This is my least favorite episode of The Last of Us. Let’s get through it together.
ONE
Silver Lake, CO. The depths of winter.
Inside a restaurant, people meet and listen to a man reading from the Bible. A teen girl weeps. A sign written on cloth hangs at the window: “When we are in need He shall provide.”
TWO
The preacher/leader (David) kneels next to the girl. (He speaks gently but he has a creepy vibe.) She asks, “When can we bury him?” David pauses, looking at another man (James) at the gathering, then says the ground is too cold for digging. In the spring.
Outside, people in parkas head home. Blowing snow and roof ice dams indicate a very cold place. (None of Jackson’s social cheer is here.) James and David discuss that their meat stores are down to a week. Deer were spotted in the forest. David challenges James, sensing doubt in him. No, he answers, it’s just been a hard six months.
THREE
Ellie examines Joel’s wound while he sleeps. He looks feverish. Wolfing down the last packet of jerky, Ellie leaves a piece on Joel’s blanket. She heads out with the rifle.
FOUR
In the forest she tracks animal sign. A rabbit moves in the underbrush ahead. Chasing after it, Ellie face-plants in the snow. A noise. She moves cautiously and spots a buck. Dropping behind a fallen log, she aims. A good hit, but the deer runs. She pursues.
Re-establish the forest and the dead deer. It’s the men standing over it. As they bend to take the deer, Ellie’s voice stops them. She’s got her rifle trained on them. They lay down their guns, and David begins to talk, trying to persuade Ellie. He offers to trade for the meat. Ellie immediately asks if they have medicine. David sends James for two bottles of penicillin.
Talking, always talking, David suggests they take shelter while they wait for James to return. With David dragging the carcass, they head to a shelter where he can start a campfire. The conversation continues, David explaining how he became a preacher after the apocalypse. (Mostly, Ellie is skeptical of him and his faith.)
And then, twisting his ring and clasping his hands, he explains about luck. It’s been a tough winter. He sent four of their people to a nearby town to scavenge. Only three came back. (Ellie goes stone-faced.) Mesmerizing, David says everything happens for a reason. Behind Ellie, James has returned and has her in his sights. On David’s instructions, James lowers his gun and tosses Ellie the medicine. Rifle up, Ellie takes the bottles and leaves. The men watch her go (and in which direction).
Back to Joel, Ellie injects the penicillin into his wound. Tucking in his blankets, she lies beside him, her head nestled under his chin.
White caps on the lake and falling snow in town. A fire and a soup pot. Someone brings in fresh chopped meat and says it’s venison. (Pause from the cooks.) Into the broth it goes.
Dinner is served. While the community sits at tables, David and James drag the buck through the door. Everyone is completely silent. Reading the room, David admits they found a girl “who was with the man who took Alec from us.” In the morning he’ll lead a party to follow her trail and bring the man to justice. Weepy girl (Alec’s daughter) speaks up: he should kill both of them. David strolls over to her, removing his gloves. He backhands her down to the ground, then gives her a hand up. Even though Alec is gone, she will always have a father. She should show respect when he’s speaking.
SWITCH
(This is the moment when, if the viewer was charitable, waiting to see if David was evil or if he was only a desperate man ministering to a dying community, all doubt is removed.)
FIVE
He leads the community in grace, a heaping plate of meat stew in front of him. Cutlery clatters as people dig in.
Morning. Light through the basement window shines on Ellie, waking. She injects Joel’s wound again. (He seems more peaceful, as if he’s improving.)
Ellie opens the garage door, banging loudly in the muffled stillness. She gathers a bucket of snow for the horse. Suspense as she stands out front. A flock of birds, rising up in the woods and cawing, catches her attention. Crouching for cover, she gets closer. Six men, including David and James, approach carrying rifles. David is determined to bring Ellie back with them.
Slamming into the basement, Ellie rouses Joel. His eyes crack open. Placing a knife on his chest and wrapping his hand around the hilt, Ellie explains men are coming. She’ll use the horse and lead them away. (Joel may or may not be completely conscious.) She drags a bureau in front of the basement door, closes the garage, and mounts up. Yelling, she fires toward the men in the street and rides away. They give chase, David reminding them he wants her alive.
James shoots the horse from underneath her, and Ellie takes a hard tumble. She fights for consciousness while the men surrounding her take aim. “Do it,” one of them says. David firing a round in the air stops them.
She’s out. David picks her up and instructs two men to come with him, dragging the horse. (!) The others should go door-to-door.
