Explained: Who is David's group in The Last of Us episode 8?

The Last of Us episode eight aired on Sunday, March 5, 2023, at 9 pm ET/ 8 pm CT/6 pm PT on HBO and HBO Max.

Joel and Ellie's archnemesis in this episode was David and his cult. Initially, the group looked like they were going to give Ellie a fresh new start. However, it was later revealed that they were a bunch of vicious cannibals who believed that the answer to every question lies in violence.

Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers for The Last of Us, season 1, episode eight.

Thankfully, by the end, Ellie managed to outsmart and kill David when he tried to physically violate her.

Another thing that fans saw was how Joel and Ellie's relationship matured over the last couple of episodes. Joel does not perceive her as just "cargo" anymore, and the bond between them has strengthened considerably since their initial uneasy interactions.

At the end of episode six, Joel was stabbed by the lower end of a baseball bat. While Ellie was still clueless about how to save her friend, she somehow managed to stitch his wounds using a needle and thread.

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The Last of Us episode 8: What does David's group do for survival?

Viewers were introduced to David's group as a bunch of Christians who spread the message of the Almighty. David is supposedly the leader/preacher and believes that he is the one to keep his group away from harm's way. Even though David looked extremely religious, he claimed he was nothing like that before the cordyceps defeated humankind.

In fact, David was a teacher who specialized in mathematics and taught children Ellie's age during his hay days. He revealed that he discovered his true purpose when the fungus began consuming the world. David even called the cordyceps a being that provides love and protects themselves using violence.

Initially, Ellie thought that she had struck gold when she stumbled upon David's group. They even gave her penicillin to treat Joel's wound, but little did the teenager know that David was after Joel's life. In episode six, Joel killed a man to protect Ellie and was severely injured in the process. The dead man was a father who belonged to David's group.

Undoubtedly, the worst part about the bunch was that they consumed human flesh for survival. Ellie discovered a human ear when she was held in a cage by David. David confirmed these cannibalistic habits himself and revealed that only a handful of the group was aware of their diet. The episode dropped hints from the very start that David's group was into some stuff that Ellie hadn't anticipated.

At the very end, David died at the hands of Ellie when he was trying to r*pe/kill her. Joel and Ellie had already made work of the rest of the men, and Joel's condition looked much better by the time the episode concluded. The episode made it seem like an apocalypse story is always incomplete without a well-constructed human-eating human story.

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What is The Last of Us about?

HBO's The Last of Us is speculated to bag several coveted accolades and honors since the network has managed to create something truly special.

Joel is a goon who lost her daughter when a deadly pandemic destroyed the earth. Ellie is a 14-year-old girl who is blessed with a special gift. Ellie is the last chance for humanity to resurrect from the dead.

The official synopsis of the show reads:

"Based on the critically acclaimed video game The Last of Us, developed by Naughty Dog for the PlayStation platforms, the story takes place twenty years after modern civilization has been destroyed."

It continues:

Joel, a hardened survivor, is hired to smuggle Ellie, a 14-year-old girl, out of an oppressive quarantine zone. What starts as a small job soon becomes a brutal, heartbreaking journey, as they both must traverse the U.S. and depend on each other for survival."

The series was created by Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann.

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The Last of Us season one finale, will premiere on both HBO and HBO Max on Sunday, March 12, 2023, at 9 pm ET/8 pm CT/6 pm PT.