flavor to me of that that opening sequence of inglorious bastards where you have this really tense conversation at a table oh you're not quite sure where it's going to go yes a little tonally i caught that but you find out that javier is aware of his struggles as a father he doesn't make excuses for him and he's simply trying to be better than his dad was
That's the theme of the whole episode, folks. That's why we get it at the beginning. Because Joel struggles with being a father. And he's trying to figure out how to do right by Ellie. And Ellie in this episode is... Dare I say it? She's pretty unlikable. Oh, my goodness. That is the understatement of the year. And I will have I got to say here, I mean, I've never really liked the character of Ellie.
But it's almost like they took all of the unlikableness and put it in one episode to show you just how irksome she is. So, yeah, I'm struggling. you're right and you phrased it really well it feels like they took her character and said okay let's only portray the negative side of teenagehood so she comes across as really entitled really self-focused really bratty
And at times thankful. She does appreciate what Joel does for her. But what we see is over the course of these years, Joel goes like all out on these birthdays. Yeah. And Ellie is thankful but doesn't seem to show any kind of... real love and understanding in return so joel makes remakes a guitar puts a new neck on it hand crafts it with with bone and inlay
and introduces Ellie's symbol of the moth, even though Joel doesn't understand it. He wants to connect with her. So he makes this great guitar. And then Pedro plays the guitar and sings. pedro didn't know how to play the guitar he learned it just for that so good job on you pedro yes so that's touching okay we get it we get it another musical number right this is the third
Guitar solo designed to tug at our heartstrings. In season two, within a couple of episodes of each other, yes. Yeah, so they're hitting the guitar pretty hard. Yes. Then we jump, and this was my favorite part. He takes her to a museum. Apparently, there's a really big air and space and natural history museum near.
near Jackson Hole and one of the original space capsules is there and so we have this this kind of real-life virtual reality space thing and it's really well done and apparently it's in the game uh so there you go so i thought it was that was my favorite part i think the pacing and the editing and the the emotional
manipulation was was on point for that sequence what do you think yeah i agree and i like when she stands up on top of the t-rex even though she's still obnoxious i love dinosaurs yeah well who doesn't yeah right Hey, isn't there kind of a new Jurassic Park movie coming out soon? Yeah, July 2nd. Jurassic World Rebirth. Funny how you had that date right at the top of your head. That's right. It's my birthday movie this year. I'm so excited.
yes this is not that folks we did not get uh zombie t-rexes although someone should explore that idea yes so then we have this angsty struggling moment Joel comes home, finds Ellie alone in her bedroom with a girl, getting a tattoo, doing drugs, scantily clad. And this is what I... And they draw attention to it. Joel does say, what are you... You're doing all the teenage rebellion at once. That line was hilarious.
Because he said it right after I thought it. It's like, oh my gosh, we don't have time to roll these out one at a time. We're just going to have Ellie. One day she wakes up and she's like, I am uber rebellious teenage girl. Yes. That line was so funny. I laughed out loud, though. I mean, and not even in a mocking way. I just appreciated... How he nailed that because, you know, kids are kind of surprising like that. They will they will lump together offenses at times.
Yes. My kids, I've only ever caught them doing one thing wrong at a time. But why not? You know, we have to condense it down. It's a TV show. Yes. Reductive medium. And so they have a big fight. And it's sad. The cake. presumably goes uneaten whatever now this is where this we then move to to another part i really like and they've teased us with this all second season yes what happened to eugene it's my favorite part of this episode
So who's playing Eugene, man? Oh, well, you finally call him Joey Pants. Yeah, Joe Pantoliano from The Sopranos and many other things, right? Yes. It's so awesome to see him in this tight little simple role. He's aged since I'd seen him last. And I knew he was in the episode, but I didn't recognize him. But we get this really... complex confrontation because joey uh who is of course the the resident psychologist's husband uh eugene here has been bit
and he knows he's going to die he's going to turn into a monster and joel is ready to shoot him in the head right there and be done with it because that's what you do but eugene plays upon ellie's sympathies because he just wants to be able to see his wife one last time before he goes massively powerful scenario yeah and one that is quintessential in terms of the zombie narrative even though the only zombie we see in this episode is already dead
but this idea of what do you do when you know you're going to die when your death is inevitable and all he thinks about is that that connection that connection That Joel should deeply sympathize with, but doesn't. Yes. Wow, this was incredible. I mean, you could probably teach a whole ethics. class on this i bet you know i think you could have a lot of fun i could see you
doing your professor thing, you know, having the students weigh in. I mean, I just loved this debate. This is what excites me most about like kind of when zombie cinema gets into these sort of questions. I just loved it, brother.
