Warning, this podcast couldast spoilers for the Last of Us episode seven and in our nerd out, pretty major spoilers I think for the Last of Us Parts one and two, the video game, and depending on what the Last of Us Season two decides to do, potentially for the Last of Us Season two as well, so be warned about that nerd out. Hello, my name is Jason Concepcion.
I'm I'm Rosey Night, and.
Welcome to x ray Vision, the Crooked media podcast where we dive deep to your fais movies, comics, and pop culture.
In this episode, guess what. It's the Lost of Us and it's gonna make you cry. Like every week in the Hallow Week, it's episode seven, and boy, if you haven't played the game, and if you have played the game, if you haven't played the game, you're in. You're in for some some sad times ahead. And in that doubt, listen to Robe tells us about a possible Lost of Us pop three. Dun, Dun, dun.
Of course, if you want to jump around, check the show notes for time stamps. Coming up the air lock, we're stepping out of the airlock and into Ellie's feder orphanage past For the Last of Us episode seven, titled Left Behind, written by Neil Druckman and directed by E. Liza Johnson. We start somewhere in suburban Colorado. There is a bloody trail leading to the ruin of the suburban house. Inside,
Ellie is desperately trying to keep Joel alive. She has them laid out on a mattress in the garage or somewhere. She's trying to keep pressure on his gut wound. Which same place Sarah is it? You know, there's mirror images or.
Shadowing, And I think this is like a great moment to just kind of say the show is doing so many smart little things to make itself more believable, because compared to the game where Joel's like impaled, you know, this feels very real. It feels like a real small wound that could end a life, and it does have that impact of feeling like, is that where Sarah is it? It looks the same and Joel is not doing well.
I mean, do we have Neo Sporan and the post outbreak feature. It's unclear if there's any less. Joel is gasping, you know, leave, just leave, trying to get Ellie to just save herself get out of there. And Ellie is saying, Joel, shut the fuck up.
She is having any of it.
No, she is desperately trying to save his life. Joel, you know, of course, wants Ellie to take the horse ride back to Jackson live out her life with Tommy and Marie. And Ellie covers Joel with his jacket because he's shivering so hard, and she heads upstairs, closes the door on the room where Joel is and starts thinking about the past, and we flash back there. It is her Federa school. We get to see Ellie at Federal School jogging in fizzed class, jogging around in a circle.
She's wearing a walkman from like nineteen eighty eight and kind of loping around in a circle. And as she's doing that, a tall girl who we will soon come to learn is named Bethany snatches her headphones off her head and is like, hey, pick it up. Apparently, collective punishment is the rule at feder which is not surprising. And because Ellie is slow, everybody's going to have to run extra aps, and Bethany is tired of running extra laps, so Ellie's like, okay, then I'll fight you to get
my walkman back. Bethanie says, you don't fight. Your friend fights, and she's not here anymore, is she? And then Ellie punches the girl in the face.
It's great, It's really just a good moment. And I think as well, I feel like this is such an important moment in Ellie's story because what we see here is this transition from the girl who likes behind the girl's kind of in our own world, the girl who clearly was just protected by her friend, And in this moment we get that little bit of fierceness and agency and that Ellie that we kind of know now, which is the Ellie who's not afraid to just punch someone in the face.
That's a great point because as we see over the course of this episode, and as we've seen over the course of this series, Ellie is often the person under the protection of the fighter, the more aggressive person, the stronger person, the more confident person, as she's been with Joel, and that has been the case with her friend, who we have yet to meet. We catch up with Ellie in Captain Kwang's office, Captain Quang's kind of the principle of this federal school. And in this meeting we learned
that Ellie's been disruptive lately. It's been just the last few weeks that this kicked off. She's obviously very smart, brilliant. Even Captain Kwang notes that, but she's been in the whole several times over the last few weeks. When she offers to just go to the hole again for knocking Bethany out, Kuwang is doesn't take the bait. He's frustrated
because again she is smarter than she's been acting. So he lays out a couple of passer He says, okay, path number one, you keep fucking up, and Bethany's going to make your commanding officer. How do you like that?
Or two?
Follow the rules. Become an officer. You get the better food, you get, the better housing, you get, the less dangerous work, and you get to give other people orders. What do you think about that? And the truth is, though she doesn't say any here, Ellie thinks that sounds pretty good.
Actually, so he sells her on it. In that moment, it has like an honesty here an adult who is just telling her how it is and who is basically like look, you can either let your bullies bully you, or you can rise up the ranks of this fascist organization. But then you can bully the bully and you can also be in like a safer space.
It's it's interesting. This scene starts with Ellie looking at Gwang's family photos. It's a wife and daughter, I'm assuming, right, and who knows if they're still alive or what. But thinking about this, this is our first real moment of like seeing Federick humanized. Because Gwang says right after that kind of lecture on the two pass, he says, quote, we're the only thing holding this all together. If we go down, the people in the zone will starve and
murder each other. Now. And it's interesting because we've been framing the things that Joel or tom Me have done in the past as you did what you had to do to survive. And I think Kwang would say, not only am I doing what I have to do to survive, as distasteful and at times unfair as it is, but I'm also doing what I have to do so other people could survive.
He believed, he's a believer, he's a believer in Federra and he kind of hints at this like, you know, no now what other people say about Fedro, like it's only us and you know what in the Boston QZ, I maybe maybe that was what was real. Maybe that was a version of that was true at least at some point, or that's what Quang believes. But like, I do think it's a really interesting comparison after we saw what Fedri did in you know, Kansas City.
