That thing we knew was coming happened in ‘The Last of Us’ Season 2 Episode 2. Let’s discuss
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This story is all about that big spoiler from “The Last of Us” Season 2 Episode 2. If you’ve yet to see the episode, consider reading this review or interview instead.
(Taps mic.) Is this on? (Feedback screeches.) Yep, it’s on, can we turn it down actually? (Words are drowned out by general sobbing and strangled noises of outrage.) OK, maybe not. Right, let’s just get started. Welcome to “The Last of Us” grief recovery group. Tissues and various support animals are available in the back. Please remember that Kaitlyn Dever is an actor playing the murderously vengeful Abby and that anyone who has been following the coverage of the show at least suspected that our beloved Joel (Pedro Pascal) had to die. The second part of the video game from which this series has been adapted is based on events following his death, and series creator Craig Mazin has said, publicly and repeatedly, that the second season of the show, like the first, would remain true to the game.
So as terrible as it was to witness Joel’s brutal death at the hands of Abby while Ellie (Bella Ramsey) watches in heartbreak and horror, it was not surprising. The question was never “if” but “when.” And, as audiences just discovered, the answer is in the episode on Sunday night.
The star of HBO’s post-apocalyptic drama said shooting Season 2 was much more grueling, but that it helped the actor understand more about themself.
Can someone help that young person over there? They appear to be hyperventilating. If it’s any consolation (and not too much of a spoiler), Pascal’s name remains on the credits for the remainder of the series, and there were loads of flashbacks in the game so ... but perhaps it’s too soon to do anything but sit with our collective trauma.
Joel is dead and Ellie has vowed vengeance, setting the stage for the remainder of the season.
Other things happened during Sunday night’s episode, some small — the discovery of Eugene’s abandoned pot farm, Ellie’s accidental revelation to Jesse (Young Mazino) that she and Dina (Isabella Merced) kissed — and some very big. Including and especially a “Game of Thrones”-like attack on Jackson by an army of the infected (woken by Abby — thanks for everything!), who now appear to be capable of tactical thinking. The brief lull of semi-normality presented in Episode 1 has been shattered. Thanks to Tommy (Gabriel Luna) and Maria (Rutina Wesley), Jackson was armed for the onslaught, but even for those aware of Joel’s fate, nothing could quite prepare fans for the reality of his death.
To help move us through the five stages of grief, The Times’ “Last of Us” viewers and players Mary McNamara, Tracy Brown and Todd Martens take on the pivotal second episode.
McNamara: Having just attempted to write a second-season review while hemmed in with embargo rules, I confess I am relieved to have this not-very-secret development out in the open — if nothing else, I do not like lying to my daughters, even through omission, as they pelted me with questions about Pascal’s, I mean, Joel’s fate. Whether the youngest follows through on her vow to stop watching the show if he died in the second episode remains to be seen. Certainly Joel’s death divided the gaming community when “The Last of Us Part II” debuted five years ago, but as it became a best-seller anyway, I don’t think HBO has too much to worry about.
That said, it is hard to imagine the show without Pascal. Joel’s journey from the hardened warrior who agreed to transport Ellie across country in exchange for a car battery to a man who will do anything to protect the surrogate daughter he has come to love has been the emotional through-line of the story. Now, one supposes, it’s Ellie’s turn to prove her love, although I’m not sure following one act of revenge with another is the best way. Which may, of course, be the whole point.
If the first season of ‘The Last of Us’ was about navigating the horrors of a country ravaged by cordyceps, Season 2 looks more closely at the perilous landscape of the heart.
The attack on Jackson is unique to the series (i.e. not in the game, which I have never played) and while it feels like a necessary reminder of this world’s dangers (not to mention a nod to HBO’s last big action hit), it also occurs in parallel to Joel’s capture and murder by Abby and the now-defunct fireflies. Was that a way to heighten or distract from the answer to the question that was on everyone’s minds as they tuned in to Season 2?
Brown: Yes, we don’t ever see any infected breach Jackson’s walls in the game, but the possibility is why they have all those patrols. I don’t know that it was intentional, but for me the attack on Jackson was more than just distracting; it was a heavy-handed metaphor. As you mentioned, Mary, it’s a good reminder of just how dangerous the world of the show is. It also seems like a response to complaints some viewers had about the lack of action in Season 1. And, for those familiar with the game, it offers a reason for why Dina was out patrolling with Joel instead of Tommy — which potentially sets up a different payoff later — while giving Tommy a moment to shine.
But it was also very unsubtle. Jackson, a peaceful safe haven and home to a close-knit community, is destroyed by infected monsters while Joel, the only safe space and home Ellie has ever known, is killed by human monsters. Was either tragedy more devastating than the other? Was either perpetrator more monstrous than the other? By juxtaposing these two events, it feels like the show is putting its thematic cards out on the table pretty early.
Now, I’m not one of the people who thought the show needed more action. For me, one of the fascinating parts of the game is how much it allows you to sit in quiet discomfort, crouched behind some cover for far too long while you try to figure out your next move. Maybe that says more about my play style than anything else, but it also means that I like having to overthink things — including unsettling moral dilemmas, which leads me to Abby and her revenge tour. Unlike with the TV show, Joel’s death was an actual surprise for “The Last of Us Part II” game. Todd, what do you remember about the response back then? Not that it was that long ago ...
