LAST OF US Episode 8 Breakdown - HIDDEN MEANING and Easter Eggs EXPLAINED

silent breed is people hey welcome back screen Crush I'm Ryan Erie and this is all the Easter eggs references and little things that you might have missed in The Last of Us episode eight when we are in need so this episode had a lot of Easter eggs to the game but I'm actually more impressed by what they added to the story there's also a lot of allegory and biblical symbolism that I'm going to break down for you and the episode actually has a flaw or at least a story point that I fundamentally disagree with that I'm going to talk about a little bit later on and there were also lots of hints that led up to that big twist but first let's get to those Easter eggs the title of the episode when we are in need could be paraphrased from Hebrews 4 16. let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find Grace when we are in need of help now the Bible actually has many many passages about approaching God in times of both physical and spiritual need in this show there's a lot of needy people who need guidance and a strong protector and Pastor Dave is here to take advantage of them to bolster his own ego and twisted worldview so we start in Silver Lake Colorado which later on we're told is a resort it's not a real town name it's a resort Resort and that is a really interesting turn of phrase because it allows us to make an immediate comparison to the other communities that we've seen fedra ruled Boston with an iron fist Kansas City was essentially run by Angry anarchists while Jackson is an actual real Community where people work together but Silver Lake is called a fake town both because it's a resort but it's also a community that is built on lies this is not a real community of people who have banded together for a common goal they follow Pastor Dave because they are afraid and want to be protected and literally and metaphorically they swallow the truth about what they actually are right so what are they also afraid of well zombies that they're afraid of the truth despite what Pastor Dave says I think that everyone knows that they are eating human flesh and Pastor Dave allows them to live this lie that they were eating deer meat what is it venison foreign is also reflected in the banner that hangs in the dining room and that also hangs in the game now we're made to think that this Banner is talking about God but consider that it's hanging up in the dining hall and then we start to understand that it's actually referring to Pastor Dave and how he will provide human meat for everyone to eat tasty what'd you say right I don't know what did I say that human meat is tasty yeah man human meat let the meat humans give me taste oh okay what'd you say nothing a story what's that oh I'm just learning Spanish but it's taken forever because I'm just a little dog I'll probably just quit like I always do don't quit Doug I mean learning a new language is really hard if you're trying all on your own and by the way if learning a new language is something you've always wanted to do I recommend Babel they're the sponsor of this video in fact if you use our Link in the description or scan our QR code to sign up you get 60 off of Babel subscription yeah I've been like learning a new language is a lifetime goal of mine but but that goes to him sir insurmountable yeah I know believe me I was always way too intimidated to start a new language until I found Babel like last year I took a trip to Italy and using Babel was crucial for me navigating my way through the country and Babel is very easy to use for example to say de Roma which means you are from Rome ha ha okay Italian nice wow Babble helps you start speaking a new language in just three weeks and you use these short 10 minute lessons that are made by actual language teachers not some AI or an algorithm AI is Bond and that's good this is mimicry of human behavior the lessons use situations and dialogue that you would actually use in the real world like you're meeting new people on a train and you're asking them where they're from and I'm telling you Babble really works University Studies have shown that 15 hours of Babel equals a semester of college Spanish and they offer lessons in 14 different languages Babel Has a few different subscriptions to choose from so if you are interested in learning a new language this is a great opportunity to try it out click our Link in the description or scan this QR code to get started today now back to what I was saying the passage Dave is reading from is from The Book of Revelations so if you're unfamiliar with the Book of Revelation is the final book of the Christian Bible and it details a prophecy about how the world will end and be reborn and it is weird like the Bible is going along for a long time telling a story about prophets and Messiahs disciples Parables and then all of a sudden at the end it turns into Twin Peaks directed by Michael Bay [Music] foreign s is filled with imagery and symbolism and references that are best understood to a culture that existed 2000 years ago so its literal meaning has been debated by theologians but one thing we all agree on is that it depicts the end of the world with some very bad things happening lots of Bloodshed stuff like that and then the world is reborn as a paradise I'm actually surprised that more post-apocalyptic stories don't lean into this more like post-apocalypse times would be a perfect time for a cult leader like Pastor Dave to take power by pointing to Revelations and saying see I told you so now this particular passage from Revelation is after the world has been destroyed and after the Beast has been cast back down into the pit and when God and Jesus have returned to the Earth so in the context of the show Dave is trying to say that now his flock lives