Episode Grade: (8.1/10)
Ellie makes a deal with David, the leader of a local community, in an attempt to save Joel’s life. However, without Joel’s support, she’s eventually captured by David and his men. As David’s intentions are revealed, she finds herself in increasingly dangerous situations that push her beyond her limits.
Plot (41/50)
While this episode featured a contained story, much like some of the season’s previous episodes, there was a surprising link to the events of the past episode that immediately upped the stakes for this one. Ellie comes across two men standing over the deer she had just successfully hunted. One of the men is David, the ostensibly peaceful religious leader of a local community. She agrees to trade half the deer in exchange for some penicillin. A seemingly harmless conversation with David turns ominous after he discovers that Ellie is with Joel, and that he was the one who killed a member of their community at the university. It turns out that the four men that attacked Joel and Ellie at the university towards the end of the previous episode were sent by David in search of food. This was a nice bit of continuity that immediately changed the tone of the episode and upped the stakes for Ellie. Still, David seemingly lets her go out of kindness, although we later learn that his intentions were anything but pure. Ellie returns to Joel with the penicillin she acquired and continues to nurse him back to health, but he remains out of commission for the time being. This was the first time we see the roles reverse between Joel and Ellie (more on that in the next section). When David returns the following day with a handful of his men, Ellie sacrifices herself to lead them away from Joel, but not before warning a still-decommissioned Joel of the impending threat. Fortunately, Joel recovers just in time to eliminate the three men left behind to take him out. He then heads towards Silver Lake to rescue Ellie from captivity, but by the time he gets there, she had already managed to escape on her own. This was a solid episode featuring disturbing twists that saw the suspense rise as the episode got darker and darker until its violent final act. Despite being the penultimate episode of the season, this felt like a major turning point in the show.
Character Development (13/15)
This episode was all about eliminating what shred of innocence Ellie had left. She’s come a long way from the petulant little girl that was acting out against Marlene and the Fireflies for holding her captive. She’s always had a fiery personality, and the survival skills she’s picked up from Joel have made it possible for her to focus her aggression into protecting herself from outside threats. She still has much to learn, but the way she conducted herself here was that of someone who’s clearly no longer a child. She uses the knowledge she gained from her experiences over the last few months to nurse Joel back to health after he was on the edge of death. There have been instances of Ellie taking up a greater responsibility in her relationship with Joel, but this was the first time we saw a full-fledged role-reversal where Ellie was the one protecting Joel. Even when she wasn’t protecting him, she was on her own, but that didn’t stop her from standing up for herself. Despite being outnumbered and overpowered, Ellie uses her cunning to get herself out of several sticky situations. Unfortunately, she’s put in an even tougher situation at the end of the episode that leads to a true explosion of rage. She’s comforted by Joel, but the way this played out will permanently change Ellie’s outlook on life. Ellie has been fairly open to trusting strangers and even mocked Joel for his paranoia at times. She’s become less trusting over time, but I imagine her experience with David will push her towards the same level of paranoia as Joel, and who can blame her? David seemed like a decent man at first, but he turned out to be a cannibal and a pedophile. It’ll be interesting to see if she chooses to share her traumatizing experience with Joel. Speaking of Joel, when he finally regained his strength, he was in full-survival mode. The way he went about dealing with the three men that were hunting him was methodical and absolutely heartless, but that’s exactly what was needed from him given the circumstances. Tommy suggested that there was another way for them to survive, but it’s really hard to argue with Joel’s vicious, violent, kill-or-be-killed approach after what happened here. Finally, there are some scary similarities between David and Joel’s thoughts on survival. Ellie was appalled by David’s cannabalism, but it’s entirely possible that Joel resorted to such lengths in a moment over desperation over the past two decades. You see, that’s the thing about survival-at-all-costs, it means they will do absolutely anything they need to do in order to survive. Inherently, the closer they are to death, the less options they have, and the more depraved their thinking becomes. It’s a slippery slope, and Ellie just started on it.
Theme/Messages (3/5)
- People will go to horrifying lengths to survive.
Acting (13/15)
Bella Ramsey (Ellie) is proving that she can do it all with a more visceral performance in this episode. Scott Shepherd (David) was very convincing in his role as well.
Cinematography (11/15)
- Nothing of note.