Nick Offerman (left) and Ian Bartlett star in the show’s best episode so far. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Last week, Tess sacrificed herself to hold off the zombie horde headed straight for the State House where She, Joel, and Eliie found the Firefly members dead. She pleaded with Joel to take Ellie to their allies Frank and Bill. Tess still had hope for the future and believed Ellie is is the key to “set things right.”
Ellie (Bella Ramsey) puts up defenses and eats a sandwich. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
We pick up with Joel and Ellie in the woods. Joel is outwardly angry at Ellie, but in reality at himself. Ellie feels responsible for Tesses death but is outwardly defiant and tells Joel not to blame her for Tess’s death because what happened wasn’t her fault. These two are cut from the same cloth.
They agree to tolerate each other for the five-hour hike to hand off Ellie to Frank and Bill. Despite their agreement, Ellie shoots questions at Joel, rapid fire. She knows he has fought with fists, and weapons to survive and he’s the role model she won’t admit she wants. She again asks for a gun and again Joel shuts her down.
Ellie (Bella Ramsey) checks out a really gross zombie who has a legitimate reason for not calling his girlfriend back. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
They reach an abandoned store where Joel has forgotten exactly where he hid a secret and mysterious stash. We never find out what it is, so it will likely play a role in a future episode. While he’s busy, Ellie hunts for a type of protection different to a gun. She finds a basement that miraculously holds the coveted object. If you’re a woman, you probably know how a feminine product in a time of need is cause for celebration.
Ellie soon discovers she has company in the ruined cellar. An infected man has been pinned under a pile of stone debris for who knows how long. Pathetically, he reaches out to grab her with his one free hand, still driven by the fungus to attack. Ellie approaches him with understandable fascination. If you don’t have the state of this zombie in mind, please go back to minute 9:55 and take a good look. Several types of fruiting bodies sprout from his face and head, including what looks like a mushroom beret perched at a jaunty angle atop his head.
Ellie pulls out her knife and the zombie’s yellowed eye almost comically follows the blade up to his forehead. His gaze makes one ponder whether the infecteds are still aware of themselves beneath the fungus’s relentless control, or is the fungus the one looking up. Perhaps the man hopes for the release of death. Whatever the case, he’s either unaware or trapped in a “sunken place” like the victims in the film Get Out, a nightmare worse than that of the survivors.
Ellie slices into his forehead to reveal fungus interwoven throughout. However, a drop of red blood trickles out, which again suggests a man inside the monster.
Elle takes a moment to observe her proverbial ant under the magnifying glass, then plunges the knife through his head. She has killed a zombie for the first time, without hesitation.
Ellie and Joel pass the site of a dark chapter in pandemic mitigation tactics. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Back on the road again, Joel and Ellie pass a ditch littered with the skeletal remains of a dozen people, their personal possessions broken and scattered about. Joel tells Ellie that when the military evacuated civilians back in 2003, they brought them to Quarantine Zones “if there was room.” Otherwise, they executed innocent people in order to slow down the spread of infection because “the dead can’t be infected.”
The camera lingers on a colorful blouse next to a small blanket. The most depressing transition ensues. We rewind to the initial outbreak in 2003. A woman dons the blouse from the ditch and carries a small baby in the blanket. She smiles and comforts her child as they board the transport that promises them a haven but will deliver only death.
Nick Offerman as survivalist extraordinaire, Bill. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
A shot of surveillance cameras mounted around a nearby house cuts to a middle-aged man who sits alone in his basement in front of a row of screens that display the scene outside from several vantage points. This is Bill (Nick Offerman), half of the pair Ellie and Joel will set out to find twenty years in the future.
The military goes door to door and rounds up all his neighbors, Bill says, “Not today you new-world-order jackboots.”
The episode then follows Bill’s story from that moment to present day, and I loved every minute. Bill doesn’t like people and his topnotch survivalist skills couldn’t come in handier at the moment.
Once he ventures outside wearing a gas mask and turns every which way with his rifle trained on potential threats. Once he’s sure everyone is gone, he removes the gas mask and smiles.
For Bill, the apocalypse is a gift. He joyfully goes about gathering supplies, building fences, digging traps, and dusting off an old generator he looks at like a proud papa. A thoroughly entertaining montage captures him driving through locked fences, breaking into an abandoned convenience store, and loading up barrels of gasoline.
Perhaps most satisfyingly, he gets to live the American dream as he pushes a cart through an empty Home Depot and grabs everything he wants.
When the lights in the store go out, there’s no emotion under his “already?” comment other than slight surprise. It’s the end of the world and Bill feels fine.
Perfecting his sovereign nation of one keeps him buzzing along. He chops wood, grows vegetables, keeps chickens, and hunts and butchers wild game.