in this time of paradise the world has been destroyed emptied out so God could fill it with love again now later on Pastor Dave shares his true perversion of this idea the cordyceps it loves but more on that in a bit Dave is trying to use this passage to control the grief of his people telling them and God will wipe away all tears from their eyes which on first viewing seems like a nice man trying to comfort a young girl but in hindsight he's telling her shut up don't cry I'm your daddy now the girl asks can you bury him and I think that she's asking because she knows like everyone else knows that they're eating human meat she wants her dad buried and not eaten but Dave lies the ground is too cold to dig will bury your father in the spring now Dave's second in command James is played by Troy Baker and Baker played Joel In The Last of Us video game now here I do think that they talk in code to disguise their cannibalism cyan Martin think they spotted some deer the other night now I'm not sure whether they do this to protect the secret from the others or just to lie to themselves but this coded language persists throughout the entire episode like when he tells Ellie so I sent four of our people to a nearby town to to scavenge whatever they could they sent people out to look for humans to eat hunger is also a driving motivation for Ellie she's trying to help Joel get back on his feet but they're down to what might be Jerky like I'm not really sure so this drives her to grab his rifle and start hunting the White Rabbit she takes a shot at is straight from the game where she actually takes it in fact it's the opening shot of the winter stage of the game but in the game Ellie has to specifically say to motivate her to chase after the deer but in the show she doesn't have the rabbit to fall back on so her need for the deer meat is even more desperate it's a really good change just like in the game she doesn't get the kill shot on her first try so she chases after the deer although in the game it takes much much much longer now there's another key change from the game in the game Ellie finds the deer first but here it's James and Pastor Dave this is a great change because it lets us see these two men talk privately for a while and it makes them seem more trustworthy you think we can just take it I mean they're acting like they just found money on the street but they're hoping someone comes back to claim it one of the major themes in this episode is trust Pastor Dave wants the trust of his flock which is why he presses James for his support I sense doubt in there they had a lost faith in you David you're just scared Joe and Ellie trust one another with their lives Ellie is tricked into trusting Pastor Dave in fact later in the episode this theme of trust occurs when Joel is torturing people okay no I believe him no that shot also taken straight from the game but the most important trusting relationship in this episode is for the audience to feel like that we can trust Pastor Dave so these sequences where he's with Ellie are crucial they make us feel like we know the man even though we don't see the whole picture so the whole sequence where she meets these guys is lifted straight from the game everything from how they describe their people from a larger group women children they're all very very hungry I'm from a large group too also hungry to Ellie's threats any sudden moves and I put one right between your eyes ditto for Buddy Boy and Ellie wanting penicillin weapons ammo clothes medicine like for infections and then Dave wanting to take shelter you uh mind if we take some shelter from the cold bring him with us with us at first Ellie rightly distrust these strangers she doesn't give them a friendly greeting she starts the conversation with a gun to their heads and from her demeanor Dave can tell that she has killed and will kill again he sees her as a kindred spirit now Ellie initially does not trust them refusing to follow them back to the village and not even offering her name even after Dave and James do my name is David this is my friend James offering your name is a way to humanize yourself to someone else we saw this in episode 4 when a guy gives his name to Ellie to try to earn her mercy Dave gives his name as a way to earn trust and also to reveal who he is to Ellie but Ellie withholding her name is a sign of distrust which makes it even sweeter when she finally reveals her name and shows him who she really is tell them that Ellie is a little girl broker now another major deviation from the game is the way that Dave earns her trust in the game it's told through combat as the two of them fight off like hordes of zombies including a bloater now during this sequence they save one another's lives several times and by the end of it Ellie no longer bothers pointing a gun at his head now the show look probably could use a few more zombies here and there just saying but they were wise to reinvent this as a dialogue scene where Ellie gradually drops her guard and so do we he starts by telling us his story but when the Pittsburgh QC fell in 17 fireflies and fedra I left with a few others and that's how I ended up with our flock and in the game we do see that the Pittsburgh QC has fallen but that storyline was replaced with the Kansas City story in the show Dave is presenting himself as a decent humble man you're the leader wasn't my choice it was theirs but it's yes but if you remember just like two scenes ago we saw him leaning on James for his continued support but I need to know you're with me he tells Ellie about his civilian life before that I was a teacher math talk kids about your age and this is when Ellie starts to let down her guard we saw in episode 7 that Ellie had a big grudging respect for her school's leader Captain Kwong he tells Ellie that she