On today's episode of the Unbinged podcast, we're breaking down and giving you our review to the finale of the last of us season two. There's just a lot of emotions going on right now. I don't think a lot of them are good. Let's just jump right into it.
Samantha Holt:This is your official spoiler warning for the season finale of season two of last of us.
Alfredo Brown:Everybody clear out. Get the ball to Jagger. Move out. Jag, ISO, it's your turn. How do you feel?
Jagger May:What in the Game of Thrones season eight are we fucking watching? Like, that's like, I'm not I'm not trying to we've defended this show on this podcast for seven episodes on on TikTok, on YouTube, and then they they do this shit to us. It's I don't even know where to begin because, one, we know that they're gonna stretch this out. They've already told us that we've spent four episodes in Seattle, moved very little plot, and now we're gonna go back to get Abby's side of it without any of the characters that I've grown to hate or like. And then go back to the hate.
Jagger May:What is Ellie right now? That that's like, I'm not gonna completely, like, unload everything, unload the clip here because there's so much to unpack. I just think that Ellie, at this point, if I were to present this script, this story to someone who has never watched The Last of Us season one, who has never played the games or even heard of it, and I said, here's the plot. Someone killed an entire group of researchers trying to save the world. They came and killed the dude.
Jagger May:Now his daughter is is running around killing people and risking her entire community on it. She is a fucking villain at this point. It's not even, like, a cool villain turn. Like, it's not even an Anakin villain turn at this point. It is just some straight up bullshit cockamie.
Jagger May:I would just say shitty writing tropes that we ended on a cliffhanger and I'm and I'm really frustrated and I think now even after watching the the post credit on there where they're talking, these riders are just glazing themselves and and drinking their own Kool Aid, and it I'm just frustrated. And and I have very little faith we could turn this ship around, especially with their plans of what they had in season three. I'm done. I'm sorry.
Matthew Kopfhamer:My favorite part, Jagger, was when when Jesse and Ellie are having their little discussion at the end of the episode, and Jesse turns to her and goes, I know that if I was in trouble, you would set the world on fire to save me. And she's like, yep. And it's like, literally five seconds before that, we had a scene where she chose not to save Tommy to go for her revenge quest instead. And then she accidentally kills a pregnant woman and gets in her feels about it. So how the fuck are you gonna have that conversation literally the scene after she chose not to save the second most important person in her life?
Matthew Kopfhamer:Like, what are we fucking doing? This show is so nonsensical at times that it's ridiculous.
Jagger May:Apparently, the game is a lot like that too. Really?
Alfredo Brown:Alright. Well, I just love that, like, in this episode, Ellie goes full Philadelphia. Oh, you think you're better than me? So just, like, it was just it just took me out of that moment so much. Okay.
Alfredo Brown:Sam, I feel like you have been the one that has tried to give us as much clarity on these episodes and be like, hey. We are going through this emotional roller coaster. It is for a reason. You might be on an island here, but I wanna hear your opinion on this. Do you still feel like we are on an emotional roller coaster for a reason, or has this show just lost its way?
Samantha Holt:No. I feel like there I feel like there is a reason behind it. I mean, I feel like they needed to unplug us from wanting Ellie to win. Like, obviously, we've been defending her. I've been defending her this entire season as well in terms of where she's been going, but I think that this is intentional in order to set us up where you started the season off with, obviously, Joel dying at Abby's hands.
Samantha Holt:And so all of us are in this fuck Abby mentality. They're trying to create a level of perspectives in terms of setting us up to be on Abby's side for season three. That's not entirely what I feel like this episode is doing.
Matthew Kopfhamer:They didn't do a good job.
Samantha Holt:Well, I think I feel like that was the goal whether they did a good job of it or not. I'm not entirely sure. I did feel a lot of frustration at Ellie for, like, my first time this season in watching this. There were so many moments where she could step away. She could choose the new community she has outside of Joel to protect them, and she never did.
Samantha Holt:And they just kept removing that. But, obviously, this all has to follow the state of where they have this pinnacle moment of Ellie being faced with not only her horrible decisions and all of that leading to trauma where Abby is holding a gun to Tommy, and now that her worst nightmare has come. I feel like they had to do something to bring Ellie to her rock bottom in order to now face us with coming to confrontation with Abby and obviously now setting us up for season three. Do I like it? No.
Samantha Holt:It's very frustrating. I feel like the entire time I'm just waiting for some level of a seed of any of the wisdom that's being dropped on her all episode long to, like, latch on, and it never does. So I'm not entirely on the same side, but I am equally frustrated and set.
Alfredo Brown:I will say this. I do not think that this is a good season of television. However, if there is somewhere where they succeeded, it is getting us to feel whether that feeling is anger, frustration, confusion about the show. They got us to feel. And honestly, that's where you start to to tell yourself it's actually just kind of irresponsible by the showrunners because they took something that we loved, and it kind of feels like they were fucking around with it a lot.
