Television, drug of the nation

Shouldn’t a tv program be fairly self explanatory

typically yes but it can only explain itself as much as the story unfolds. plenty of great shows spend the first episode setting the scene.

in this case though we know what the story is as it's being pulled almost verbatim from a video game that was flooded with accolades for it's story and characters. I'm explaining that formulaic is probably an unfair assessment this early on.

the two halves of the first episode are important because they provide context for the relationship between Joel and Ellie and explains what they need to do and in what kind of world they need to do it in. the overall story is about their journey and they basically just stepped out of the front door.