Among his many skills, he’s an excellent chef. He expertly prepares a venison steak with a brandy reduction and sits down to savor his beautiful meal in front of the bank of monitors now set up in his dining room. When a perimeter alarm sounds, he switches on screens with a remote like he’s about to watch a new episode of his favorite show. A dopey-looking zombie approaches his fence, then walks right into a tripwire, which triggers a perfectly placed gun to shoot him square in the head. Bill chuckles, remarks with satisfaction that “it doesn’t get old”, and digs into his steak again.
Bill approaches a stranger stuck in a deep zombie-catching hole Bill dug. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Four years later, Bill still happily goes about his business, coming and going in his pickup, using a remote to open and close his gates, metal working, and apparently doing taxidermy. Another alarm goes off and Frank (Ian Bartlett) comes into his life and thankfully doesn’t get shot in the head. Frank is another middle-aged man. He’s a survivor from the now collapsed Baltimore Quarantine Zone headed to Boston. He started the journey with ten other people but is now the last one of them alive. Now he’s fallen in one of Bill’s ten-foot deep camouflaged holes in the ground.
Despite his situation, Frank is calm, funny, and charming. Bill drops a ladder into the hole and Frank climbs out to find Bill pointing a shotgun in his face.
Bill knows how to butcher a deer, but Frank is a master at butchering a song. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Frank stays and persuades Bill to invite him in for a shower and a meal. Bill is clearly intrigued by Frank almost immediately and Frank sees past Bill’s lone-wolf demeanor to the repressed, lonely man underneath.
Frank’s takes what sounds like the best shower of his life and enjoys a lunch with Bill. Frank is in no hurry to leave. He stalls by going over to Bill’s piano. He finds some acceptable sheet music and plays and sings Linda Ronstadts’s Long, long, Time very, very badly.
Bill’s perfectionistic sensibilities are offended. “No , no, no thank you” he says as he ends Frank’s assault on music, then sits down to play and sing it himself, with much greater skill. The song brings his long-repressed pain to the surface and he breaks down in front of a virtual stranger. Frank kindly places his hand on Bill’s shoulder and asks “who’s the girl?” Bill tells him “there is no girl” and Frank tells him “I know.” Bill has been closeted his whole life, while Frank is not only openly gay, but also emotionally open.
After Frank forces Bill to take a shower (excellent call), Bill has his first intimate encounter with a man. They fall in love and Frank never leaves. Bill finds purpose in protecting Frank at all costs. Frank brings love, appreciation of beauty, and emotional release to Bill’s life.
Over the years, that love settles into the contentment and bickering of a longterm relationship. They have their struggles. Bill doesn’t want to open up to the world because Frank is his world and he’s afraid a wider circle may put Frank in danger. Frank wants to fix up their deserted neighborhood and reach out to the world beyond their fences.
Tess (Anna Torv) makes contact with Frank. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Frank admits he’s been talking to “a very nice woman” on the radio. That woman is Tess. Frank convinces Bill to let Tess and Joel come visit them for a lovely lunch in the garden. Frank’s a great host. Bill sits with his arms folded as a shotgun rests on the table in front of him.
Joel points out that an alliance would help protect both of them. He knows there are raiders (we learn later he’s been one himself) and Bill’s perimeter fence will fail. Joel offers to bring in stronger, longer-lasting materials. Bill begrudgingly accepts Joel and Tess into their lives as traders, allies, and ultimately, friends.
Bill agrees to work with Joel. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
It’s bittersweet to see a younger, more optimistic Joel and Tess and know how things have turned out for them. to trade him to accept Joel and Tess into their lives.
At some point, Frank trades a gun (a small one!) for strawberry seeds and delights Bill with the secret garden he’s grown. They lie in the garden and chuckle as they eat the first strawberries they’ve tasted in years. Frank is the more fit and youthful of the pair and Bill apologizes to him for “aging faster.” He worries he’ll die and leave Frank vulnerable without him.
One night, the dreaded raiders attack. Bill uses all his weapons and traps to thwart them, and eventually runs outside with a shotgun and fires at them with no cover. He defeats the raiders but gets shot in the side of his stomach. Frank drags him back into the house, now Bill’s protector. Bill Kills to protect. Frank nurtures to protect. Bill is sure he’s going to die and frantically fills Frank in about all the steps he’s taken to protect him in case of his own death. Tellingly, this includes calling Joel, whom he has grown to respect and upon whom they now rely.
An older Bill and Frank at dinner. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
We jump forward in time to find Bill has, in fact, survived and fully healed. In a twist of fate, it’s Frank who develops a neurodegenerative disease (most likely Parkinson’s or ALS) while Bill remains healthy. Frank is confined to a wheelchair and has lost mobility in his arms and hands. He can no longer tend the garden, go for a run, or paint.
Though Bill cares for Frank with great patience and love, Frank grows increasingly weary of the declining quality of life. Frank tells Bill his plan to go out on his own terms and asks the very man who has centered his entire life around protecting him to help kill him.