Alfredo Brown:Like, this feels very much like a Star Wars sequel type energy around this, where they're just like, let's change things and let's give you something that maybe you haven't had. Let's go into a direction where you're not even sure if you're supposed to be rooting for this character, but, oh, you kinda like your villain. And then, like, just there was just a lot of things that it it doesn't feel like the story or the characters themselves are very cohesive at the moment. And even in just the one moment, whether it's in the game or not, I don't care. Like, that's that's the whole thing that this show has been able to take stuff from the game and been able to improve on it.
Alfredo Brown:There's a moment where Ellie gets captured by the Seraphites, and then there's just something that goes off in the distance. And I'm sure we'll get that explanation. They're like, just leave her. I was like, damn. That was my sure.
Alfredo Brown:But that's mighty convenient. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Way convenient.
Alfredo Brown:It was it was it was watching it was watching Austin Powers where, like, Scott Evil is like, no. I got a gun in my room. We'll just come over here. Boom. Kill them together.
Alfredo Brown:It'll take, like, ten seconds. It'll be great. Like, that's how I'm sitting here watching Sara fights like, yo. You guys can kill her really fast. It would be so simple, and then you just go to your thing.
Alfredo Brown:Instead, you're like, nah. Let her go. We changed our minds. And that to me was the encapsulation of this whole show, whereas Ellie has changed her mind. She went from being surrounded by that red light ready to to just fuck up Nora to then the next episode.
Alfredo Brown:She's like, yeah. You're right. Maybe maybe we should go back to then. Like, no. I've gotta go find app.
Alfredo Brown:Like, there's so much inconsistency. Yeah. And, you know, the whale like, I get it. I get it. That is part of human nature to have inconsistency.
Alfredo Brown:But on a show where you can control the narrative of it, you can do a better job of it. And that's where I think this show has gone totally off the rails is in terms of its consistency of its characters.
Jagger May:And, Alfredo, that point when they went to Scar Island, I was like, yes. She's gonna fuck around and find out. Like, you wanna talk about, what what could have saved that whole episode for me is even if they would have stopped with her on Scar Island and made, like, a tough sequence.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yeah.
Jagger May:Yeah. That would have made sense to me because we have a character who made a mistake, and they paid for that mistake. That's what we loved. I know I compared it to Game of Thrones. That's what we loved about the first six seasons of Game
Matthew Kopfhamer:of Thrones. Seasons. Yeah.
Jagger May:Early season. If you fucked up and made a mistake, there were consequences for it. Yeah. And we don't have that here on there. I mean, because, like, I was ready for it.
Jagger May:We have the little kid. It was just like, you saw me
Matthew Kopfhamer:Bro, children look a born ass looking kid. Yeah.
Jagger May:Yeah. And he's just like, You know? I said, You know? And Yeah. To for for your point, Samantha, I'm gonna call you sunshine Sammy because you're just like you've you really are fucking positive about this.
Jagger May:It's a what what Alfredo said and I think are
Alfredo Brown:Care Bear just walking onto the show.
Jagger May:Is, like like, Alfredo, you said they do a good job of making us feel. It's like I said last episode is, like, they they capture good moments. The problem is and, like, to speak your language, you're the same like, opposite side of the same coin as far as creating. Like, you're, like, you draw and make art. Writing, it's the same thing.
Jagger May:You have forced perspective. They do a shit job at at forcing a good perspective and driving a narrative on there where you get, like, a blotch of something. You're like, here's death, and you're like, oh, wow. And then you're just kind of going around in this quagmire feelings until you're forced into a moment again, and that's where that inconsistency come comes in here where you're like, how the fuck did we get here? How do these characters make these decisions?
Jagger May:Because all we have as writers wanna create scenes and not a story, and that's my problem.
Samantha Holt:I I hear you on that. In terms of, like, the in in the post episode moment where we're hearing from the writer's perspective and they're saying, well, you know, you've got this mirror of community. It was kind of like a fun house of mirrors in terms of going back and forth too quickly. I think that they could have done one of them. They didn't need to do literally all of them.
Samantha Holt:You had the mirror of, you know, the wolf community versus the Seraphites. You had Ellie's community versus Jesse's community, and then you had Abby's community versus, the Jackson community. So you've got way too many things happening where they did little bits of that in different episodes. And you're like, okay. I can see, you know, this tribalism.
Samantha Holt:We've talked about that a lot this season, but this was just too much ping ponging back and forth between these mirrors. And it became a fun house that didn't feel very fun.
Matthew Kopfhamer:And it's because it it goes back to our main complaint for this entire season, which is pacing and the amount of episodes. The fact that we only got seven fucking episodes for this season, they really couldn't give us a lot of backstory on some of these side characters or characters they're introducing. And and that's just that's just a failure of the showrunners at this point. Like, you should know that if you're only gonna have this many episodes, fill those fucking episodes with backstory that makes us care about these care like, I wanted to know more about Owen, Nora, Mel, like that crew, but three of them now are dead. So we're not really gonna get backstory on them.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Well, we may
Jagger May:Said it before.
