Help us understand, stay interested and become involved

Question

I saw the following sentence on a YouTube video about "Imagery"(why do authors use imagery):
Help us understand (plain verb)
Help us stay interested (verb plus adjective)
Help us become involved (verb plus adjective)
In all three above sentences the pattern is different: help plus us plus different parts of speech.

Persian Learner · Accepted Answer

It really doesn't have anything to do with the verb being plain; 'help' gets both the base or to-infinitive form of the verb.

Help us (to) understand.

Help us (to) stay interested.

Help us (to) become involved.

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The main difference between 'understand' and the other two verbs (stay and become) is that 'understand' is not a linking verb-- It can't link an agent to its complement.

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Let's analyze the sentences:

1) Help us understand. -> an imperative sentence with the implied subject 'you'.

'help': main verb- transitive

us: object pronoun- object of the verb 'help'

understand: infinitive- complement of the verb 'help'

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2) Help us stay interested. -> an imperative sentence with the implied subject 'you'.

'help': main verb- transitive

us: object pronoun- object of the verb 'help'

stay: linking verb- complement of the verb 'help'

interested: adjective- complement of the agent/actor 'us'.

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3) Help us become involved.

'help': main verb- transitive

us: object pronoun- object of the verb 'help'

become: linking verb- complement of the verb 'help'

involved: adjective- complement of the agent/actor 'us'.

Help us understand, stay interested and become involved

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