I’ll try to keep this relatively spoiler-free, but, as usual, don’t be surprised if a few plot details show up. What do you expect me to do, edit this?

Pros:

-The cast was fantastic the whole way through: Pedro Pascal turned in a soulful, haunting performance as a much more hardcore adoptive dad than he plays in The Mandalorian, Merle Dandridge (who voice-acted Marlene in the game before playing her in the TV show) was great – her character evinced desperation, vulnerability, and a hard-edged steeliness at the same time. I was a little iffy on Bella Ramsey’s casting before the show aired, but my concerns vanished within the first hour of viewing. I just hope she doesn’t get typecast as “the kid who kills people and swears a lot.”

-The season has a great ending that sticks with you after the credits roll and is sure to reignite a polite and nuanced debate over the decisions made by certain characters. It’ll be fun to see all of the reasonable, objective takes fans of the series surely have to share.

-There’s some amazing set and costume design on offer here. The show’s world accurately mirrors the game’s decrepit, overgrown visual style, and the little details on characters’ costumes added some fun flavor. On top of that, I didn’t spot any immersion-breaking anachronisms – which is impressive, given that, in the show’s timeline, the outbreak began in 2003. Thankfully, some of the worst parts of the early aughts don’t seem to have survived the apocalypse: for instance, you won’t see any Attack of the Clones references, or be subjected to the musical stylings of Clay Aiken.

-It’s apparent that the showrunners respect the story of the game and did their best to faithfully translate it to the small screen. This makes sense, given that one of the showrunners wrote the game, but still, the effort is appreciated – the way the audience interacts with games is obviously quite distinct from how viewers watch a TV show, and representing game mechanics in a non-interactive medium can’t be easy.

-On a similar note, I found that the additions made to the story in the TV show did a great job of building out the setting and characters without coming across as clunky or shoehorned-in. Some of these set up payoffs later in the season that were just cool, one-off events in the game (like Joel’s method for having pairs of strangers identify locations on maps, which is only slightly less effective than traditional GPS systems).

Cons:

-After Episode 5, appearances from the infected were very few and far between. I’m not saying I needed a massive action set piece featuring hundreds of fungus zombies every episode, but I could’ve used the occasional reminder that, oh yeah, this is the zombie apocalypse.

-The series’ short runtime (only 9 episodes) and the inclusion of “side” episodes (particularly 3 and 7) left the core duo of Joel and Ellie feeling a bit underserved.

-This is a relatively minor quibble – but I could have used a bit more in the way of big, wide-angle shots emphasizing the scope of Joel and Ellie’s journey and signposting their location a little bit.

As mentioned above, the cast was strong throughout – even the more loathsome human characters were fascinating to watch when they were onscreen. Due to the nature of the story, no one bad guy had enough screentime to really become a “main” villain, but that’s not the end of the world.

It was fun to see voice actors from the original game make appearances in the show: besides Merle Dandridge’s return as Marlene, Troy Baker (the voice of Joel) played one of David’s henchmen, Ashley Johnson (the voice of Ellie) played Ellie’s mother Anna in the finale’s opening flashback, and Jeffrey Pierce (the voice of Tommy) appeared as Kathleen’s gloriously-haired goon Perry.

Coming off the excellence of Episode 5, pretty much anything was going to be a disappointment…but Episode 6 was solid! I enjoyed the palette shift brought on by the change in setting and season, and this instalment had a few moments of levity and warmth that brought a smile to my face. After the grim ending to Episode 5, these more tender scenes were much appreciated.

I also quite liked Episode 7, a slower-paced, character-focused journey into Ellie’s past (although it didn’t quite outshine Episode 3, the arguable high point of the season for me). I get the argument that it felt like the time this instalment took up could have been used to further the bond between Joel and Ellie…but “Left Behind” was really damn good, and, if scenes were going to be cut in order to focus more on the core duo, I’d rather Episode 7 be left as is.

Episodes 8 and 9 are real rollercoaster rides that crank the tension high before letting loose with some visceral, intense action and wrapping up with quieter scenes that tug at the heartstrings. That said, the final two episodes didn’t fix my biggest problem with the show: the pacing is fucking weird.

Major character beats are well-executed, but some of these moments struck me as a bit…well, not unearned, but as if I’d missed something beforehand that might have served to contextualize what just happened. It’s like a present with no wrapping paper: it’s still the socks you wanted, but there’s no buildup to it, just…socks.

I think the issue could have been resolved with an extra episode (or, ideally, three) – that would allow for the “side stories” like Bill and Frank’s episode to remain while also permitting the relationship between the core duo a bit more time to breathe.

This season was like sitting down for a delicious meal, and you eat the appetizer and it’s fucking awesome, and you’re waiting for the entrée and then you realize the appetizer was the entrée, and you’re just extremely drunk…or is that just me?

So, I had something tasty, but I spent the rest of the day with this nagging thought in the back of my mind that the meal could’ve been a lot more filling. Like, I’d heard this restaurant was awesome, and it was good, but I came here for a big-boy meal, not some Senior Menu bullshit. Do you see me wearing dentures or eating tilapia?[1]

Pacing complaints aside, I really enjoyed this show. Let’s hit it with some numbers:

Rating (Eps. 6-9): 9/10 (+.25/-1.5)

Full Season Rating: 8.5/10 (+.5/-.5)

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[1] Fact: the only people who eat tilapia also have wooden teeth. This isn’t to say that they’re bad people, just that I don’t like tilapia.