Dobian

You're right, in the scene from the show, there is no reason for Nora to believe anything Ellie says, but... I watched the scene from the game on YouTube. Very close to the scene from the show, but with subtle differences that make it better. In the game, they both say things that give better context. Nora says why should she tell Ellie where Abby is since she's already dead. She also says that Abby is her friend, so her motivation is different than if Abby was just her comrade in arms. Ellie says a lot of the same stuff as on the show, but when she leans down, she says, "I can make it quick, or I can make it so much worse." So she gives Nora the option that she doesn't on the show. And she does it with an expression that says she's being truthful. This is the main problem I have with Ellie on the show, whether it's the writing or Ramsey's acting or a little of both. Ellie leans down, and her words and facial expression are like a cold-blooded killer. You don't feel like she's an ordinary girl who was pushed over the edge like in the game, you feel like she is just a natural-born sociopath who was wronged. She's like Tony Soprano. In the game, you see Ellie hit Nora with the pipe with the camera on Ellie's face, and you see the hurt and anger. On the show, you see it sideview and behind with nothing but rage from Ellie. So the scene was virtually the same, but lacked the subtle nuance from the scene in the game.

So Ellie is just as bad as Abby. Way to lose the moral high ground. I thought she might tell Nora that if she gave Abby's location then Ellie would give her a quick death so she wouldn't end up as an infected mutant. But no, she went full psychopath on her.

Shimmer bails on them in the next episode, hitting the road solo to L.A. Warm weather, beaches to run on. It's every horse's post-apocalypse dream.

So basically, the Jackson Hole town council was right to not send the assassin squad of 16 to Seattle to take on the 100+ heavily armed and armored W.L.F. army. 😄

Yes I got confused. The went from France to Porto then Porto to Miami. But they flew Turkish Airlines, which usually doesn't fly direct from Porto to Miami and goes back to Istanbul. So they may have flown back to Istanbul, though I don't know how clear the show was about this. And why Turkish Airlines I have no idea. No other airline can get you from Porto to Miami I guess.

They had a connecting flight through Istanbul to Porto.

Yes, the dreaded Abby episode. I knew what would happen from the video games. My wife didn't. So I kept my mouth shut. She said she was as shocked as during the Red Wedding in GoT. I suspect this time there won't be as much backlash as when it happened in the game, because the game forced you to play as Abby after she murdered Joel. Which led to lots of hilarious YouTube and Twitch videos of people maiming and killing Abby in every way possible. 🤣

They didn't; they flew from Istanbul to Porto, then from Porto to Miami.

I'm glad Carson and Jack won. Of course, I'm a video game and D&D dork myself. But they were one of the always happy and positive teams, so they were easy to root for. Han and Holden can be proud to have finished second. They had a little luck along the way, like with the non-elimination leg, but they made the most of their opportunity to beat out all but one team. I'm glad Jonathan and Ana didn't win it. I didn't want them in the top three even. I don't hate them or anything, but Jonathan was too much of a dbag for me to want to see them win the million. @PurpleTentacle Yes, though even more accurately they should have said they won on charisma like a sorcerer. The soaring challenge looked brutal since it's so easy to lose your balance slightly and then overcompensate. Sailing was hilarious with Carson and Jack rowing their way through it. Hey whatever works. Another Amazing Race fender-bender with Han. I'd like to know how the crew resolves these things with the other driver so quickly to get the team on their way again. This isn't the first time there's been a car collision in the race. Not much tension at the finish. We pretty much knew what the order would be when the teams got to the final challenge.

Echoing the general consensus above that Issa Rae was terrible. A more competent actor could have really sold it in those scenes. I kept thinking at the end when the movie wrapped, how could that steaming pile of Casablanca garbage have possibly sold, given that train wreck of an opening scene with Chopsticks and nonsensical dialogue and calling the other lead character by the actress' name? The epilogue scene should have been them in studio making another film with a big "NO DRINKS IN THE COMPUTER ROOM" sign on the wall.

Giamatti is great as always. He's a master at playing these kinds of tragically flawed characters. I think this guy is his Sideways character 20 years later. There is no what-if here. Even if they didn't break up then, they were a bad match and that relationship would have only gotten worse. I couldn't imagine him raising another man's daughter without falling into a petulant "Not my daughter!" rage at some point. Some 40 years later and he still had no new perspective or wisdom that comes with age. He shouldn't have needed to see that letter to figure out that he was at least as much to blame as his ex-girlfriend for the way things went. The only good thing that came out of it was that he was at last able to get closure so he could find peace and move on.

This is a fun episode if you suspend disbelief. Quantum physics doesn't really work that way. It's more like quantum "magic." (I know, I wrote a story in the past year based on quantum physics and alternate realities) I was fully expecting a dark ending like in the first episode and cheered when Maria grabbed the cop's gun and blew the quantum witch's head off. For entertainment value, while loosey-goosey on the science, it was good.

This is a classic Black Mirror episode. Super dark and depressing near the end. An astute depiction of unchecked corporate evil in a new, unregulated industry. In the real world, Congress would be all over this one. Of course, they were one of the first adopters so there was no public awareness yet of all the manipulation, personal violations, and abuses. Great episode.

My prediction is that Teenjus is going to be so epically bad, earning 0% from critics on Rotten Tomatoes, that people are going to rush to the theater to see what will be the greatest comedy of the year, earning $500 million domestic and $800 million worldwide, making the Gemstones a fortune and propelling their jet pack Christ Man of the Year church to the top of the televangelist mountain!

Good to know. I felt like in every episode I had it down with what was going on. That was the first time something threw me, and it was because I missed that one small detail. Thanks.