Yeah, I think that argument holds some weight. And it's also clear that there is no overarching command in control of federal like each the men and were like they've become their own little city states unto themselves without any kind of like oversight. But I think it's an important perspective to hear that despite the corruption of the rank and file soldiers, there are people at the top who are like this is I'm not saying this is perfect, but this is the best we got. And maybe he's
I'm not sure that he's necessarily wrong. Gwang then goes on to tell Ellie, you know, basically like I see you as a future leader. Now get your walk in and get the fuck out of here, and she leaves. Later, Ellie is in her room. She's reading an issue of Savage Starlight. It is raining, much like the night where she and Joel set out on their big adventure from the QZ. You see her knife on the table next to her. She stares across the room at an empty bed.
She's frustrated, she's lonely, she's clearly not getting any kind of satisfaction from reading this issue of Savage Starlight. And eventually she falls asleep. And when she's asleep, late almost two in the morning, someone creeps into the room through the window and it is Riley. This is the person who is missing, This as the protector. This is Ellie's best friend, owner of the empty bed, and Riley has been missing for the last three weeks.
And I will say this is a great bit of foreshadowing about is not sensible Riley is Yeah, because Riley creeps into this room and basically sneaks up on her armed friend, who obviously is like what the fuck and almost stabs her like and I think that is a really good kind of like. Riley is someone who has
not been made more cautious by the post apocalypse. Riley is someone who has found that humor and pranks and kind of this lazzy affair, like reckless attitude is what helps her get by, and she even says it to Ellie. She's like, it was a joke. I thought you'd find it funny.
Yeah, it's interesting. Riley is where is Ellie is? I didn't of how she was raised. Is kind of a believer in what Federra is selling. Riley is looking for a cause and she has clearly found it. Ellie is like, are you okay? And Riley's like, I just ran away for a little bit, and then she flashes a gun a piece.
Ellie loves a gun.
Ellis nobody loves a gun more than Ellie. And Ellie is fucking shocked because you know, Riley has joined the Fireflies. Is what this means now, I would say for anyone who has been thinking of the Fireflies as like this freedom fighter organization fighting against the evils of Fedra, they just armed like a sixteen year old kid literally, and it as we learn to put her in charge of bombs spoiler moving out.
Yeah, there's a lot of you learn a lot about Molly and I feel like, and I wrote a piece actually ign where I think this leans into some of our thoughts about like what does Molly know and how much is she kind of this kind of puppet Masstu. But yeah, they literally just armed a child who is clearly lovely but reckless. Af well, I mean, then she's a kid, you know, she.
Is a kid. You know, there's almost no situation in which you can be like, we're we're an armed quasi military operation fighting to overthrow you know, despotic regime and uh, and we're trying to bring democracy and freedom, you know.
Bad chilsages and that's and how.
We're going to do that is by giving sixteen year old guns like it. It doesn't work. So Riley says, you know, she went and joined the Fireflies. She wants Ellie to come out with her for a few hours, doesn't say what they're gonna do and have basically the best night of their lives. Ellie is like, I gotta be a drill tomorrow, but she goes of course. Anyway, they head out to the street to the QZ. Riley wants Elie to stop fucking around with Bethany. Uh, she's
it's interesting to your point. Riley has come away from this three weeks with the Fireflies and now she's acting like listen, kid, I've seen the world and as a as a mature adult now an owner of a firearm, I got a telegal Yeah, a little drama. Yeah, this little drama you have, it's small potatoes compared to what's really going out there in the big, big adult world. It's a little patronizing, just a little bit patronizing. Riley
we learn as a fighter. She talks about how she's learned to kind of like focus her rage, her anger on the things that matter, meaning overthrowing turity and re establishing democracy under the aegis of the Firefly, and she gives Elle a little bit of a you can't fight everything again, this wisdom that she has gleaned in the three weeks. You gotta pick, you gotta pick Firefly traded camp. Listen, I've been firing at paper targets for the last two weeks.
I gotta tell you, you can't fight everybody.
I mean, it's also like me. I think this is a really interesting episode in terms of how it showcases the similarities because Federer is making child soldiers, that's what they're training people for, and they arguably probably armed some of those children. And guess what the Fireflies are doing exactly the same thing. It's kind of the Kansas City question of what do you replace something like Feder with. It has to be something better, it can't be the
same thing. And are the Fireflies in a process of actually planning for something bad or are they just replicating the thing that they want to stop?
Exactly what I was thinking so much about watching this episode.
This is maybe this conversation time because maybe jumping ahead a little bit, but I think the downfall of the Fireflies of Feder, of the Kansas City freedom fighters if you could call them that, and people who fight for causes in the real world is this thought of, Okay, we're opposing the bad guys, therefore we are good, and when we get power, we will be good, when in actual fact, you will just become the thing that you overthrew, because no one has the clear eyed ability to look
at themselves and go no, actually, the problem is not the people who are in charge. The problem is the corrosive effect of being in charge.
Yeah, and if we.
Yeah, the systems that we build, if we don't build a system that has oversight on the people who were in power, then we're just gonna be Feder Part two and this is not a thing that either the Fireflies or Riley or anybody is thinking about. Yes, that we've seen in this world.
No, I think that only people who are thinking about it. Ironically is like Jackson Jackson, the Comnists. They took years to plan a system with from what we know like democratic oversight and like extreme planning. But what has that meant? That means it's a tiny society that's actually incredibly exclusionary. So there's this kind of like all these really interesting conversations. And the thing that so blew me away about this episode is like, look in our discord on the internet.
