‘The Last Of Us’ Episode 8 Did Justice To The Most Terrifying Portion Of The Video Game

Ahead of tonight’s episode of The Last of Us, Ellie actress Bella Ramsey tweeted, “I’m only slightly terrified for tonight’s episode. And if I’m scared you should be scared. ITS GONNA BE FIIIIINE SHUSHHHH.” The Catherine Called Birdy star also called filming the episode “exhausting, but those were some of my favorite days on set. That sounds really masochistic, but it’s the scenes that break me that I love the most.”

I also loved “When We Are in Need” (directed by Ali Abbasi and written by Craig Mazin). For one thing, give Ramsey the freaking Emmy right now; for another, it reminded me that Yellowjackets is coming back soon. It also covered maybe my favorite part of The Last of Us video game. It’s certainly the most horrifying — even more than the, ahem, “big daddy” bloater.

While out hunting, Ellie runs into David, the pedophilic leader of a God-fearing group who is disturbingly casual about punishing the sheep in his flock, so to speak, and his right-hand man James. (James is played by Troy Baker, the actor who portrayed Joel in The Last of Us video games; he also voiced Magni in God of War.) She shares some of the deer she shot, but only as part of a trade; she needs penicillin for Joel, who’s still wounded from his near-death encounter. David gets James to fetch the medicine (yay), but the next day, Ellie is captured and taken to their cannibal community (less great).

Did I mention they’re cannibals I probably should have mentioned that they’re cannibals. And what’s on the menu for tonight Joel Soup. But first, David’s goons have to find him, which they do… and then television’s favorite father figure recovers in time to kill them and find his way to where Baby Yoda, I mean Grogu, I mean Ellie is being held captive.

Right as she’s about to be hacked to death, Ellie blurts out that she’s been infected. This clever distraction gives her enough time to run away and reunite with Joel, although not before a thrilling sequence in a burning room where she kills David by smashing him with a cleaver approximately 300 times. If she wasn’t already traumatized, that would do it. Speaking of being traumatized…