can have a future and afterwards she parrots his words to Riley we're the only thing holding this all together but in a way Federal kind of holds everything together Pastor Dave also goes on to make his people sound like victims we'd settle somewhere and then Raiders would come so we'd move again which makes him seem helpless earning Ellie's pity when maybe they were actually the Raiders killing and eating people before they moved on and we see Ellie's growing trust written on Bella Ramsay's face Small Smiles a little glint in her eye Dave says I believe everything happens for a reason and this is a little magical I mean Ellie and all of us are starting to think that maybe this guy does have all the answers that there is some mystical reason for this apocalypse after all Ellie is already placing blind faith in her Quest he's going to Utah because she believes that her blood will create a vaccine and she even tried it on young Sam and Dave has found her weak point and exploited it just like he's exploited his followers need for God and this is where we get the turn which is awesome that crazy man was traveling with a little girl which by the way is also in the game he's crazy man traveling a little girl and this seems like a good place to mention that in this episode Pastor Dave is a metaphor for the devil it's not subtle and by the way everybody if you like our not the bees gag and you want to help support our Channel we have a merch store where you can get your very own not the Beast t-shirt the merch store greatly helps out our Channel we'd appreciate if you stop by and took a look at any of our high quality t-shirts at shopzeroedition.com we also have a Doug father t-shirt an original truly t-shirt this top five one where you get to write in your top five movies or shows and lots of other high quality products for you to look at it shopzeroedition.com with the link in the description now back to the video so again I'm going to generalize several stories from the Bible and the Torah about the more popular interpretation of Satan there are several figures in these religious texts like the snake in the Garden of Eden Lucifer hasaton the opposer the beast in Revelations but popular belief has kind of melted these figures into one with theologians debating about whether or not that's actually correct well of course they're all manner of lesser amps and demons Pete but the great Satan itself is red and scaly with a bifurcated tail he carries a form so disclaimer over here is the story of the devil doesn't analogous to Pastor Dave the devil was once an angel named Lucifer Morningstar who was the greatest of all God's creations Lucifer led a rebellion against God along with one-third of the Angelic coast and they were defeated and cast down to Hell Lucifer wrote In Hell by turning people away from God so they would be his to torment and hell for all eternity and the Book of Revelations talks about casting this Beast back into the fire and everything working out just fine sir roots are the Skagit Pastor Dave well I'm glad you asked Pastor Dave like Lucifer was not always evil he served his students and was a regular guy but the outbreak forced him to split from society as Lucifer split from heaven and Dave by forming this radical evil way of life took other people with him he lies and tempts people the way Satan takes many forms to steal people's Souls except instead of stealing Souls Dave goes all Hannibal on you David and James are also biblical names James was one of Jesus's 12 disciples and along with Peter and John James was one of his favorites just like how we see James in this show has favored status with David and David famously was the great king of the Israelites he slew Goliath freed his people from Philistine rule was a great king and one hell of a writer I will fear no evil for thou art with me in the same way this David is the leader of his people he brought them through great hardship and he has a way with words no I I believe everything happens for a reason but King David was also a ruler with flaws he once sent a man in a battle just so he could marry his widow after David had already impregnated her but King David repented of his sins while Pastor David like Lucifer has not in fact later in the episode David admits that something inside of him has always been evil and that the fungus just allowed him to release his true nature I've always had a violent heart but then the world ended and I was shown the truth and this is what the Book of Revelations essentially does for the world it reveals the truth disaster after disaster befalls Earth plagues Stars being wiped out of the sky horses with the heads of snakes I might have made that one up but I'm pretty sure that's in there the point is the world is wiped clean and nothing of the old world remains and that is what's happening in The Last of Us people can no longer hide behind civilization and they have to reveal who they really are Joel starts off with a Gruff exterior and emotional barriers but eventually he breaks down and accepts Ellie into his heart and becomes her new father figure Joe will be your father figure 5. so David is the inverse of Joel he is someone who puts up a nice facade to mask his cruelty he says well I found God after the apocalypse which is either the best time or the worst time to find him hard to say but what he actually means here is he found the power of God after the apocalypse and we see him exploit that power for his own pleasure the fighting is the part I like the most but what's most satanic about David is that unlike Kathleen or fedra he gains power through lies and deceit this goes back to our themes of trust and faith David Gets Ellie to trust him even when he releases her so he's gonna let it get away it's actually a trap when the Sun rises I'll lead a