Matthew Kopfhamer:I. Yeah. So it's it's one of those yeah, the baby. Which obviously, they're clearly mirroring Dina and Jesse in that scene, and they're making Abby or they're making Ellie confront the fact that, like, this is what's gonna cost you if you continue a revenge fantasy. And that kinda goes back to my my biggest complaint this scene this episode is Ellie, in my estimation, had four moments, like four fucking moments where she should have stopped and be like, you know what?
Matthew Kopfhamer:This revenge thing's not worth it. The first one, she gets back from the hospital and they're like, hey. What happened? And she's all, like, shell shocked because she just tortured somebody, but she conveniently forgets to mention, hey. There's this really crazy thing happening in the basement of the hospital where they're fucking breathing out spores and now it's airborne.
Matthew Kopfhamer:And people can get infected from breathing in. No mention of that. And when when Dean is like, hey, I'm gonna, like, clean your back. I was like, oh, her clothing is fucking full of spores. Her hair is full of spores.
Jagger May:Thank you. You could be breathing it out. Yes.
Matthew Kopfhamer:This the whole the whole time, I'm like off. But it's just like this whole scene, she should be like, hey, guys. We're fucked right now. Like, we need to get Wait.
Alfredo Brown:Wait. I've made a really good point, and we just messed it off. We just wanted to get that little Actually,
Samantha Holt:I I was a good point, but she ran through the rain, and she came in soaking wet. So all of it
Jagger May:Still. Sunshine's Tammy. Always,
Matthew Kopfhamer:I guess. But but again
Alfredo Brown:Like, we're not a generation that didn't survive a pandemic where the greatest weapon was washing your hands.
Jagger May:We tried to kill ourselves really bad, like, hard, Alfredo, during that time. We tried hard to fuck that up. Come on, man.
Alfredo Brown:Oh my god. Full circle. Back to the men that don't wash their hands.
Jagger May:Oh, the apocalypse videos. As host of this as as, like, the driver of the show, you had a point. We will allow it.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yeah. So so that moment right there, she should have been like, guys, we
Jagger May:need to get out of Seattle.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Like, this this is more dangerous than just Wolf versus Scar at this point. Like, there are fucking spores under the ground. Like, let's get the fuck out of here. And then It's boring. There's the moment where, like, Dina like, she tells Dina the full story of what happened.
Matthew Kopfhamer:And Dina's like, alright, we need we need to go back to Jackson. And at that moment, it's like, alright. Let's roll the fuck out. And then she gets to the point where Tommy's pinned down. He's in trouble.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Jesse confronts her as like, hey, community. Like, pick community over personal vengeance. And she's like, no. Tommy would be fine. We don't even know if that's really Tommy.
Matthew Kopfhamer:And she goes off on her own. Fucking bullshit. And then she was annoying is when she oh. Sorry.
Alfredo Brown:Go go go. Go. Mean, you're recapping the entire episode, I was trying to break up conversation a little bit.
Matthew Kopfhamer:But but the thing is, like, those are the four main points where it's like every single time she chose the wrong choice and she faced no consequences till Abby shows up out of the fucking blue. And it's like The thing in the right mind picks a goddamn motorboat in the middle of a hurricane? And it's like, this is gonna be a great idea.
Samantha Holt:I mean, alright. We can
Alfredo Brown:we can nitpick all the dumb decisions. Like, I think we're all there. Like, we're there. That she's been doing dumb shit this whole time. I think, like, the the one of the most egregious things is when she's mad at Jesse for not saving the little Seraphite boy.
Matthew Kopfhamer:That, like,
Alfredo Brown:that if you don't know. And so to compare to compare the Seraphite boy that you don't know in a war zone when you're actually going to that war zone to kill people and then be like, but Joel saved me, and I've gotta save that boy. Like, I get that you have this internal conflict, but that does not connect. Like, those dots are not connected whatsoever. And the idea of the showrunners wanna say, like, hey, yo, we're gonna need a we're gonna need four seasons to do this.
Alfredo Brown:Bitch, don't give us seven episodes then. Give us give us a season two that is 10 episodes. Give us a season three that is 10 episodes. Make your story work. It's it's pretty simple.
Jagger May:Get the fuck out, Craig Maison. It's just like they didn't learn anything. They didn't learn anything from Game of Thrones. What's crazy, Craig Maison learned nothing from his own show that got him that fucking job. We don't need a thousand fucking seasons.
Jagger May:I need a tight story in our rewatch. Watchmen. I put that on the other day. Like, Amy recommended. So what that was really good.
Jagger May:I would like to rewatch that again. It's one fucking season. It's fantastic. Like, to 10 episodes, and it's fantastic. Do do I need a new season?
Jagger May:Man, if they nail it, cool. But no. I don't. I don't want you to fuck up what you've given me because I can rewatch that over and over again because it's so good. They could have done that with they could have given us two seasons, realistically, guys.
Jagger May:They could have given us two fucking seasons, cut out some fluff, and this would have been goated. This would have been another one of those Yeah. HBO bangers we would rewatch. They learned fuck all. And I am tired as us as a community to reward this bullshit.