The thing that is going to get you about this episode is the emotional arc of the characters, right.
Absolutely.
I came away from it knowing so much more about the world and having so many more questions about the Fireflies. The piece that I wrote I cover this show every week at IGN, and the piece that I wrote this week wasn't even to do with Ellie and Riley. It was just all about Marlene because I was like, wait a minute, what does this mean? Because they will get to this later, but they changed so far, they haven't
revealed something that's really important in the game. To understand Marlene, and without that knowledge, Marlene seems like a very sinister figure, and I find that to be a very interesting choice. So, yeah, this is just such a mind blowing episode because it is essentially like a fun Stranger Things esque like why.
To a point it reminded me of I mean, it's it's so very very modeled on the DLC in which Riley Oh years, it's like direct, but it also reminded me of the San Junipero episode of Black Men. Yes, very San Junipero. Yeah, two women together just living a life in.
A night, which I also think is like probably completely intentional because I feel like the people felt like that. The third episode of the show, another great queer episode of TV. A lot of people I saw them being like the gaze, they have their Sand Junipero, like the Cis gaze, Like they have it, you know, the men
have had They've they found their space. And I kind of think that they probably look to that a lot, that this idea of where can you find like joy in love and in queer love even in the face of like an apocalypse.
X Ray Vision will be back.
And We're back.
So Riley leads Ellie over rooftops. They head up into a building. Ellie is winded. They find a dead body there, which apparently was not there the last time Riley has been through this building. They then take a closer look good time to time back, Yeah, I would imagine so. But then it's clear that the guy committed suicide. There's a bottle of pre outbreak liquor, I think next toom, which is clearly very expensive, as is the you know, there's also a baggy of pills, and we know the
bag at least this is extremely expensive. Yeah, so this this person went out with a bang. The hopelessness caught up to them and they have killed themselves, and they kind of like lean in close and they examine this person. They take the bottle of whiskey, and then all of a sudden, the floor under this corpse gives way and it just falls down. And it's a measure of how hardened you would be growing up in this world that Ellie just fucking laughs, just laughing hysterically at this. Yeah.
On the roof, the girls sip from the bottle. Ellie asks, is that the first dead body you've ever seen? Riley? Is? Like, no, I saw my parents Ellie's like, oh, that's right. I'm sorry, I'm sorry I asked about that as a change of topic. Can I hold your gun?
Could I please? She's like, I just love guns.
Could I just feel the weight of it?
Yeah?
I didn't love the trigger discipline here, but that's another thing. Ellie then asks, okay, well, why did you join the Fireflies? Like what wasn't a boy? Like? What was it this probing? You know? Clearly for what happens later on, Riley says that she was just out. She just snuck out. She's clearly was very frustrated with the kind of rules and regulations at FEDRA, so she had snuck out. She's running
around on the streets. She ran into a woman who she doesn't define who it is here, but it's clearly Marlene who asked her, hey, what do you think of FEDRA?
And Riley must have asked in the right way because next thing you know, Riley is in the Fireflies and Ellie here pushing back against this kind of clear, you know, romance that Riley is in, with this kind of like new mission that she has found in her life, pushes back with by by basically recycling Captain Wong's line, which is like, well, you know, Fedra, they're not perfect, but like, aren't they the only things holding it together? They're here.
Riley doesn't argue with this now, she isn't not at this moment. She leads Ellie on to where they're going. They're standing on the rooftop. She's look over there, you see those new lights. Yeah, Fedra has been apparently running new electric lines to some of the vacant apartments, and it is like service and house the growing population. And now they have that argument, you know, Ellie's like, well, see, feder is not bad. They're not all bad, right, They're
giving people a place to live. And Riley says, yeah, but they're starving a portion of their population. And Ellie says, well, it wouldn't be so difficult if the fireflies hadn't blown up the warehouse where all the food is kept. And then Riley's like, no, we didn't do that, and then Ellie's like, and also the fireflies are killing civilians when they get caught in the crossfire, get you know, or just happen to be around where these bombs blow up.
And then Riley says, no, we're not doing that, and then she says the thing that is so literally ironic and she doesn't know it. It's you know, again with this incredible maturity that she's gleaned, like in the three weeks that she's a grutty way is you know, it's okay to admit that you don't know everything, the implication being I do kind of know not everything, but a lot more about the world, a lot more than you.
You don't understand how it works, and of course that you know they're The tragedy of this is that they're both wrong. And she also says, Okay, we're here and it's them. All this building is supposedly sealed up because it's full of infected and Riley says, oh yeah, well if it's sealed off, then why is it sealed off? And they see there's a hole in the roof and they go inside. What they find in here is that
the electricity is on. Riley turns it on and all the stuff is almost as it had been on outbreak day, like still the signs of looting at different stores, but electricity on. It's really fountains running.
It's really amazing. And also I saw some people who were like, oh, how could you not see those lights. No, I've actually been to those American malls where the roof is completely solid, but it looks like there's skylights, and they're actually electrical lights and stuff. I believe that there is a version of the world where you could not see those lights coming on from outside. Now, do I think you should be like lasting Carousel music when there is a whole race of infected monsters who can only
hear things. No, this is obviously a bad idea, but I will say I do believe that there. I do believe there's a version where people couldn't see the lights outside. I don't think the lights are what you should be worrying about.
I think the story will bear you out. Riley notes that hey, looks like there's no infected in the mall, like they've been telling us. Score one for Feather being absolute liars. She tells Ellie again that some of the
stores are empty because of the looting. They stand in front of a victorious secret store and they're kind of just talking about like what they're experiencing, and then Riley says, you know, I'm trying to imagine you wearing that, pointing at one of the pieces there Ellie blushes extremely strongly, and then Riley is like, Okay, are you ready for I've got several wonders that you're going to experience tonight.