group out to pick up her Trail he knows they can track her back to the house and he figures that she can't move a sick man and all of this was foreshadowed by Maria's parting words to Ellie be careful who you put your faith in the only people who can betray us are the ones we trust when David returns to the resort there's another big cannibal clue when they serve dinner what is it and listen but we know that it's not venison because they literally just took the deer it hasn't even been dressed yet even the fact that she has to ask what it is that's a big clue silent breed is people and next there's an interesting scene in the dining hall you should kill him you should kill both of them yeah why does he hit her in the face like that now he hits her for a couple reasons one he's already decided that he wants Ellie for himself but two he's the only one who gets to decide who lives and who dies later David says I'm a Shepherd surrounded by sheep but he's actually a Wolf Among his sheep and he wants to make sure that it stays that way it's also appropriate the daughter's name is Hannah because Hannah means Grace and then he slaps her in the face so Grace is what God offers to the human race in place of punishment and if Pastor Dave is the devil his way is the antithesis of Grace just as he wants to be a father figure to Ellie that will be the antithesis of Joel he tells her it's the truth is Hannah you will always have a father and he's not talking about God here he's talking about himself this scene is great on a re-watch because it shows you what was under the surface in that opening scene no one here is happy because they all have to eat people okay Ellie injects the world's greatest penicillin into Joel's wound where do we get penicillin from fungus and outside she knows that the bad guys are coming because she sees the birds flying away now when it's obvious that Joel is not going to wake up Ellie has to become the protector now we've talked about this all season how a major theme of the show is how people show love specifically how some people like Joel or Bill show love through protection and now that role has been inverted with LA protecting Joel from these horse murder and a-holes enough to kill a horse on killing forces the scene unfolds pretty much like it does in the game with Ellie leaving Joe in the basement getting the horse shot out from under her and then being taken prisoner now once she's prisoner the men want to kill her and David drops another bit of foreshadowing you're so hungry for vengeance deliver it oh because they were gonna eat Ellie that's right so Joel comes too just in time to Ambush the wrong guy in the wrong basement the guy passes out with blood in his teeth another way to foreshadow the cannibalism revealed and I just want to say that as soon as this guy entered the basement I thought of a cannibalism storyline from The Walking Dead when the heroes were kidnapped by cannibals and all seems lost and Rick just says talking with the wrong people that is one of the best moments in that show we go straight from Joel line on the floor to Ellie on the floor and David says I started worrying you wouldn't wake up this is again showing us inverted roles the episode begins with Ellie worried that Joel won't wake up because she was his protector but now David is trying to take over that protector role from Ellie and this in particular is a scene that takes on a whole new meaning when you realize that David is a secret Satan when Ellie wakes up David does not want to punish her he wants her to worship him first he tries to force her gratitude did you hear me say the others want to kill you but Ellie resists yeah but I stopped them now because Ellie does not cave in right away it shows that she is powerful and that makes David want her even more and all I want is an equal he tells her that what he wants is her trust and her trust is just another word for Faith he even implies that if she doesn't give him her faith then she will live a life of Torment but if you can't find a way to trust me then yes you are alone this whole scene has its roots in the Book of Matthew when Jesus fasted in the desert and was tempted by Satan and this was dramatized perfectly by Martin Scorsese in The Last Temptation Of Christ so when you even see these scenes side by side you see they're very similar Ellie is trapped in a Cell while Willem defoes Jesus is inside a protective Circle in this scene Satan tempts Jesus three times offering him companionship power and the kingdom of heaven and David very similarly makes three offers to Ellie he offers to save Joel if she joins him I can tell the others to stop looking for him then he offers her the chance to run to town with him think of what we could do together we'd grow spread out which is pretty specifically paraphrased from the Bible when Satan offers Jesus kingdoms on Earth to rule your heart is so greedy you said it was God but you really wanted power while David is essentially offering Ellie a chance to rule his kingdom at his side they follow me and they would follow us he even gives her the old We're Not So Different you and I speech and you know what I see when I look at you you remind me of me you and I are not so different We're Not So Different you and I are we so different to you and I our methods are not different as much as you pretend we're not so different you and I Lieutenant the scene also has a monologue that really summarizes the theme of the game and the show when he describes cordyceps he kind of revers the fungus saying that it caused his religious conversion but then the world ended and I was shown the truth right my God no the cordyceps he goes on to say it's fruitful it multiplies and this is paraphrased from The Book of Genesis when God commanded his Creations to go and multiply and