Martens: I think it’s important to note that when the game came out in 2020, it was released amid some of the most stressful days of the pandemic. Games were something of a salve, as many players had just spent months welcoming folks to our virtual islands in “Animal Crossing: New Horizons.” And “The Last of Us Part II” had become arguably the most anticipated pop-culture event of the summer, so anticipated that leaks before its release allowed fans to collectively freak out at the direction the game appeared to be heading. We were all largely confined to our homes, and here was a work that was to explore the worst of humanity during a crisis that made the game feel too close for comfort. Times were tense.
And, to be sure, we saw some of the worst of humanity in the early response to the game, as a toxic segment of the gaming community couldn’t come to grips with the centering of LGBTQ+ characters while leaving less significant roles to some of the popular characters from the first part. Those who worked at the game’s studio, Naughty Dog, were subject to horrific harassment. But those bad actors failed. “The Last of Us Part II” had us enthralled, even if it could frustrate.
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Neil Druckmann, the primary architect of the game franchise and co-writer of the second game with Halley Gross, made it very clear that nothing would be treated as sacred as they sought to explore the after-effects of PTSD and how we could lose our humanity in our trauma. We knew before the game even made its way to our PlayStation consoles, it asked us to reassess who is good, who is evil and if anyone can, or should be, saved. “The Last of Us Part II” would, in a way, give many fans what that they most desired — the chance to play primarily as Ellie. It ended up being kind of a devil’s bargain, as Joel — a character we had steered to for hours and who finally found something to love in a hellscape of a world — was gone, and the character we couldn’t wait to see grow up was now overtaken with an all-consuming rage. It was a test. How do we inhabit the roles of virtual characters who are constantly making choices we disagree with? Love or hate the direction of the story, it displayed grueling confidence in leading players — who in a game have the illusion of directing the story — into places of discomfort. It worked, because playing as Ellie ultimately aligned us with her. We were searching for some form of resilience.
I’ll be curious if TV viewers feel the same? I do sometimes worry it’s a story better suited for interactivity. The reaction that Mary mentions, of someone abandoning the show in the wake of Joel’s death, is one I wonder if many will feel.
McNamara: Oh I doubt it. My daughter’s devotion to Pascal aside, we’ve grown used to television shows killing off beloved characters, and Ellie, Tommy and now Dina, as well as the world of “The Last of Us,” remain far too compelling to abandon. Joel’s death actually makes the series as interactive as television can be — for many viewers, he felt indispensable and yet we must all now soldier on without him, just like Ellie.
As for Abby, we no longer require our main characters to be old-school likable, as long as we are given some sort of access to their motivations. Though Abby killing Joel so horrifically right after he saved her life seemed impossible to justify in the moment, we did get a brief glimpse of her own tragic backstory, both in this episode and the last. Neither Joel nor Ellie are the only people to experience deep, sustaining love for one particular human. Abby lost her lodestar — her father — to what she believes was a random act of extreme violence. (If we’re being honest, Joel could have just shot the doc in the leg or punched him in the face and still rescued Ellie.)
Whether or not Abby knew her father was about to kill Ellie to potentially save humanity — she has denounced the stories of Joel also snatching a girl — is beside the point. This is, as Todd adroitly points out, a story of PTSD. As history has repeatedly proved, including during the COVID-19 pandemic, no one emerges unscathed from a mass traumatic event. That people will splinter into hostile groups when common sense would lead them to unite is what fuels “The Last of Us,” as a game and a series, and lifts it into classical epic territory.
As a young queer woman, Ellie is an epic-hero breakthrough. As a surly, teenage combination of self-aggrandizement and self-doubt, she is the instantly recognizable character that makes the rest of the world believable.
Brown: Speaking of Ellie, I have to admit that it’s been a relief to see that navigating your (complicated) feelings for your best friend is a queer rite of passage even in a world ravaged by a fungal zombie apocalypse — and she’s experienced it twice! Though I was not as thrilled to see that some people in the community still think a queer teen romance as not family-friendly. But I digress.
Without getting too far ahead of ourselves, I am curious to see how audiences will respond to Ellie’s decisions and actions because we are engaging with her story in a completely different way on TV. There is no real analogue to the way a player instantly connects with a character that they essentially become, and experience the world through, in order to win a game, which is something that came up when Todd and I discussed Season 1. It’ll be interesting to see how that affects how people see both Ellie and Abby moving forward and how our ideas around heroes and villains can be subverted through their trauma and rage.
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But TV has its own strengths. The attack on Jackson, for example, is something that’s possible because TV is not locked into the perspective of the player character. How the attack affects the community will also likely shape how the story progresses in some way. OK, maybe I am coming around to thinking about that attack as more than just a distraction. For now, though, the only thing that seems inevitable is a showdown between Ellie and Abby, and I can’t wait.
Martens: What I do love about the game and now the show are the patient steps taken to world building. I think that emotional attachment you both speak of is due, in part, to the time and care given to let us live in its universe, to let its towns feel fully lived in.
And that brings me to Ellie, Dina and, yes, that inevitable showdown with Abby that Tracy teases. Ellie fears little. Little, that is, except true attachment. In a world of horrors, she finds comfort in grief, trauma and violence. It’s what, after all, she knows best.
She’s given purpose in avenging Joel’s death. The comfort of Dina is, at times, awfully confusing to her. As difficult as we may think of its narrative — the infected, the dystopia, the terrorizing factions — the second episode of this season sets up a core theme of “The Last of Us Part II.” This is a story of heartbreak, and that’s why I couldn’t put my controller down and why now I can’t look away.
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