Are you ready for the first one? And she takes her to a carousel and it's it's gorgeous, one of the old school carousels with the carved wooden horses, you know, galloping in full gallop, the beautiful lights and mirrored pieces all around the outside. Riley turns it on, it starts spinning around. It's I love the touch that it's like right across the way from a game stop, like there's a game stuff right there.
Yeah. I just I just want to say as well, I love this because Ellie is like Riley kind of in her jaded firefly new persona. The carousel that's like a wonder to her and she can't even see it. But like when Ellie sees an escalator, Ellie is like moving stairs, like is this a wonder? And you really
learned so much about like what Ellie doesn't know. There's loads of great moments like that, like after the the Victoria's Secret moment with this lingerie, you know, Riley walks ahead and Ellie's kind of checking her hair in the window, and you start to really see that Riley and Ellie are not just friends, or at least Ellie would like them to be something more.
They both would like the exactly to be something more, but they're both like afraid, nervous about and.
That's why you know, it's so cute. And I have to say, storm Read is just so incredible hair.
She's incredible now.
She's incredible in the Man. She was really really great in Wrinkling Time, which I know people think is really weird movie and it is, but she's brilliant in it, Like she is just such Oh she's great in Euphoria, Like she's such a great actress. And something that this show has done so well is like they bring in cast members for one episode and you just would do anything for them to stick around, you know. But this is a flashback, so you're already aware that that's not
necessarily going to be the case. And if you remember what Ellie told Tess about getting bitten, Ellie claimed that she was in there by herself. So I think you're starting to get a vision for what this is gonna be. But I love this idea that Riley is like, they're just friends. But Riley's planned like this date night in an abandoned wall, which, by the way, is the kind of thing we should see more in these post apocalyptic storytelling. I remember playing DLC. It's like, oh, this is what.
Why don't we see this? Why is there never a moment where people take advantage of the emptiness and do something cool and fun. It's like in The Walking Dead, how is there never a moment where somebody like goes to old movie there or something, you know, like, yeah, I love this idea of like trying to seek out the human nature of having fun and bringing fun into someone else's life, even if, as we are sure to learn, this was a very reckless choice.
The carousel stops and the conversation about the firefly starts back up again. Riley and Ellie kind of argue about like whether they think the fireflies will make a difference, and clearly Riley does. Riley says, hey, they freed other cuesies, this is probably not true, Like, clearly this is I think firefly propaganda. It feels like something would be to join the fireflys. I agree. Ellie says that if you know, like if you stay with Fedra. I mean Captain Wong says,
I'm a leader. I think we could be running things in a few years. And Riley says, forget that Guang had me on sewage detail, like that's what I would have been doing. They you know, like that's why I ran away, which made me think again that Quang kind of has a point in the sense of listen, sewer detail. Is it anything that anyone wants to do? No? Is it absolutely necessary for like the functioning of a civilized
society where people live together and scale. Yes, Like maybe you could argue in the top three most important jobs that you could have is making sure we don't drown in our own waist, Like that's a vital job. But because it's not framed as this adventure, this grand fight against against tyranny, there's no romance in it. It's not something that you could use to groom young people to get excited for. You know, they want to have old guns and fight the bad guys. They don't want to
go into the sewer and clean it out. So the twenty thousand or forty thousand how many people live here, don't die of some disease that is preventable.
Yeah, I think as well. Like that is also partly Federer's fault because it's clear that they use these they use it as punishment, So if you don't follow the rules, you're going to get the bad thing. But you're right like that in a post apocalyptic well, that is a heroic job because that is something everybody needs to do every single day and needs to not die and not get you know, sick, and be able to go to the bathroom. And and I love that because it's such
a good smart point. There's something true in what he's saying. But it's not all about presentation. They're not present They use these roles as punishment and slight reward if you become a commander. But the Fireflies, they promise a mission.
They promise a store, romance and adventure and fighting against you know, we're going to do it and you get all the gun. It's gonna be great. X Ray Vision will be back, and we're back. They move on to the next wonder And it is a photo booth. And as a person who loves a photo booth, I'm looking into my office, I see numerous pictures of from various times with various friends, and other people. I fucking love a photo booth. It cost five dollars, which of course
Riley has, she's been waiting to use it. And this evening there's a wonderful moment where you know, they're hanging on each other. It's like, you know, like and then all of a sudden, Ellie gets a little uncomfortable by like the closeness, and so they they sit very chastely like next to each other and they look at the picks, and Ellie's like, oh, I love that one. And Riley, let's Ellie have the lunch.
Yeah, it's and it's this is a great like direct from the gate where they're doing these kind of scary faces and there's so much childlike wonder here. I just love it and I love that. As we go along, the five dollars is your first hint the fact that Riley knows about this at all. You start to realize that Riley has like planned this, Riley has spent time working present this for Ellie.
Next, the arcade. Gotta gotta go to the arcade old school. I love I get this cabinets coin up arcade.
When I go to the mall and they have an arcade which, by the way, I am blessed with because a lot of I am as excited as they are in the post apocalypse just in a normal day. So I love this moment. I feel like it's very representative. It encapsulates that excitement, and obviously for Ellie, this is that game that we know that Riley told her about.