oh yeah and me too because the idea is what's the right choice do you risk the safety of the entire community for the dying wish of one person well ellie it's not even a moment's thought come on joel let's just bring him to the gate he doesn't have to come in he can talk to his wife everything will be beautiful well joel makes a big misstep in my mind he promises ellie he will yeah and then he gets ellie out of the picture
and he takes eugene to what is one of the gotta be one of the most beautiful lakes on the planet and it's real it's not cgi there's a real lake out there and he brings him there to kill him pentaleon leono that's why everybody calls him pants uh pentaleano has said that even though this was a super short role it was one of the hardest bits of acting he's ever done because he's he's he's begging for not his life he's begging for his last moments yeah yeah and i was crushed
when joel says well tell me what you want to tell gail and i'll deliver the message and he said and he says it's not about gail seeing me one last time it's about me seeing her yes yes oh that was the brother that took that took my legs out from under me when i saw that yeah that was incredible That was emotional stuff. Yeah. And Joel, the hard-hearted survivalist, just shoots him dead. Brutal. Just.
brutal cult now i love how they did it because we as the audience we don't hear the gunshot we just hear the birds take we just see the birds take flight Yes. So you know the deed is done. Well, they go back to the base to bury him and Joel flat out lies to Gail's face. Yes. And so now we know why Gale kind of hates his guts. And Joel clearly assumes that Ellie's just going to back him on this lie. Yeah, of course, because he's...
He's calling the shots. Right. He's got his back. But see, this is where we get this cool turning point in Ellie's character, where it's no longer... dad is always right i'll do what dad says i'll follow dad's lead this is her really stepping out on her own and saying no no dad's wrong and i have an ethical responsibility that is greater than his
And so she totally rats him out. How do you feel about that on a personal level, Kyle? I'm very curious. I know you're a very moral man, but let me just pose one thing to you. I'm not trying to be devil's advocate, but... What good could possibly come for her emotional well-being? Because Joel said all the right things, soothing it over. Yeah. You know, he said all the right things for her to be, I guess, go away as peacefully as.
she can with it but then with what with what ellie gave her it just harmed her even worse right okay so i think you're spot on here what what might have been the better move is joel lies gail feels better they go home and then ellie takes joel to task and says at some point you got to come clean with her but it's not my place to do that however as we learned from the the final scene on the porch
Ellie has been suspecting Joel to be a liar for years now. And this is that tipping point for her because she thought, well, Joel said all this about the fireflies. And I don't know if he's telling me the truth, but he's not a liar, so I'll believe him. But now she knows Joel is a liar. Yeah.
because she's caught him first person right in the lie and so this gives her the energy the the motivation it's the catalyst for her to sit down and say what happened joel and you better tell me the truth because now he's he's caught in a lie which is going to reveal v lie right you know they're two different situations so so amazing work i think with with the uh the writing team
uh of druckman graus and madden uh for putting this together in this structure because we do see the the kind of increased tensions between the two but then we get this really poignant powerful moment that kicks off this confessional on the porch which is a pretty powerful emotional exchange as joel finally comes clean and confesses his his great sin which is he saved ellie's life At the cost of the rest of the world. Yeah, now, this is...
This is where I have a problem, though, because I can understand, from a writing perspective, I can understand why Ellie, the teenager, might not either recognize or acknowledge that, but it needed to be spoken out loud by one of them, probably Joel, saying, hey, I know.
but I love you and I wanted to protect you. They were going to kill you in order to do this and I couldn't have it happen. I had to protect you. So, I mean, there's got to be some level of her acknowledging, oh, well, he did that. to save me. So she irks me even further that she completely disregards that in her critique of him.
well and i find this is true to the character as she's currently being because she's really ticked i think what she's really mad about is that he made the decision for her And who's to say she wouldn't have made the same decision? But he made the decision for her and then didn't tell her. He had to because... It's the betrayal of trust, I think, is why she's so ticked off. But they didn't... When they put her under, put her to sleep, they didn't tell her the plan was...
you know, for her to go to sleep forever. Like, you know, he had to make that decision while she was under anesthesia. I know, but she's not going to understand that at this point. She doesn't have the life experience or the maturity. She's just being, dad lied to me. But don't you think he should have tried to explain that to the dummy? He should have said that to her. Say, hey, you were unconscious.
