Infected – Simon’s Incoherent Blog

The Last of Us: Season 2, Episode 5 – Feel Her Love

“Would it have made a difference if my family had hurt his people first? No. No. And if I hadn’t killed him, if he had gotten away, I promise you I would have hunted him down forever.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Feel Her Love, eh? Fnarr, fnarr 😊
Actually, though, the ep title really is a double entendre, albeit not in a smutty, Carry On film kind of way. Yes, there’s the literal motto of the Seraphites (or “scars”, as the WLF disparagingly refer to them). But it’s also, presumably, a reference to the burgeoning love affair between Ellie and Dina; which, having been properly established last week, is already in jeopardy with the unexpected return of old flame (and father to her baby) Jesse.

The Last of Us: Season 2, Episode 2 – Through the Valley

“This is bullshit, right? It’s just a drill.”
“Yeah. It’s a drill.”
“Unless we’re attacked, and then it’s not.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Whoa.

Well, if you were disappointed by the low key, character-focused opener of The Last of Us season 2, this episode will have more than made up for that. All the spectacle, action and drama you could hope for was here in spades, along with some jaw-dropping plot developments. It’s just that, typically for this show, that first episode was necessary to establish the stakes before throwing us headlong into the carnage.

The Last of Us: Season 2, Episode 1 – Future Days

“This is where we live. And what’s that?”
“The fence!”
“And what’s inside?”
“People!”
“And what’s outside?”
“Monsters!”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It’s a typically slow-burn start for the sophomore season of video game adaptation The Last of Us, a show whose first season I very much enjoyed despite never having played any of the games. As before, the most obvious comparison is to the seemingly never-ending The Walking Dead, and as before, The Last of Us is a far more thoughtful show. Both have very strong characterisation, but while TWD’s season openers typically included a spectacular horde of zombies, this dispensed with spectacle to build on the characters and relationships that were so strong last time.

The Last of Us: season 1, episode 7 – Left Behind

“It ends this way sooner or later for everyone, right? Some of us just get there faster than others. But we don’t quit.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

This week’s ep is another example of what sets The Last of Us apart from other post-apocalyptic dramas – it’s not an action piece driven by plot, but a character piece that happens to be set after the end of the world. Hearkening back to the heights of ep3, Left Behind is another virtual two-hander, featuring basically only two characters. But unlike the heartrending story of Bill and Frank, this tale unfolds not over twenty years but the course of a single night – a night that changed Ellie’s life in more ways than one.

The Last of Us: season 1, episode 6 – Kin

“Be careful who you put your faith in. The only people who can betray us, are the ones we trust.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

After last week’s sturm und drang of action and emotion, it’s a much quieter ep for The Last of Us this week. As the title suggests, it’s all about family – both blood and adoptive. We’ve seen Joel and Ellie’s relationship thawing into something like an ersatz father-daughter relationship throughout, and this ep brings that front and centre as both are forced to confront how they feel about each other. Without an Infected anywhere in sight, which might displease some of the game fans watching.

The Last of Us: season 1, episode 5 – Endure and Survive

“They raped and tortured and murdered people for twenty years. And you know what happens when you do that to people? The moment they get a chance, they do it right back to you.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Following on from last week’s cliffhanger, this week’s Last of Us was again a fairly conventional post-apocalypse tale, nothing we hadn’t seen before. But this story of revolution against oppression and personal grudges unable to be left behind was well told, and had this show’s now trademark thoughtful focus on character rather than action. Not that there wasn’t action – we may have been here before, but Jeremy Webb’s assured direction handled the story well from a well-structured script by Craig Mazin.

The Last of Us: season 1, episode 4 – Please Hold to My Hand

“If you don’t believe there’s any hope for the world, why bother going on?”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

After last week’s hugely acclaimed sidetrip to tell other survivors’ stories, this week The Last of Us was squarely back to its main story, with a far more conventional episode. I’ve said before that, however handsomely produced and earnestly written, this is not a show that’s particularly original. The obvious, and inevitable, comparison is to AMC’s The Walking Dead, which, let’s not forget, predated the Last of Us game by several years. Yet even that relied on tried and trusted post-apocalypse tropes going back decades, ones aficionados will have seen/read in the likes of Day of the Triffids, or 1970s BBC classic Survivors.

The Last of Us: season 1, episode 2 – Infected

“Save who you can save.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

In every post-apocalyptic story, there’s the chance to show off the devastation of The End of the World by having a wander round an eerily empty, ruined city, with all the modern surroundings rendered unfamiliar by collapsed buildings, rampant vegetation – and, of course, corpses. That is, if your budget allows it; it’s not cheap to clear chunks of real cities in order to film a post-human wilderness. No matter how much CG you use to paint out the reality of the bustling metropolis you’re trying to portray as a desolate ruin.

The Walking Dead: Season 4, Episode 2–Infected

“How can you die from a cold – in a day?”

Well, that period of idyllic calm didn’t last long. Thank goodness. Despite last week’s Walker mall attack, I had visions of the new, agrarian community at the prison becoming like the one seen in series 2 of the original Survivors, where all the drama seemed to revolve around farming dilemmas. Not unlike, in fact, season 2 of The Walking Dead, for that matter.

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