The Last of Us

Cybsled · Mar 15, 2023

That detail alone made me question their plan. If it was interconnected with the host in some manner of symbiotic relationship (or benign parasite), then wouldn’t it be more important to figure how that works? If you kill the host and try to replicate the infection and it doesn’t work, then that means the fungus inside Ellie alone isn’t the solution and something else causes the immunity…but now that she is dead, you’re SOL.

Fireflies were basically desperate with minimal resources, so they were essentially willing to roll the dice on a hypothesis that would have fucked their plans if it didn’t work out, but they probably figured they were fucked anyways if plan A failed

Phazael · Mar 15, 2023

In the game its clear they had found other immunes and cut them open and killed them without finding the cure. It is also implied that they were going to use the cure as leverage to take over from Fedra. Fireflies were shit all around, which makes the second game even more of a ridiculous retcon premise.

Khane · Mar 15, 2023

Yea. In the game the Fireflies were interested in becoming the new world order, and a cure was just a means to that end.

Fadaar · Mar 15, 2023

You know I was wondering what the show was missing besides the actual fuckin zombies. They never delved into how shitty the Fireflies were at all.

BrutulTM · Mar 15, 2023

It's definitely irresponsible to kill the one immune person right away. If the first attempt at a cure doesn't work you're SOL. It's actually possible that Joel saved humanity by not letting an incompetent fuckwad kill her. Of course it's also possible that he doomed everyone.

Cybsled · Mar 15, 2023

Fadaar said:
You know I was wondering what the show was missing besides the actual fuckin zombies. They never delved into how shitty the Fireflies were at all.

They really need to during the second season. The audience is going to tune out if they don’t make Abby sympathetic before she does that deed. Trying to make her sympathetic after the fact will backfire

Penance · Mar 15, 2023

I think my biggest complaint is after episode 5 the season feels disjointed and each episode feels horribly directed/paced/put together.

No characters besides Joel and Ellie feel interesting (besides Ellies mom). Hell I just realized that the mall episode sucked so bad not because BBQ nonsense but because they had an entire episode to flesh out two characters and they shit the bed.

Besides the plot of Ellie goes west nothing interesting happens besides the Christian diddlers. And even that episode felt off.

Although how much say a director has in shows is questionable, it's probably more on the show runners. Season could've possibly used 2 more episodes to flesh things out and avoided so much belief suspension moments.

Xevy · Mar 15, 2023

There is a weird thing about video game to movies/tv where if they 1:1 the action, like if Joel and Ellie are blasting 100's of fungoids you won't feel the danger when they're on screen. If they're just speedbumbs and not road blockades it makes everything feel low-risk. I think by doing less is more you understand that everytime infected are around it's a danger to the characters rather than just waiting for Joel to blast through them in 5 seconds.

That said I definitely would've liked more action versus the infected, but they want to tell a human story rather than a monster story.

Penance · Mar 15, 2023

Xevy said:
There is a weird thing about video game to movies/tv where if they 1:1 the action, like if Joel and Ellie are blasting 100's of fungoids you won't feel the danger when they're on screen. If they're just speedbumbs and not road blockades it makes everything feel low-risk. I think by doing less is more you understand that everytime infected are around it's a danger to the characters rather than just waiting for Joel to blast through them in 5 seconds.

That said I definitely would've liked more action versus the infected, but they want to tell a human story rather than a monster story.

You're never going to feel danger when those two are on the screen regardless because of plot armor. That's why it's so important to build up supporting characters and direct drama towards things other then life or death.

Khane · Mar 15, 2023

It wasn't a lack of action against infected. It was a lack of infected period.

It was more huge hoards of them in big open spaces with tons of humans to use as cover fodder every few episodes and less small surprise attacks in tight confined spaces like was the case in the game.

They hardly encountered them in the show at all. My guess is budget decision. Easier to CGI a shitload of them and do quick camera pans that never focus too much on the detail and movement of them than it is to choreograph 1 on 1 or 2 on 1 actual fights against them over the course of an entire season.

Penance · Mar 15, 2023

Khane said:
It wasn't a lack of action against infected. It was a lack of infected period.

It was more huge hoards of them in big open spaces with tons of humans to use as cover fodder every few episodes and less small surprise attacks in tight confined spaces like was the case in the game.

They hardly encountered them in the show at all. My guess is budget decision. Easier to CGI a shitload of them and do quick camera pans that never focus too much on the detail and movement of them than it is to choreograph 1 on 1 or 2 on 1 actual fights against them over the course of an entire season.

Lack of infected definitely made the world feel less authentic

pharmakos · Mar 15, 2023

Last four episodes had, what, two infected total?