The game I remember as a kid, like being taken to the mall and just hearing the sounds in the distance as you got close to like the change machine going and the like, and just being like, oh fuck, I want to go to the arcade. I want to arcade. I want to be there. I remember, like I remember the first time I ever cashed in five dollars for quarters and just being like, oh my god, this is like a jew I'm going to be here for twelve hours playing.
This is like the most English situation. But like they didn't relate moors, didn't really exist that way when I
was a kid, or like arcades and mores. But if you went to the seaside, the British seaside as we call that the side, the British seaside, if you went towards start to broad Church, don't know you know it could to Brighton or with the ball, Like if you went there, especially Brighton Pier, it was like they're just huge arcades and there would mostly be ones to win money and toys, but you would get a couple of stand up cabinets and it's that same thing hearing that
noise and that like chink chink, chink chink chin of the coins. It just makes you feel like a little kid.
And they just love it.
They encapsulated it so well. Here.
The excitement that Ellie feels is just palpable again. You know, what a great job by Bella Ramsey. And the first thing she wants to do is play Mortal Kombat too, because, as we've seen from previous episodes, she has heard a lot about this game.
There's even a more combat to banner in that bedroom, like this is like Riley's hyper fixation.
Yeah, so they play Raydon versus Molina. Riley wins round one. Riley then wins round two and man, this hit because anybody who's ever played Mortal Kombat knows that when you win the bout, you get to hit the finisher, your your character.
You can hit you if you can, if you can press the button, if you can.
You can execute your your character's fatality slash finishing move, and in this case it's Molina's man eater move where she eats the opponent. But the thing that I that really resonated for me was like playing Mortal Kombat against other people and being like mad if they were going to hit the fatality, like you better not hit the dude, don't do it and don't do it.
And also because I I love More Kombat. That's like one of the video games and the series I play more than any other. I even love the movies. I love More Kombat. But I tell you I'm terrible at a fatality, that horrible feeling if you miss it and your character just goes like.
And then falls over.
So I also love again. If we talk about Riley and how much she cares about Ellie and the planning, I know she was in there playing that game practicing. She basically admits it, like yeah, she knows where the money is, because how does she get the coarse? She breaks open a change machine.
She's like up, up, down, and then you have to like, come on, you've been.
Practicing a bottom. So I don't know.
Now as they are playing camera drifts off, and our friends are unaware of the fact that a few stores over somewhere here close by in the mall, there is an infected heavily you know, scaled with cordy steps mushrooms. Who is just now stirring into consciousness. Ellie finally wins about.
I just want to say, yeah, if we're talking about fireflies and they're bad, training, yeah, like sweets them all, sweet them all. How is that not like the first thing that they taught her that makes me mad? You haven't got you could have. You could have just gone and shot that infected in the head and this would not be a problem because it's I like as well, it touches on that thing like you said, I love that moment where you said they're both wrong. That's the
sad thing. They're both wrong. Mark. You know, Ellie is wrong about Fedra and Riley is wrong about the fireflies. And I love this because this is a great moment of that fireflies were not wrong. Fedra has been lying. The mall is not overrun with infected, but Fedra was not completely wrong. They are infected in the mall. So it's that great gray area of like, what is the truth? And in this moment, the most important thing is just that there's a single infected in them all.
Yeah, and to your point, one, let's secure them all if you're going to have a child you've been so long, Yeah, let's secure them all number and tell her how to secure them all and don't have her do it on her own. Have teams. And then seconds to your point, the Fireflies want to overthrow Federer and they want to
re establish a government. You know that that I ostensibly they would run, and everything that we've seen from them tells us that they wouldn't be good at it, like they Marlene and the Fireflies have have executed one fuck up after another throughout the course of this show. And here they are doing it again, tasking a child with like securing like a large sensitive space while sitting on a cash of I guess like important munitions, Like that's her child making and they have a child doing it.
It's ridiculous. Ellie finally wins. They get There's this moment where she and Riley get close to each other, but nothing happens. Ellie is then like, hey, I gotta go back soon. I don't want to get in trouble. Riley is disappointed, but then she decides to speed up her timetable of wonders to really get to all the things that they want to get to. Riley takes Ellie to a spot in the food court and we see that she has been sleeping there. We also see the pipe bombs,
as you said, and she gives Ellie the gift. It's the no pun intended Volume two book.
Dun dun d It's going to be the cost of Joel's life.
Yes, six weeks so as they're trading puns, this is when Ellie discovers the pipe bombs that Riley's been building, and Ellie is upset. She realizes that Riley didn't discover them all, that she's been posted here by the fireflies to make bombs and to guard this like arsenal that she is creating. Then Riley again shows her naivete by saying, hey, don't worry about it, like the fireflies number one. She's like, Ellie's like, so what happens if the fireflies blow me
up with fedra right? And Riley is like, no, no, no, I wouldn't. I wouldn't let them do it. And it's almost tragic. The naivete that Riley has here. She's so I mean, who hasn't at a young age, especially been entranced by the feeling of belonging somewhere, like finding a community, and they're being like a real it's like almost like
falling in love. You realize around people who are like me, and we have a you know, she really believes that, oh everyone's like me, and they therefore love and value Ellie and they understand that though she is in Federa, she's good and they wouldn't hurt her. And it's so childlike and sad in understandable that she would think like this in.
And brainwashing.
That's exactly it, because I would argue to your point, the fireflies are counting on people being this knave or exact Why approach a sixteen year old to do this. You're counting on the fact and that they don't know about exactly and.
Also not just that, you're counting on the fact that they're reckless, because think about this in a world where Fedra hangs people for like going against them for the smallest infractions. We even saw this in Boston, so we noticed the case where Riley grew up. Riley a random woman in the street asked her what she thought about feder and Riley started chatting shit and bad mouth in Fedra.