And I had to make a paternal decision, and I did. So you're welcome. Yeah, I really do agree with you. I just think that he's such a chicken about it that it's too hard for him to speak. Yeah. So he doesn't actually respond much in words at all. He just kind of grunts and nods his head and feels shame. However, that is the most incredible.
in my opinion, probably the most incredible performance I've seen from him because of his eyes, like the way his eyes get glassy and you can tell he's devastated and worried. I mean, it is just exceptionally heartbreaking. That this man loves this girl so much. And we know why he wouldn't let her go for nothing because he already lost a daughter. We know that. And so this is excessively, I mean, exceedingly tragic.
That all of this happens and he's losing her again, meaning her heart and her love. You know, he's losing her and then he ends up dying knowing she was mad at him. That's terrible. well you nailed it that's really great insight this idea that um he's so desperate to not lose another daughter that he makes some questionable choices and it really is an episode about ethics you're absolutely right this episode has two or three different variations on the ethics question yeah
So it's a real tearjerker. It's a super sad episode. It's a typical penultimate episode because it does... It takes our emotions to one place and sets us up for the final episode of the series next week, which has already happened, but we're pretending. And so I'm really curious where we're going to go.
because we only have this one episode left and it's called convergence and convergence is a pretty obvious title because we've got all these different storylines that are going to have to come together like a seinfeld episode and and make some resolution uh which will and prediction will likely culminate in a cliffhanger oh yeah
That's where I'm going with it. So how did you feel ultimately then with all the pros and cons? How did you feel ultimately about the price? Well, it was a fantastic episode. I have to admit in terms of like. the writing the character work the dramatic beats i mean the performances the dialogue and and all of those ethical questions that come up during it It was just tremendous. I mean, this is top-tier stuff, especially for a zombie fare here. Oh, yeah. But, yeah, I mean, still...
They haven't given us monster. There's got to be a way to fit some monsters. And even The Walking Dead was able to fit zombies into every, just about every episode pretty well. Yes. Just saying. Well, it's become a soap opera to a certain extent, and I'm not against that, but give me a rating. Well... I kind of hate myself, but I'm going to give a 7 out of 10. And honestly, just the three points taken off are just how annoying, how much the...
I find the Ellie character off putting and the lack of zombies. And it's like, okay, this is not, this is not a, um, after school special. This is, this is supposed to be last of us, but you know what? This was pretty. stuff and it was great well done so yeah I'm saying I said seven right so seven and it's definitely worth seeing but I can tell you this right now I don't I honestly don't care
in a way, how this next episode ends, I probably will never watch this season ever again. Not because I'm mad at it. I just have zero interest in revisiting it, at least at this point. What say you? Well, I'm going to give it one more episode before I make that call. But I think this episode is really cleverly structured, and I think it's really well acted. I think it is taking a lot of liberties to... make the plot development fix the structural
And as such, some of that pulled me out of the episode a little bit. But I am going to give it an eight. I don't think it's perfect. And I do think that we could have had some more. horror and not just drama. So this episode really is, like I've said it before, it is developing into a little bit more of a teen angst coming of age season. And this episode... was really just there to fill in some of the gaps but honestly i imagined most of what we saw from the clues that we were given
So it wasn't super revelatory to me, but it wasn't bad. So I do recommend people watch it. I don't know yet if this is a season worth re-watching. Well, I'd like to say one thing about this, and that is... I really feel that, especially the lead up to Joel's death, I think it would have been even more powerful and even more devastating and heartbreaking if we had gotten all of these story beats in order.
chronological order instead of the way they've done it. Because once again, I just want to restate that I don't like when a major character is killed off and then they sort of cop out by... bringing him back again in order to do all these flashback scenes. I like there to be a finality to the death. Well, at least he hasn't miraculously come back to life. That's true. Not yet. Oh yeah. And even this was a flashback episode. I get that, but.
Man, the fungus is in the pipes. Are we ever going to go back to that? We'll see. Maybe next week. All right. Well, that's what I got on this episode, bud. Thanks for meeting with me. Yes. Thanks for the t-shirt. You're welcome. Thanks for letting me rib you a little bit about that night. Oh, two dads left alone.
alone on a mic yeah kyle's gonna get me when he uh when he sees me again oh it's gonna be glorious yes well tune in folks for the the final episode uh which will be coming up soon uh jay and i are gonna record in a couple of days and it'll post eventually so you can get our take and then see if you agree or not because we love contention. Yes.