Frank tells Bill his plan. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
At first, Bill outright refuses. He won’t even consider such a thing. Frank calmly tells Bill he’s had more good days than bad with him and more good days with him than anyone else. He’d like one more good day with Bill, ending with crushed up pills in his wine and a final night of sleeps in his arms.
Bill manages to go against his every instinct to protect Frank and agrees to the plan. The pair spend their last day together. They visit the abandoned boutique Frank fixed up and pick out nice suits. They perform their own wedding ceremony. Bill cooks a beautiful dinner.
When the moment of truth comes, Bill pours the pills into Frank’s glass of wine, then pours himself a glass from the bottle. After they both drink, Frank notices there are also pills in the bottle.
Bill and Frank’s final feast. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Frank protests until Bill tells him, simply, “I’m old, I’m satisfied, and you were my purpose. They leave the table as it is and go to the back bedroom to die in each other’s arms.
Joel and Ellie arrive a few days later to to find the house unlocked and silent. Bill and Frank’s last dinner rots on the table. Joel knows they’re gone. Ellie discovers a note from Bill. Ever the planner, Bill knew that, most likely, Joel would find the note. Bill’s note explains what happened and kindly warns the reader not to enter the back bedroom.
The note also functions as a will. He has everything to Joel, including a wall of weapons. Ellie once again asks for a gun and Joel again shuts her down.
Ellie decides to take a shower and tells Joel he desperately needs to take one after her, mirroring Frank’s taming of Bill. While he’s busy, Ellie again goes on the hunt. Of course Bill would have weapons stashed all over the house (and unlike Joel, would never forget where he put them.) She eventually finds a gun (just a small one!) hidden in a draw and hides it in her bag right before Joel comes into the room, now showered and dressed in fresh clothing.
Bella shows her bite scar to Joel again.
Joel decides the best course of action is to travel to Wyoming to find his brother Tommy, who is a former member of the Firefly resistance. He knows how dangerous the trip will be and makes Ellie (sort of) promise to abide by all his rules and never expose her bite scar. The episode ends as the duo drive off in Bill’s pickup loaded with weapons and supplies. The final shot is from an open inside Bill and Frank’s house. Curtains blow in the breeze as the truck disappears in the distance and into harsher circumstances.
Nick Offerman, Peter Hoar(center), and Ian Bartlett on set.
Nick Offerman does a wonderful job in mostly dramatic role. The choice to cast a comic actor who can pull off both the drama and comedy in the script was a great one. A very good comedian, Offerman both plays the comedy in the absurdities of life and communicates the weight of the human condition.
Ian Bartlett as Frank. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Ian Bartlett’s performance as Frank is masterful. I didn’t even recognize the actor until I checked IMDB and realized he played a pivotal role in the first season of The White Lotus. In that series, the Australian actor plays a tightly-wound Australian hotel manager who is a former drug addict.
Ian Barlett as Armond in season 1 of HBO’s “The White Lotus.” Photograph by Mario Perez/HBO
The character’s increasingly unhinged battle with an obnoxious guest leads to both slapstick and tragedy. His performance is another (much showier) tour de force. Here, he pulls off a convincing American accent and beautifully plays a calm, gentle, and open person through many years of life. The characters couldn’t be more different and I’m convinced Bartlett could play almost any role. I hope an Emmy nomination is in the cards for his work in the episode.
Final thoughts
The theme song for episode 3
I was not familiar with the music of Linda Ronstadt before this episode. The song Long, Long Time was not only a great choice for the episode, it’s a welcome development when a great but somewhat forgotten song gets a revival.
As with Kate Bush’s 1980s alternative hit Running Up That Hill did after it was repeatedly featured on Netflix’s Stranger Things, Long, Long Time is back on the billboard charts almost fifty-three years after its initial release. The lyrics are indeed perfect for the episode and beautifully capture the sorrow of a lost love. Listen to the song.
There are no small parts, right?
I like to give shout outs to the unheralded actors who nail their small parts. Brazilian mixed martial artist Marcus Aurélio does a great job as the dopey zombie who gets offed outside Bill’s fence. His expression and physicality add to the comedy and he pulls off the stunt beautifully. He currently works as a stunt person. Give this man some bigger roles. Also, take a look at his story in martial arts, it’s a good read.
Funniest moments
Thanks to Nick Offerman, this episode was loaded with them. His timing, expressions, and delivery are fantastic. Some of my favorites are below.
• Bill zombie death dinner theater. “It doesn’t get old.”
• When Bill tells Frank his doesn’t give out free meals like at Arby’s, Frank points out that Arby’s was a restaurant so it wasn’t free.
• Everything Bill did in the montage at the beginning.
Lastly
• What was in Joel’s stash?
• There was no way Ellie wasn’t going to get her gun.
• Who are the people Joel is so worried about running into?
See you all next week as Joel and Ellie make their way to Wyoming and make a pitstop in Kansas City.