That in itself that is like stealth, like this is a problem, but it shows that the anger and hatred towards Fedra, I think probably very understandably being raised in a federal orphanage. It bubbles to the top in Riley and they can take it of that. And I think this is such a heartbreaking narrative revealed because I think they do such a good job seeding how much Riley's planned it. And I do believe that Riley planned this state. But the date is secondary and just the offshoot of
this mission that she has. And that's heartbreaking because to Ellie, it proves to Ellie that she second she ran away for three weeks, she didn't know where she was, she thought she was dead, and then she did this beautiful, huge, like romantic gesture. But it was really just an offshoot of this mission that she took her away from Ellie. That's so heartbreaking because two things can be true. It's romantic, it's kind, she put thought into it, but it wasn't
the purpose of her being in the mall. This wasn't something for the two of them.
It's not just Ellie she's in love with She is in love with being a firefly. Truly. It's a great point. Ellie is now furious and rightly so honestly, and she's notes, Hey, none of this shit was even about me. You were already here. They ordered you to do this. Yeah, yeah, I'm out. Uh. Riley tells Ellie that, well, if you're leaving, this is it just so you know, like I'm leaving too, Like Marlene is giving me my posting, I'll be leaving Boston. Tonight's my last night here. Ellie asks why did you
bring me here then? And Riley's like, because I wanted to see you. I wanted to say goodbye. Ellie leaves, then doubles back. Just the thought of leaving Riley under these circumstances it brings her up short. And here's the show has been doing this all season, which is subvert giving us these little fake outs where you think prospect to happen, and it's always based around some point of the game that the game players would be expecting. And here is that moment she comes back. You here, screams,
She runs up panicked. Riley are you, okay, but it isn't Riley. It's one of those Halloween decorations and it's like.
Ah a, a's like waking up and saying back, and it's they're in this halloween store.
She finds Riley just kind of sad moping in this halloween store, and Riley says, surprise, it's the Fifth Wonder and it's the store she thought Ellie would love it, so she saved it for last. Riley gives Ellie the Book of Puns. Ellie tells Riley that basically she doesn't think that she understands what the fireflies are really about, and Riley again says, like you think you know everything, but you don't know everything. But then she kind of
admits that Ellie is right. She basically says, like, hey, you don't understand what it's like to feel like I'm part of a mission, part of a community. They chose me. I matter to them, and it's a way of saying, yes, maybe I don't know everything that the fireflies are doing, but they want me so I will.
Yeah, how they make me feel as more important? Also, I think it's really there's a really interesting thing here where you know, Riley is not callous to her feelings about Ellie or Ellie's feelings. Riley asked Marlene if Ellie could go with her, and Marlene said, no, she stays
in Fedra. She stays in that Boston orphanage. Now, like I say, I'm not going to get into spoiler territory, but in the game and in the TYE, in comic and in the DLC, there is like there is a reasoning behind why Marlene cares for Ellie and and kind of does these makes these choices, that is a human reason. I feel like in the game. I understand that they may likely show this later, but currently it feels like a conspiracy to me. I feel like Marlene wants Ellie
in Fedra for a reason. Whether it's because she thinks maybe they have a bunch of kids who were born after the Fall and they think that they could be immune and they want to see, or maybe it's because she wants a plant within Fedra. I don't know what it is, but I found this announcement even knowing what the game reasoning is. I feel like it's so interesting. We've heard r Ellie has asked Marlene about her mom.
Ellie asked malleyne, are you my mom? There was a chance there for a conversation that could lean into what happened in the game, but instead this just makes Morlene seem like she has some kind of shadowy oceans.
Definitely, And don't forget Marlene basically intimating earlier in this in episode one, that she's been keeping eye on Ellie for a long time.
So actually you in that orphanage like it was me, and it's like, so she's there a season and I find that really interesting.
Ellie basically is unhappy with Riley's decision, becomes to a place where she accept it, accepts it. Riley tells Ellie that, Okay, we have one last surprise left. She gives Ellie a werewolf mask. Riley puts on a scary clown mask and they play on They play on Ellie's walk and a cover of I Got You Babe by Edna James, and they dance and then at the end of the dance, the masks come off. Ellie desperately says to Riley like
that she doesn't want her to leave. Riley says, okay, and then they kiss and it's a wonderful, tender, nervy moment. Ellie then apologizes, but of course it's fine.
Like they both wanted this. It's like they this is a world where maybe in this night, it feels like they can make something great happen between the.
Yeah, and then before you know what, the infected is there. They hear it before they see it, and Riley has her gun out. She says, get ready to run. It feels like something Joel would say. Also, which which it really does. The contrast is so stark, you know. Then all of a sudden the affected is with insight Ley opening fire on it, hits it a couple of times. The infected, of course, does not go down. It's like almost like to clicker level something of like heartiness.
Yeah. And also like again, I feel like the three weeks did not was not spent well. They did not think like, listen, let's make sure she can. She needs to know or shift something like that. They need to know. She needs to know how to kill a zomb because she's protecting these I'm sure very you know, expensive in the relative terms of the last of US economy, munitions that could kill many people. Uh, maybe it would have been good to have one of those around in case
there was an infected. Riley has clearly been told there is no infected. Riley is not ready for this, and it is like really heartbreaking to see this. Also, just want to shout out the fact that throughout this episode from the beginning, they're playing eighties music, So if we know what Bill's code is, we knew where this was going to.