finally he says he loves and the show's co-creator Craig Mason has said as much in the last of his podcast when he was discussing Tess's romantic kiss with a zombie the fungus loves too so Mason's point was that the fungus like all life is trying to propagate as an act of love and a recurring theme in the show is that people show love in different ways like I said for bill and Joel It's protection but for Frank it's different paying attention to things it's how we show love and this is where I disagree a bit with the showrunner's take the fungus does not love it reacts it is a stimulus and a response if you want to anthropomorphize a plant then you can say that a tree loves the sun sure but a tree can't fill actual love it is just committing an act of photosynthesis sure but could you argue that the entire natural world is just one single act of Love ah but see Doug the fungus is not love it's assault this fungus spreads with no regard for any other life and this is alluded to when Ellie calls him an animal and he says well yes we all are that's sort of the point and this is the real theme of The Last of Us game and show it's about how the human race has been wiped out by a fungus which in turn has caused us to lose our Humanity on a micro level we see this with Joel following the death of Sarah he did Terrible Things To Survive and on a macro level we see that places like Kansas City are consumed with hatred until they are literally consumed by cordyceps and this is like how Dave's flock is consumed by fear so they in turn consume people just like the cordyceps they Now consume human flesh displaying how they have lost their Humanity like most animals in nature the cordyceps simply respond to stimuli oh not you buddy you're great and we see this in Pastor David's animal-like behavior and it secures its future with violence if it must but the difference between the fungus and humanity is that the cordyceps has to kill and humans choose to kill but the most important thing about Satan and stories is that he's always used to show the inverse of God for example instead of showing people Grace he punishes which is indicative when he literally slaps a girl whose name means Grace and in this show Pastor Dave is shown to be the inverse of Joel at first he tells Ellie that he wants to be a father to her I've decided you do need a father but through the bars of the prison we see that what he actually wants is to sexually assault her the fighting is the part I like the most then we shift right to the scene where Joel tortures these guys it's also straight out of the game you're gonna mark it on the map and it better be the exact same spot everybody points to and this is where Joel shows that he is the opposite of the fungus the fungus kills because it has to Joel is killing to protect Ellie but really I think he's kind of enjoying it too just like in the game Joel finds Ellie's backpack and then The Boathouse filled with dead bodies we won't show on here so we don't get demonetized so then they're about to chop up Ellie by the way it's pretty appropriate that she's fighting cannibals in a kitchen and dining hall right so the dialogue and shot selection are all taken straight from the game not accepted in the dining hall she starts a fire just like in the game and just like in the Kansas City finale fire is a metaphor for rage rage is like the fungus it eats it consumes it destroys just like fire David is also completely unbothered by the fire and doesn't care if the whole Lodge burns down again we're hitting the Satanism symbolism pretty hard here yeah I mean what is this guy a dark funeral album right man it's a metal band get hit so the whole sequence of Ellie versus David is also taken straight from the game it's a stealth mission where you have to like slowly injure him although the big difference between Ellie and Joel is that Joel doesn't scream right before he stabs someone then he tries to assault her and we see how much he's actually adopted the cordyceps warped version of love he takes pleasure in harming others it makes him feel powerful and complete Ellie fights him off in a brutal scene that goes on for an uncomfortably long time a lot like in the game I also thought that there was a parallel here with another scene with a cannibal in Silence of the Lambs if you like Ellie then frees herself from hell and enters the world outside Joe for some reason sneaks up on her and freaks her out whereas like in the game he pulls her off of David but like that's a minor nitpicking Point as he leaves her he says okay baby girl now this kind of fatherly intonation is so sweet because it shows how much he has finally accepted her and is coping with Sarah's death but also just to really nail down the biblical symbolism it's showing how Ellie has been saved from Satan by a father figure Joe will be your father figure he's a kind of Jesse Custer Jesse Custer yeah man it's like a hidden hidden reference in the video for people to go look up Jesse Custer well guys that's all the Easter eggs we found but if you found any let us know in the comments below or at me on Twitter and if it's your first time here please subscribe and smash that Bell for alerts for screen Crush I'm Ryan Airy foreign [Music]

Channel: ScreenCrush

Views: 285,438

Keywords: LAST OF US Episode 8 Breakdown, new rockstars last of us, heavy spoielr slast of us, heavy spoilers, lastr of us episode 8 breakdown, last of us epsiode 8 breakdown, the last of us episode 8, last of us part 8, last of us ep 8, lastr of us epsiode 8 breakdown, think story last of us, the last of us epsiode 8, teh last of us episode 8, the lastr of us episode 8, teh lastr of us epsiode 8, lastr of us ep 8, lastr of us part 8

Id: m_vG0Cngic0

Length: 25min 21sec (1521 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 05 2023