Jagger May:It's just it is so frustrating. And, again, it is cheap writing, cheap writing, where they're like, well, we're gonna write like shit. It's it's Marley and me, guys. Marley and me is fucking slop. It is slop.
Jagger May:It is feel good bullshit.
Alfredo Brown:Something breaks,
Matthew Kopfhamer:kid. Till the end.
Alfredo Brown:That dog's a natural
Jagger May:But they kill the fucking dog. And what are you supposed to do? Spoilers. Spoilers. Are you supposed to do?
Jagger May:I'm sorry, Sam. Read the spoiler on Marvel.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Ruin the movie for me, Jagger.
Jagger May:Yeah. They killed the dog, and then and then it it just it saves us from whatever the fuck that ninety minutes were. Like, oh, well, that was really sad.
Matthew Kopfhamer:I thought
Alfredo Brown:it was a Christmas Carol spinoff.
Jagger May:It's fucking bullshit, dude. And then on this one, it's the same thing. We're like, I'm gonna be mad for seven episodes, but I gotta know if Ellie dies, so I have to come back. Like, get fucked, Craig. Listen.
Jagger May:I'm sorry.
Alfredo Brown:I wanna ask this question because it almost feels like the showrunners and writers are doing this purposely where they are comparing Ellie to these characters almost directly. It's a side by side comparison where you get the episode with Joel where you have the flashback where he's saying, you know, do better than me. Did I do good? All these things where he's really trying to be a good dad and
Jagger May:a
Alfredo Brown:smart human just in general. Then in the very next episode, you've got Jesse who is being and doing all the things that we have wanted out of Ellie as a character. And it's it's contrasting so hard even to the point where you get to the end of the show with Abby there. And even she's like, I let you live. Basically, all you had to do was just not come over here, and all the people around you would have survived.
Alfredo Brown:Jesse didn't have to die.
Matthew Kopfhamer:She's so hypocritical of Abby. Like, all you had to do is leave Joel alone. But I'm not gonna lie.
Jagger May:I'm team Abby, dude. I'm straight up. I'm having a hard time seeing where these wolf people are fucking wrong, man. Is anyone else there at that point here where it's just like, you we spent five
Matthew Kopfhamer:minutes people through the street and then torturing them is kinda wrong. You know?
Jagger May:You ended up on five minutes. Like, Ellie was on Scar Island for five minutes and almost got gutted. I mean,
Alfredo Brown:that legitimately even ask her, like, where she was.
Samantha Holt:Your name.
Alfredo Brown:Yeah. They just they looked at an eight year old, he was like, way out. Yeah.
Jagger May:Have a really cool guy. Like, maybe Isaac is on to some shit. Like like, I don't know, man. I don't think they're that bad. Did
Matthew Kopfhamer:you notice when they pointed out, like, the the other poster or the other portrait of a different woman? And so do you I I didn't play the second game. That's religion. Anything about but do you think that
Jagger May:this is reveal?
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yes. But do you think they're gonna reveal that this there's, like, a string of prophets and it's just, like, somebody taking advantage of these these people in a religious sense? Or do you think it's just, a one off little teaser?
Alfredo Brown:I gotta I gotta say I don't think I care. Like, that's not a that's not a story that's not a storyline I care about. Like, to me, that would be another flaw in this show where it's, like, we have story that we really wanna get to, and for some reason, you need four seasons to tell that story and do an entire Abby season, which is the news that came out recently that Mhmm. We're gonna end on this cliffhanger where you hear the gunshot, the black screen, we don't know what happened to Ellie. By the way, season three, it's gonna be all Abby, which mind you is gonna take place over these, what, four days in Seattle?
Alfredo Brown:Five Days? I can't three days? Like so it it doesn't seem
Matthew Kopfhamer:You play as Abby in the second game.
Jagger May:No. No.
Alfredo Brown:No. And and I and and I get that. That's fine. But the show's kinda taken liberties of changing things where they can. Yeah.
Alfredo Brown:I don't like this as being the ending of of this season. And if they jumped into some other, like, hey. Let's give you some more background info on the Sara fight. It's like, I'm good. I I think I get it for the most part.
Samantha Holt:I mean, we're gonna end up getting it because Seattle from the perspective of Abby is WLF against the Seraphites. So we're gonna end up getting a lot more of it. We just have to be prepared for that now. I mean, I think the point that you made, Koff, like, they gonna have another woman that's leading the Seraphites? I feel like it's gonna end up being the same thing where, you know, Isaac replaces someone else.
Samantha Holt:You have all these leaders that are replacing others. I feel like it's probably gonna be along those lines of now they're the strong leader, and that's who they're following.
Alfredo Brown:But It's Andor.
Samantha Holt:To everyone else's point, like, do I care about the Seraphites? I don't. I understand the plot point of them in terms of showing the perspective of, you know, people against people despite being in an apocalypse. I understand that. But do I want that?
Samantha Holt:No. Am I annoyed that now I have to and I after watching the show, I had to just, like, sit down and write down a ton of notes because I was, like, all in my feelings. I was like, we have to process this and end up logical because that's how I am. But I also felt like the jarring cut
Alfredo Brown:Logic is stupid.