Go, and it's going exactly here. So there is a struggle. Riley is knocked out for a little bit, Ellie is on her own. Then Riley comes back to knocks the infected off of Ellie. Ellie finally kills it with a head stab sumb and they are both so high on adrenaline. Ellie is like particularly like flushed with victory, and then she looks at Riley and Riley's got this devastated look on her face and they realize they've both been bitten and so they're dead essentially. We go back to the house.
Joel is shivering on the floor. Ellie is still standing on the door. All of these thoughts have flashed through her mind in the seconds that she had been standing on the other side of the door, and it steals her for what comes next. She thinks, I'm not going to lose Joel the way I lost Riley. It's not gonna happen. She runs upstairs looks for any supplies she
can find to try and stabilize Joel. We go back to the mall, and Ellie, in her rage at the hopelessness of their situation, is just smashing everything in sight. Riley is like, go ahead, there's more stuff smash over there. She's really kind of resigned to this happening. I will say, both of them are acting like there's no more zombies in this building, like, you know, like if you saw one, that would tell me there might be more. But that's
for another time. Riley is really resigned to this being In the end, she says that, you know, I guess we could kill ourselves, but I don't want to. I think what we should do is go into whatever comes next, hand in hand. We squeeze every last good moment out of the moments that we have left. And it's just really I read it as this very young you know,
the passion and strength of young love. Is this feeling like even as infected, we'd know who each other are, you know, like that It's almost that kind of that kind of statement of like, yes, but we'll be together exactly.
Actually, I really love how in this final moment, Riley actually has like this immense amount of wisdom, Like we've kind of joked about this three weeks of wisdom that she got from the fireflies, but in this moment she has a recognition that like no one else really has had apart from Sam. So it's kind of that childlike wonder of you know what. One, we could still have four or five hours together in this moll where we remember each other, so let's make the most of that.
And two, who knows what happens? Who knows what happened when we turned You never know, we might just be both living in here being infected together. And I love that is such an out of the box, different hopeful outlook than what we usually get, which is this you've got to kill them, you got to kill someone. It
brings me back. I'm really happy to see a lot of people in the discord reading The Girl with all the Gifts and starting to watch the movie, and I feel like this is really playing into those questions like we don't really know what the cognizance of a zombie is, We don't know how the infected experience life, and I love that Riley has this kind of you know, kind of that mind blowing moment where she's just like, well, we could just enjoy each other and spend time together.
I mean, I can't imagine how horrific that would have ended up being for Ellie, because we know who survived and who didn't.
Yes, so they grasp hands and lean on each other and go forward into whatever comes next. We go back to the house. Ellie has come back to Joel. She has a sewing needle, and she kind of grits her teeth, steals herself and goes about the really really hard work of binding up Joel's wounds. He passes out from the pain of it, and we fed to black.
Yeah, and just before Joel, just before he passes out, there's this great moment where, like she put she's pressuring the wound right, putting pressure on it, and Joel allows her to hold his hand, Yeah, and their fingers like intertwine. And it's this first moment of vulnerability, real vulnerability that Joel's shown Ellie. And also I think that marks a change. If Ellie asked Joel if she was family now, he would say yes. It wouldn't be your cargo. You know.
This is she's willing to save him and he can feel that, and he's willing to be saved in that moment. What an episode.
What an episode, and an episode that really underlines Ellie's growth from a person who has kind of been the sidekick and a lot of the important relationships in her life until now and now she's really standing up on her own t feet and being the person who saves the other people. Really beautiful and also, I got to say, is an episode that makes you see the fireflies in a very very different light.
Yeah, it's a really interesting world building episode. Like I said, like this as the potential emotional theft of like episode three, and I'm sure that for a lot of people it's going to hit that way. And it is storm Read and Bella Ramsey is so brilliant together.
Yeah.
But the thing that really blew me away as a viewer and as a kind of somebody who's always enjoys looking at these narratives, it was that world building. It was this idea of like, who are the fireflies really? What does Marlene know? What could happen that would explain away this behavior and will it come too late, does it matter? And also, like you said, our main children putting them in charge of munitions. This is not some great hope for the future. Currently, this is like dangerous.
Yeah. Well, we'll be continuing our coverage of the Last of a Show here on the Xtra Vision podcast. Up next, nerd.
Out Spoiler, spoiler. This nerd Out contains spoilers for the video game The Last of Us Part two, which would make me say, probably just skip past this if you have not played the game or care about spoilers, because this will likely come into play or there will be characters mentioned he who would come into play in a second season.
I would say, Also, secondarily, yes, if you are a show watcher who has never played the game exactly, I would also stay.
Yeah, I'm saying like I'm saying, just generally, don't do it.
Probably don't listen to this, and you have played the Last of Us one and two.
If you do, do not be googling anything about these characters.
Also, don't do that.
Don't do that. In today's nerd Out, where you tell us what you love or why or a theory that you're excited to share. Rob pictures us the Last of US Part three video game, which I think introduces something that the first Last of Us was arguably missing, though I understand why it was missing.
So here is Rob's pitch for a Last of Us three game and how it would end. Quote. The third act would end with Ellie traveling with Abby back to the new Firefly HQ. I would love to be able to switch from Abby to Ellie on their journey, using each one's different skill sets or play skill sets to
move the player along towards the goal and survive. I would also make Ellie's choice to sacrifice herself up to the player, So, in other words, unlike the Last of Us one and two, but I would love to have that be the choice, be the potential savior of mankind or act like the father figure of her life Joel,
and tear down the fireflies once again. So in other words, Rob's pitches a Last of Us three ending with a choice as Ellie, you can either A sacrifice yourself, save the hear and race, or b kill all the fireflies.