Xevy · Mar 15, 2023

Therein lies the rub though. Joel is some pro-survivor dude, he's obviously #1 going to avoid infected everytime he can. He's going to go as backwoods as he can outside main roads, but avoid every major population area (which is why he did NOT want to go into KC). So if it made sense, you wouldn't see much infected because he's avoiding them as much as he possibly can and we only really see infected when other humans fuck shit up for him. In the game you obviously can't have an entire game where you encounter enemies 5 times in 20 hours of gameplay, but if this were a real world scenario that would be how it would turn out. You'd do everything you could to avoid the infected and you'd only run into them in complete surprise events or when you're forced out of your preferred path.

Penance · Mar 15, 2023

Except there were plenty of scenes in populated areas. What are you saying? Are you high?

It was most likely a budget thing like Khane said. Its understandable, but definitely takes away from the experience.

Xevy · Mar 15, 2023

HBO's The Last of Us Season 2 Will Feature 'A Lot More Infected' - IGN

Some Last of Us fans have complained about the lack of the franchise's iconic Runners, Clickers, and Bloaters in the show, prompting showrunner Craig Mazin to address the low infected count.

www.ign.com

Basically says they didn't want a shootem up every episode to develop more tension between humans and to develop characters. I'm sure there will be more infected in Season 2 due to budget increase based on the success of Season 1.

Phazael · Mar 17, 2023

Does not matter. Everyone, and I do mean EVERYONE, is going to bail once Gigantor tees off at the Par 4. There is zero way to make that character resonate with wider audiences, especially since as was pointed out we got fuck all of background on what the Fireflies were actually up to. Who would they even cast? And we are going to get more infected _now_ for Gigantor and pals? The cynic in me says its purely to show Gigantor ripping them apart with bare hands like in the game, which will be even more retarded in live action.

Short version is HBO fucked up on two fronts. First, they let Druckmann take a correcting pencil to things and insert a bunch of virtue signal alphabet people bullshit that had zero impact on the main story. We should have gotten Bill, Elly, and Joel developing a bond while struggling to get a working car and fighting off infected at a school, but instead we got The Bear Bridges of Madison Country starring Gay Ron Swanson. The Left Behind shit should have been a few small flashback clips inserted into the main series or just ditched entirely. Riley was a shitty character and shitty person, existing solely to let Druckmann have Ellie be gay. It was shit in the game and it was even worse in the show. When the show was on point, it was when it stuck to the fucking source material. And the Sri Lanka and news show bits to flesh out the origin, but those clearly were from the show runner (felt a lot like his work on Chernobyl) which is probably why they added to the story.

Second, they tried to do this on the cheap and everything good got rushed. The first game IS the only worthwhile part of this IP and even Suckmann has to know this. It either needed to be two seasons or a 20 episode first season to build up to everything. HBO, bleeding money, cheaped out and we got nine episodes, two of which were Druckmann jerking himself off to his own virtue signaling that ate limited time with no real contribution to the story. If they had put some real money and effort behind it and greenlighted a longer series run for the original game storyline, this would have been epic. Instead its merely good with obvious flaws and clearly wasted potential. This show will die with Joel.

ShakyJake · Mar 17, 2023

There is a significant time jump between the two games, correct? I have not played part 2 and do not plan to, but I am curious if the series could progress towards it and hopefully avoid reaching that point.

OU Ariakas · Mar 17, 2023

The worst part about this show, which is also the worst part of The Walking Dead, is that they never ever show human intelligence vs. the major threat. Every single time the infected (or zombies) show up, someone gets bitten in the struggle. There is never a point where the humans show strategy, intelligence, or pack hunting behavior that made our squishy species the apex predators on the planet.

Body armor, thick coveralls, boots, gloves, duct tape at all joints, and Phalanx pushes to clear places. Not once, not ever. It shows how bad the writing is in all of these shows/games/books is and why the movie version of World War Z was so disappointing since the book took all of these notions very seriously.

Frenzied Wombat · Mar 17, 2023

Honestly, the best defense against the zombies is if they had looted a Medieval Times for some cheap Chinese made chain mail and a broadsword.

Khane · Mar 17, 2023

OU Ariakas said:
The worst part about this show, which is also the worst part of The Walking Dead, is that they never ever show human intelligence vs. the major threat. Every single time the infected (or zombies) show up, someone gets bitten in the struggle. There is never a point where the humans show strategy, intelligence, or pack hunting behavior that made our squishy species the apex predators on the planet.

Body armor, thick coveralls, boots, gloves, duct tape at all joints, and Phalanx pushes to clear places. Not once, not ever. It shows how bad the writing is in all of these shows/games/books is and why the movie version of World War Z was so disappointing since the book took all of these notions very seriously.

It would be pointless to show that because it wouldn't be believable in this particular story world. While the above makes sense from a "human logic" perspective, this fungus beat major military powers with far more technologically advanced gear. So showing a rag tag bunch of survivors auto winning with coveralls and duct tape would be a huge "WTF?". Because if it was that simple to prevent a bite how the fuck did the world get to this state?

Anyway, zombiepocalypses are always going to have plot holes and require the suspension of disbelief so, meh.

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