Samantha Holt:It is. Come on, son. I know. I should just live in Wonderland or whatever. I feel like going from
Matthew Kopfhamer:live in
Samantha Holt:the feels. Going from being the cut to black gunshot to now being forced back to this day one standing point is just like, ugh. I feel like I agree with all of you guys in terms of what you said in terms of, like, you know, Owen died, Mel died, and obviously Nora died. Although I did kind of enjoy the Nora death. I feel like now why do I care about knowing about these characters that I already know die?
Samantha Holt:I do have to understand that this is a video game. Every character we've fallen in love with so far in this entire series ends up dying anyways. Of course, we knew we got more screen time out of Jesse. He was gonna be a goner by the end of the episode. I think we all kind of felt that.
Samantha Holt:But at the same time, it's just like this it's given away too much, and now there's less incentive to care about the backstory behind these characters knowing we're not gonna see them again.
Alfredo Brown:So can I bring up one?
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yeah. Yeah. Go.
Alfredo Brown:I wanna bring up one point that was brought up in this episode that makes Jesse to me the most likable character in the whole fucking show. He told us where Shimmer was, and he saved Shimmer. And he was like, not that you asked, Kelly. You asked. Yep.
Alfredo Brown:You left a fucking horse. I've been wondering that for four episodes now.
Samantha Holt:We've all been wondering. Yeah. Jesse's the prince that
Alfredo Brown:was prom like, that's it.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Oh, yeah. Yeah. Damn it. And and also, I think it's pretty disingenuous of the showrunners to kinda dangle that plot point of Isaac doing some crazy fuck shit with the surf or the Scar Island. And him throwing that one line at sergeant lieutenant captain Park or whatever, where he's like, there's a pretty good chance you're gonna die tonight.
Matthew Kopfhamer:And there's an even better chance that I'm gonna die tonight, and Abby's the one that's gonna replace me. It's like for them to throw that single line after giving us almost no story of of Isaac and the wolves this entire season, except for, like, one flashback scene where we see him bomb his like, grenade his own men. So I get it. Like, they're it's intriguing. I wanna see what happens next, but I'm so pissed off by how this episode ended.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Like, I almost don't care anymore.
Samantha Holt:They did the tell.
Jagger May:They should've
Matthew Kopfhamer:given us more. Yeah. They should've given us more in this season about the wolves and what they're doing to get us really bought in on, okay, they have a they have a plan. They're doing something crazy other than, alright, there's boats, there's an island, there's an explosion. And maybe the leadership of the wolves are gonna die for some reason.
Matthew Kopfhamer:But it would have
Jagger May:been nice if
Matthew Kopfhamer:they paced it out better. Yeah. They it would have been nice if they paced it out better. Again, that's gonna my complaint for this whole season. It's pacing.
Jagger May:It's fucked. Nailed it. Like, and my point is is, like, are they trying to make the wolves villains? Because, again, I I don't have any perspective from what I've seen. They seem like with the exception of, obviously, the Jacksonville people.
Jagger May:Like, yeah, they just seem like Jackson. The most
Alfredo Brown:yeah. Or not Jacksonville.
Jagger May:Whatever. Fucking Jackson, Wyoming. Like, the those people are separate. They're not even they're their own little community. But between the scars and the Ellie group, I won't call them the Jackson group because clearly Ellie doesn't give a fuck.
Jagger May:And then the scars like, like, the wolves that what are they trying to do? Like, wipe out a a cult? You know? Like, to me, they're trying to kill Scientology with fuck the Scientology with crossbows. So I'm like, I kinda get it.
Jagger May:And then we got this this this little fuck coming around picking off people. I'm sorry. It it I'm team Isaac. I I if if I had to choose based on what I've seen here and there was a gun in my head, I'm in prison. You gotta pick your game.
Jagger May:It's like, wolf wolf, baby. You know? That's where I'm going.
Matthew Kopfhamer:You're copper pan guy. Yeah.
Samantha Holt:Yeah. Oh my god.
Alfredo Brown:Copper pan got nice cookware over there on that too.
Jagger May:Yeah, dude. Exactly. It's like, you got the you got French cookware.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Mana taste.
Jagger May:I'm in.
Matthew Kopfhamer:It's a
Alfredo Brown:mana taste. And I think that, like, all the obviously, all of this has been intentional, right, is to gas up Abby a bit, to make her this very important character for us to care about Isaac going into the next season, try to separate us as much from Jackson and that community as much as possible because we know we're not gonna get them in the next season. Right? And you almost like I I wonder if they wanted to make Ellie this unlikable so that you're kind of like, thank god we're getting a break from her. And you go to Abby.
Alfredo Brown:And then now you're almost rooting for Abby, and you're kinda trying to say, well, who do I root for at this point? Right? So I can get what they're doing, but the assumption that you are gonna get this many seasons of TV to do it Bullshit. That doesn't play, baby girl. Yeah.
Samantha Holt:It doesn't play anymore. Made made more sense if what they had done was and you guys probably don't watch this. But, like, in terms of how Bridgerton handled their latest season, which is split into two different parts.