The suspense builds as they search. We see Joel’s eyes open as bootsteps sound above his head. As the man slides the bureau, Joel struggles to rise.
One down. Joel grabs him from behind and drives the knife into his neck. Panting, Joel pushes himself up.
We’re with Ellie as she regains consciousness in a holding cell. We hear David’s voice before we see him. Leaning forward, he speaks kindly. Ellie tells him to eat shit. He asks for her trust, otherwise she’ll be alone. Linger on Ellie’s tormented face with no idea how Joel is faring.
Back to the neighborhood. One man sneaks through a yard, only to find one of the others downed in the snow. From behind the tree Joel drives the rifle butt into sneaky man’s head.
Both men are duct-taped to chairs while Joel tortures them for information. He learns that Ellie is alive in Silver Lake. After they point to the resort on a map, Joel kills them both.
Ellie works at the joins in the chain link. She sees something in the room that stops her cold. In comes David with dinner. At her look he turns, seeing a human ear underneath the table. She kicks the dinner tray away and plainly accuses him of eating people. He admits it, and then rolls out the excuses and the mind games. “You have a violent heart,” he says, believing he and Ellie are alike. Cordyceps is his god. As if he’s taming her, David slowly approaches, coaxing that they should be equals and friends, and places his hand on the cell bar. Ellie caresses his hand, gets a firm grip, and breaks his finger. While she’s reaching for his keys, he slams her head repeatedly into the bars. Threatening to chop her into tiny little pieces, he walks out.
SIX
Joel, rifle over his shoulder, stumbles through the blowing snow. He sees a dragged blood trail and follows it into a shed. The boat house is the abattoir, and Joel’s flashlight reveals the hanging human meat.
SEVEN
David and James come for Ellie, unlocking the cage. She fights, but they put her on the butchering table. As David wields the cleaver, Ellie shouts that she’s infected. While the two men argue over her old scar, Ellie grabs the cleaver and drives it into James’ neck. David shoots at her fleeing back.
EIGHT
They’re in a restaurant with padded booth seating. Ellie, taking a lit log from the fire, throws it at David. He ducks, and the wood lands against the curtains, blazing the room. He stalks her with the cleaver.
Joel’s coming.
David continues to taunt. The cloth banner catches on fire. He monologues, becoming more rapey as he goes. She leaps at his back, stabbing him with a steak knife and falling. Kicking her in the abdomen, he straddles her. Ellie is frantic. She’s able to grab her knife and take all that emotion and drive it repeatedly into his torso.
(This is a deeply upsetting scene. Ramsey is fully committed and taps into our fear for a girl being dominated by a man. We don’t cheer when she attacks him, even though he gets what he deserves. Ellie’s pain is so raw that we feel it, too. We don’t want her to be in this situation, and we don’t want to join her as the audience, and yet we have no choice.)
NINE
Ellie, nose bloody, emerges through the restaurant doors, smoke following. Out in the street she’s grabbed from behind. She fights until Joel can get her to recognize him. His face scans hers, worried and fearful. Then she relaxes and hugs him hard. “It’s alright, baby girl,” he says, hugging her back. He wraps her in his coat, arm around her shoulders, and they walk away. Roll credits.
CRITICAL NOTES
We watch this episode for the Nine. Joel, wracked by the loss of his daughter throughout the season, behaves as a true father to Ellie, even calling her by his endearment for Sarah. The love these two share is a great reward after the meticulous arc that’s been built toward this moment. The fact that he somewhat improbably rises from his sick bed to wreak such vengeance stretches credulity, but it’s a visual clue to his heart. A father will not be stopped.
The Three is clearly Joel, so the Six must mirror with him. I don’t like that the scene with Joel that fits into the Six slot also includes the human meat reveal. I think it muddies the beat. The abattoir itself could have been the Six if we’d been shown a clearer indication at the Three that this community is eating each other. Would this episode have resonated more if the mystery of the meat was shown earlier? I don’t know, but I do think this episode could’ve used some structural massaging.
I know that David is a product of the original game, but the showrunners have taken liberties with other storylines. I wish they’d given him a different profile. Every other episode has brought a depth of character the actors can consume, creating brilliance. This one uses such a tired trope, the evil Christian preacher. The actor really doesn’t have room to bring fresh emotion because we’ve seen this stereotype used repeatedly over the years. Whatever surprise or outrage we should feel has been wrung out of us already. This fatigue, combined with his horrible manipulation of and attack on Ellie, makes this an unpleasant watch. I’m glad to put it behind me.