The Last of Us Part II (PS4, June 19, 2020) Video Game • Page 69

Thank you, I am clever. And you can post what you want, you’re right. And everyone will post what they want too, like how your opinions ain’t shit

 

That ending in the stadium was perfect for gamers, but can see why it may annoy/confuse some non gamers.

 

Can't believe S2 is over already. Nailed the ending

 

A+ ending. Island Ellie was fine, the episode nailed the major story beats it needed to. Would I have liked a LONGER episode, or hell, a LONGER season in general to expand on certain parts? Yeah. But I don't feel anything was to the detriment of the story. People, both game players and non game players love to hate on the show for a multitude of reasons. For the smallest of reasons too.

 

Glad you were right!

 

I’ll preface this by saying these 2 games as a whole are my favorite pieces of media ever. Nothing could ever match that gameplay experience, and I never expected the show to. I just really enjoy seeing the story come to life in another medium.

I really enjoyed season 2 though. It’s a different beast compared to season 1 which is such a tight and succinct story. Part 2 feels like such an epic and I don’t think 7 episodes could ever do it justice, even if they changed the narratives to happen side by side as I have seen some others online suggest.

I have a friend who texts me after every episode saying “that was fine”. I really think it’s because we’ve played the game already and so we know all the major story points. Nothing feels shocking. We’re basically experiencing a “the book was better” situation. I also don’t think my friend even remembers the game as his major complaint about the finale was that we didn’t see the sniper scene and he doesn’t understand why they didn’t show it. I reminded him that’s exactly how it goes down in the game and he still didn’t get it.

I do think once the series is over and we can see it as one cohesive piece, this season will be looked at more fondly. It’s not unlike the game where, at least for me, I was thinking “what the hell is going on?” by the time I got to where we’re at in the show.

Looking forward to next season though, even if it’s a couple years away.

 

hilarious seeing the differences in tone between this thread and the show thread

 

Anyone notice the sky bridge between buildings? (Not) Looking forward to that next season.

 

Also VERY glad they didn’t kill Alice like you did in the game

 

Yeah A+ for no dog death. Hated being forced to kill any of the dogs in the game

 

Yep I had literally just replayed that part earlier yesterday and loved that pan to it.

 

Writers Room for season 3:

 

any changes? Are these people notable ?

 

Ally Cheng and Ryan James are new. Cheng has no credits to her name, and James has one movie from 2006.

 

His expertise will probably help with fleshing out the Scars.

 

Ryan has worked on Naughty Dog games before like TLoU and Uncharted

Ryan M. James | Editor, Director, Writer

 

There were definitely parts of this season that hit exactly as hard as I hoped they would, but initial impression on finishing the finale is disappointment. It’s ironic because the game has a clearly sizable portion of its fan base comprised of the stupidest and worst people, but I’m still shocked at the hand holding the show has decided to do to hit viewers over the head thematically. The “everything you do is for you” conversation could not have been more on the nose. Abby’s motivation reveal and the changes to Ellie’s story both strike me as inferior to the way they’re presented in the game.

I’m also on the fence on whether I liked how much was cut to skip over long gameplay sections. On one hand it makes a lot of sense that the more action-y parts would get trimmed to 1) account for the changes in Ellie’s character and 2) because they’re basically just video game being video game, but I think so much was cut that it did a disservice to Ellie’s story. I think part of what makes the Abby day 1 reveal so painful at first in the game is that you really feel like you’ve been on a journey as Ellie. I don’t know that I care as much given that 3 long days of exploration and survival became 3 days of bumbling through Seattle only to make it to the aquarium in 3 minutes of screen time.

I’m rambling and this probably comes off more negative than my actual feelings, but overall I think a lot of weird choices were made. Decent season of tv but nowhere close to season 1 of the show nor the game itself in my opinion.

 

One more thought: I think why I’m finding this a particularly strange adaptation is that on one hand it’s adhering incredibly close to the game in terms of both structure and major set pieces, but on the other the main character feels so different from the source material, more than almost anything else I can think of.

That’s the major issue to me, or at least where I feel like this might actually be a mediocre adaptation instead of just good storytelling that differs from material I’m attached to. The game puts you in Ellie’s shoes for 8-10 hours of her being incredibly capable on an unapologetic quest for revenge. You do disgusting shit and as the player you wish you could kill fewer/no dogs but you don’t really question much until Mel’s death and even then not completely until being considerably far into Abby’s section. But the show has already thrown that way off in my estimation - we already know Abby was some degree of justified and further, we see Ellie constantly fuck things up. We see Dina and Jesse both look at her like she’s terrible. As a show viewer I’m already questioning the whole thing, and while I have no doubt there are going to be some awesome parts of season 3 I feel like the entire shock of the perspective switch has almost already been cut down. The stakes honestly feel lower?

 

I like seeing people say there’s no way they don’t include Ellie and crew in season 3, before the finale. Reminds me of people that were adamant there was no way they’d structure it like the game and end season 2 after Ellie’s portion. Or that there’s no way they kill Joel in the first couple episodes, it’ll definitely be the finale.

 

A-fucking-men. I remember when news was coming out with the announcement of S2 and I said it's keeping the same EXACT format and it WILL 100% have the theater in the ending. And people were like no no no no it won't work, they wouldn't do that it, that's stupid, etc. Take that non-believers.

 

On one hand I really respect that they still kept the super controversial midgame perspective-switch, but I really hope they don't lose the casuals in the next season

 

So does that ending scene have any impact on someone that didn’t play that game? A switch in perspective is vastly different in a tv show than it is in a game

 

I’d give the season a C overall. Even though it’s 7 episodes I still kinda struggled to get through the last few.

 

It's more jarring in the game because you don't know too much about Abby so having to play as her was pretty wild and the game does a full on reset -even going as far as giving you tutorials again (which I still hate on a replay, it's not ACTUALLY the start of a new game).

I think though that the point was gotten across in the show? If you were paying attention to day one / two / three etc, it's heavily implied that we are going to go through the 3 days as Abby and that there's probably more to the story than meets the eye. People in the non game thread are already speculating how annoying it will be if s3 ends in the theater again with what happens after that in s4.

Random thought - I absolutely loved the sky bridge in the background and can't wait for that (though we've had some dodgy CGI so hopefully that scene is done justice).