Jagger May:You watch Bridgerton, Sam?
Alfredo Brown:Yes. It's fun. Hey. Hey. I'm sorry.
Alfredo Brown:Be nice. I'm so
Samantha Holt:Play nice. Play nice. Let me get my point out first. They had season three released, and then they released the first half, and then they gave you a pause between that and the second half of the seasons the third season.
Matthew Kopfhamer:How much was the pause, though?
Samantha Holt:I think it was four or five episodes on each, and then the pause was a couple months.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Alright. That's not bad, though. It's not two years.
Jagger May:It's not bad. You gave me shit, though.
Samantha Holt:I know. That's the problem. And I think that if they had front loaded this differently and restructured it, we've been talking about the pacing this whole time. I'm trying to speak your guys' language and see if there's a level that they could have done it that made sense. Just trying to I'm trying to fix it.
Jagger May:Trying to
Alfredo Brown:fix it. Bridgerton is definitely the way to relate to us. Yeah. You nailed it.
Jagger May:I'm not I'm just surprised. Like like, that that's that's Beth watches Bridgerton. I thought
Samantha Holt:I'm not making you watch it. I'm just telling you what they mean to divide the season.
Jagger May:You're more of a girly than I thought you were. That's fine. That's perfectly acceptable. I just What kind of girl did
Alfredo Brown:you think she was?
Jagger May:Well, she doesn't watch, like, reality TV and chill, but, like, Bridgerton? I was like
Samantha Holt:Yeah. I don't watch love island. Give me Bridgerton. Like, like, just give me a plot plot point.
Jagger May:You'll watch love island if they're in British ruffles, essentially.
Samantha Holt:No. I would never anything like Love Island because I don't like reality TV. I think it's trash.
Jagger May:Well, thank you.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Well, that's the appeal.
Samantha Holt:Yeah. I don't don't like if I'm gonna eat junk food, I'm gonna eat junk food. I'm not gonna just stuff my vision with trash.
Alfredo Brown:Okay. Of this junk food and how much we're gonna get of it, I have to ask. Do you guys think we're gonna get all four seasons?
Jagger May:I don't, actually. I don't believe it.
Matthew Kopfhamer:HBO HBO's gonna make it happen. They're not Yeah.
Alfredo Brown:Unless Like,
Matthew Kopfhamer:do you think do you
Alfredo Brown:think there's a genuine possibility do you think there's a genuine possibility that the outcry from this season leads them to say, you know what? Make season three twelve episodes, and let's just finish it there. Because that seems like that would be the way to pull people back in. If, like, listen, we're gonna give you the longer season that you want. We're gonna finish this here in season three.
Alfredo Brown:We're end it the way that people want. Like, think there's gonna be a lot of people that don't return to this show in season three.
Matthew Kopfhamer:I think
Alfredo Brown:Especially because they're saying I gotta commit to two more seasons of this.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yeah. They're gonna take the third season like they want. Nobody's gonna watch it, and then they're gonna cancel it, and then we're not gonna get a finished show.
Alfredo Brown:That but that's what I'm saying. It's like, I I Yeah. The HBO has an opportunity to pivot here. Do we think that is more likely, or do you think that they just go with the four seasons and and and fuck it?
Matthew Kopfhamer:They're not gonna pivot.
Jagger May:They're not
Matthew Kopfhamer:gonna pivot. And I know that with Trump's.
Jagger May:People still watch fire country. I don't even know what the fuck that show is. There's six
Alfredo Brown:shows Chicago.
Jagger May:But, you know, like, just Chicago med,
Matthew Kopfhamer:Chicago PD. That's network television. That's not prestige television like HBO. It's different.
Alfredo Brown:But Also also the same people watch that one. It's basically just my dad
Matthew Kopfhamer:watching it all over the offices. Yeah.
Jagger May:I I guess.
Alfredo Brown:And he records it. Not Even though
Matthew Kopfhamer:he gets Sorry. On a Does he call it Tivo still? He's like, I'm recording
Jagger May:with Tivo.
Alfredo Brown:He does. Yeah.
Jagger May:Yeah. Oh my god. That's kind of a horrible
Alfredo Brown:And I asked him, why do you record it? So I can skip the commercials, obviously.
Jagger May:That's fucking hilarious. It's like Freon Peacock.
Alfredo Brown:My dad's 80, man. I just let him live, bro. I just let him live.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Know what streaming is. My
Jagger May:my point is is that we already see it in the comments, man. Is that like prestige TV is more accessible than it's ever been because of streaming. Like, used to, you would have money to have HBO. You're like, you got cable and HBO? Like, that was, an addition.
Jagger May:Yeah. Now everyone has or a lot of people have HBO. So these people who have gone from watching Fire Country and now can get The Last of Us, TV's bigger and more accessible than ever. So some of these other people will accept things that we don't. Just like the people who watch From.
Jagger May:That show fucking sucks, and it's stupid. But people are just so enamored by by, like like People who enjoy From watching this right now,
Alfredo Brown:like, why have we said fuck me
Matthew Kopfhamer:for it?