That would actually be such a nice reflection of that first game, and it would give us that It would how much has Ellie changed over these games, and what choice would the player make. It would give us back that agency that we never had, and it would give Ellie the agency to make the choice that so many people wanted her to make. I think that is like that could be a really deep, interesting way.
I think this is great. Here is a pitch because I feel like this choice it's already a video game. You've likely you know, by the time you get to Act three, you've replayed certain levels several times because you didn't make it through, and now you're here. It seems to me almost too easy to make the save Mankind choice right now. I wonder if you can add some stakes to it, like if you save Mankind. I don't know how you do it, But if you save Mankind,
you can't just play is your next playthrough? You have to start all over again. I can't you know what?
I like?
You know how like when you finish a game and end game, Yeah, you can like jump back in and play certain levels. If you save Mankind, it wipes.
I was gonna you either you don't keep because dies.
Yeah, you know all your achievements. But the next time you play, you have to play from the beginning. Now, if you decide as I would imagine either Abby and Ellie together or just Abby or just Ellie. If you decide to wipe out the fireflies, then you keep all your saves, you can play, you can jump back into different levels and keep all that stuff. You keep all your DLC regardless of what choice you make. But I'm thinking there has to be right.
Yeah, I mean, the one thing I'll say is the writers of these games are like so brilliant at telling these stories. I also think that there is a version of this where they get you so invested in this story that there are people who will make the other choice also as well, it's the it's the joker thing. There's people who just want to see the world burn.
So I think there's that interesting thing of like knowing that you're making the wrong choice and the human appeal to make this horrific choice, and also the tradition of the game, which is to make the terrible choice. So I think that's really interesting.
What about this If you choose to sacrifice yourself, there is no post you know how usually you win the game and then there's like a post game montage. That's what I'm saying.
Nothing get you just said, you just go back Black Faith, Black done. Yeah, I think that's it. You don't get any cut scenes, you don't know how to if it works, if you don't know if the rest of the world keeps going on, you have no idea because you're dead. I think that is like such a belief.
I know it just yeah, faith are black.
You never know, and that's I just have people talking for like a million years.
I do love the idea, Rob. I think it's really great. My here's the thing I wonder is Naughty Dog so invested in their style of storytelling, which is in these big moments, you don't have agency. We have agency. We're telling our story. If you want to know about our story, you can play through and that's it. But don't expect to be like, well, now Joel's not going to do this, or Ellie is not going to do this, and Ellie's going to decide to, you know, not get involved in
this fight. Abby is going to decide to walk away and live peacefully like and so I wonder.
If they howitch it up.
I do wonder if they would ever decide if they do decide to go back for a last of Us part three, which is I would can't imagine they won't if they ever do decide to hand over the keys in a key moment to a player. Yeah, I wonder.
It's so exciting to even think about. Thank you, Rob. If you have theories or passions you want to share, hit us up at x ray at crooked dot com. Instructions are in the show notes as always.
Well that's it for us, Rosie. Anything to plug plug plug pok.
You can read my coverage of this show, which is a weekly article that I write about a certain part of the show that speaks to me. At IGN you can read I wrote a lot of articles for DC dot Com DC Comics now known as DC dot Com. Ever heard of them?
Superman, Batman, I wrote Manhunter, Fanplastic Man.
I actually got to write a Plastic Man article which was very fun about Kyle Baker's brilliant Plastic Man, like one of the weirdest best comics I ever made. I wrote a lot of articles there this month. You can check them out. I have a really cool one maybe I don't know what days are. I think it will be out by the time this comes out about a really underrated, underread Green Lantern arc by Christopher Priest and Mark Bright that was really cool that ran us backups
in action comics, so those are fun. Uh yeah, like lots of articles online you can I just when this finishes, I will be sending the much toiled over next draft of this secret project that I have. I'll be able to share soon, so that's cool. And yeah, I'm here twice a week Rosie marks on Instagram and letterbox and obviously here.
Catch our next episode Friday, March third, where we'll be talking about the premiere episode of Mandalorian Season three, Big brand, the Baby.
Bring them back the baby. We want to see him.
We want to see the beautiful now fifty three year old baby. And of course remember remember we'll bring you two episodes twice a week Wednesdays and Fridays on your podcast platform of choice.
Check us out and if you want to see us as well as hear us, you can subscribe on YouTube where you can watch full episodes of the show. Now, follow us on Twitter where xrv pod, and check out our discord. We talk about it a lot because we have a lot of fun in that a bunch of amazing fans, people who love all the same cool stuff as we do. And me and Jason pop in there every now and again. If you want to do watch parties. Those are popping off at the moment. We're gonna have them for the last of us.
From Mandalorian five star ratings, five star reviews. We need them, we gotta have them, you gotta give them to us. Here is one from melligator Family Bonding. I love and learn from Jason and Rosie so much. Thank you, so much, Thank you, melligaate. They're very entertaining and occasionally I can mention something to my sixteen year old and shocker, thanks for making me a sometimes cool mom.
You're welcome. Wow. That's the power of X ray Vision. I really love it.
X ray Vision is a Crooked Media production. The show is produced by Chris Lord and Sal Rubin. The show is executive produced by myself and Sandy Garhard are editing and sound design who's by Vascillas Fatopoulos, Dylon Villanueva and Matt de Group provide video production support. Alex Roller for handle social media. Thank you Brian Vasquez for the music. See you next time, ms M