Samantha Holt:Fuck. Catching
Jagger May:strays, let
Alfredo Brown:alone you.
Jagger May:It's a terrible show, guys. Funkero. It's nothing It it it's it's nothing but cliffhangers and reveals. It's it's just gimmicks, bells, and whistles. And and the and people are willing to accept that now.
Jagger May:And I don't and am I saying are we pretentious? I don't wanna use that word, but we are. Yeah. We are % pretentious. So I think that HBO's gonna get away with this again, and they're gonna look back.
Jagger May:What happened? Then they're gonna learn
Matthew Kopfhamer:nothing. With this.
Jagger May:Yeah. And they're gonna they are gonna get away with it, Koff. They're gonna they're gonna come up with a new franchise to make. It's kinda like what they're doing with Game of Thrones. Like, how many different shows can we get with Game of Thrones?
Jagger May:You know, it's just Well
Samantha Holt:I think it also
Matthew Kopfhamer:I wish George would finish his main series, but, you know, that's another story.
Jagger May:Wheels keep on turning.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Oh, yeah. They canceled. Didn't they just Amazon just canceled their Wheel of Time?
Jagger May:Wheel of Time. Yeah. Except that wheel. That does not keep on turning.
Samantha Holt:No. I feel like it depends on the level of outrage.
Jagger May:The level of outrage?
Samantha Holt:Yeah. The level of outrage that we're gonna be seeing from, you know, the point that we're recording this right now through on into the rest of the summer, to be honest. We're gonna be talking about this because I don't know that we have another show that is usurping this Sunday night spot right now that's gonna take over and really dominate the conversation. I feel like this is gonna be a summer of talking about it. And depending on the level of fandom and how much outrage there is, I think it could move the needle.
Samantha Holt:And I'm just gonna pull random random reference. But do you guys remember when they first talked about doing Sonic the Hedgehog, and then they were going to they gave us a little sneak peek of what the little character looked like?
Matthew Kopfhamer:The Internet bullying minds,
Samantha Holt:and they changed it.
Alfredo Brown:The Sonic team
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yeah. Bullying works.
Samantha Holt:I think that is something that could end up happening here in terms of, like, being very vehemently against, you know, the the the system.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Must change it.
Samantha Holt:Make it ours.
Matthew Kopfhamer:The difference, Sam, was that was an easy fix where all they had to go is just redesign the character look, Where this is fundamental problem with the show. Well, sure. Of course, animation I'm I'm not trying to discount how hard animation is. I'm just saying, like, from a studio perspective, it's much easier to change a character design and how they look versus trying to fix the flaws that are baked into the fundamental, like, foundation of the show. Like, they fucked it from day one.
Matthew Kopfhamer:So now trying to fix it is gonna feel more like a rise of Skywalker situation where it's like, ah, we fucked up, pivot hard, and now it's just slop, which
Samantha Holt:No. I'm not gonna say
Alfredo Brown:they're gonna fix it. It's gonna go right.
Samantha Holt:I'm just gonna say that they they could end up seeing that. We could end up seeing a pivot in some level. Whether it's done successfully or not, I don't know. But there's plenty of other franchises that go through reshoots in terms of hearing different, you know, feedback from, you know, crowdsourcing and they end up making changes. I'm just saying it could happen.
Samantha Holt:Again, I'm gonna stay optimistic. Maybe they're gonna save it. I don't know.
Matthew Kopfhamer:One thing that I I I wanna put this out there. One thing that I don't think needs to be changed is the casting of Ellie. I think Bella Ramsey has shown this season despite the flaws in the writing that she can pull off the emotional range needed to play Ellie. I think we should put that right
Alfredo Brown:I'm with I'm with that.
Matthew Kopfhamer:One of the discourse yeah. One of the discourse online that I find fundamentally dumb is all these people saying, oh, Bella Ramsey could play a 14 year old Ellie, but not a 19 year old Ellie. She just can't do it. It's like, fucking shut up. Yes.
Matthew Kopfhamer:She can.
Samantha Holt:Yeah. And I think that's really important too. Like, I think all the complaints that we've talked about is all about the writing and the show structure.
Jagger May:I don't
Matthew Kopfhamer:The writing.
Samantha Holt:Heard a single moment of anyone saying it.
Alfredo Brown:And lot of the commenters agree with that. A lot of the commenters on on our on our episodes lately have been agreeing with that that they that the writing has ruined the character, not necessarily that Bella Ramsey has.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Exactly.
Alfredo Brown:Yeah.
Jagger May:Yeah. Never have never even had any chance.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yeah. No.
Alfredo Brown:Boys and girls, season two of the last of us is done. And with every season of television, we give this a rating on a scale of one to 10. So it's the moment of truth. Koff, let's start with you. One to 10.
Alfredo Brown:Where are you at with this one?
Matthew Kopfhamer:It's a six. The way it ended really dry. I mean, it was it was probably riding around a seven for the most of the season because it wasn't complete dog shit, but there were definite flaws. But the way they ended this season really has me feeling pretty, pretty low about it and for the future. So I'm I'm gonna give it a six.
Samantha Holt:Alright. Sam? I'm gonna give it a seven. But probably just because I loved that season that episode too so much in terms of what it did and everything that they were able to succeed with that one. Yeah.
Samantha Holt:I'm gonna I'm gonna
Matthew Kopfhamer:look It
Samantha Holt:was the brightest spot of the entire season. But it's just like a it heavily keeps it in the positive for me.
Matthew Kopfhamer:That's fair.
Alfredo Brown:Jag, what about you?
Jagger May:Cough nailed it. It's a six. Like and that's the bright spots were very bright. You know? Like, I I know I've kind of, like, poo pooed on it, but there are very good moments, very good, you know, photography within it, very good acting.
Jagger May:It's just Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin are on some bullshit right now, and it's unfortunate.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Their own farts. Yeah.
Jagger May:Yep. Yep. Ew.
Alfredo Brown:I think ew. Ew.
Jagger May:Where do
Matthew Kopfhamer:you wear the poo poo platter? I
Alfredo Brown:I think the easiest way for me to try to rate this is to compare it to some other stuff that we have watched. And I I look at it where we watched the most recent season of The Boys. I think we rated that a seven where it's like, there's some good stuff in there, but the show kinda sorta lost its luster. And then we watched The Acolyte, and we were like, man, this is this is some hot garbage. They they gave they they gave us some, like, some cool lightsaber stuff.
Alfredo Brown:Right? And that was a five. I'm gonna give us a six just like Koff and Jag. And thank god Sam is here, so we didn't have three sixes across the board. But this this show.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Math is hard, guys.
Samantha Holt:Math is hard.
Alfredo Brown:No. I'm saying thank god Sam is here. So it wasn't just us three giving it three sixes?
Jagger May:I got Lee. So but
Samantha Holt:you said it the opposite way, though.
Alfredo Brown:Yeah. What do say fuck me for? Alright. What I was trying to say, they showed us left a lot of meat on the bones. I think that we came into this with such expectation that I think the direction of this season and the way the way that the writing just made the character so inconsistent and and just truly unlikable.
Alfredo Brown:I think it hurts even more. And that's why I I go back to the show made us feel. The writers made us feel. And, unfortunately, those feelings are fucking anger and frustration for these characters. And I think out of that frustration, I wanna see where they go in season three, and maybe stuff gets redeemed a little bit with Abby and Isaac and WLF.
Alfredo Brown:But, man, I don't know that I have the patience for for for two more seasons and possibly stretch that over four more years. Like, that's that's just going to be a lot of waiting. And I don't I don't think I'm there. So I do worry this show is going to lose a lot of steam with a lot of viewers.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Yep.
Alfredo Brown:Yeah. Well, guys, there we go. We got our ratings in for season two of The Last of Us, and we actually recorded this a couple of days ago where we recorded our rankings for all of the Star Wars live action films. That's gonna be coming out later this week on Wednesday. So be sure to tune in for that.
Alfredo Brown:Make sure you subscribe to the YouTube channel or to the podcast networks over on Apple or Spotify. As always, please leave a like on this video. Comment down below with your thoughts on it. And as always, wanna thank you guys for watching or listening all the way through. For myself, for Koff, for Jag, for Sam, we'll see you next time.
Jagger May:Skinny bear, you're called an otter.
Alfredo Brown:You're an otter. Yeah.
Samantha Holt:So it was Alfredo.
Matthew Kopfhamer:And if you're a power bottom, you generate all of the power from the bottom, and it has to do with speed.
Jagger May:Technically, yeah. Cough, you would be a bear. Alfredo would be an otter. I would be a bull for what I've heard.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Oh, interesting. Alfredo would be a t Explain. Let's be real.
Alfredo Brown:No. Come on.
Jagger May:I don't want to. Alfredo, this
Samantha Holt:like stuff got, like, a scruff. I feel like that. And it's, like, always, like, tight. I mean, that's what comes more into the otter
Alfredo Brown:I'm not thin enough to be a twink, Carl.
Jagger May:That's yeah. So you're not even close straight. Yeah.
Alfredo Brown:I'm not a serial The same.
Matthew Kopfhamer:I guess, yeah, generally be
Jagger May:a twink.
Alfredo Brown:I don't know if
Samantha Holt:you guys noticed, but Alfredo just went like this to, like, make himself look bigger. Yeah.
Alfredo Brown:Yep. Yeah. No. I'm angling myself towards the camera now. He's like, look at look at these shoulders.
Alfredo Brown:Check out my traps.
Jagger May:Would a tweak have these traps? Look at me in the shoulder and stay. Like,
Alfredo Brown:the most mashed coated stuff right now.
Samantha Holt:This is not make it on the episode.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Just pop your
Alfredo Brown:pop Oh, it's it's here. It's here. It's here. Like, we're we're recording.
Samantha Holt:Amazing.
Matthew Kopfhamer:Oh,
Alfredo Brown:okay. This is happening.
