HBO
New episodes of The Last of Us are premiering on HBO each Sunday evening, and Ars’ Kyle Orland (who’s performed the video games) and Andrew Cunningham (who hasn’t) might be speaking about them right here each Sunday night. While these recaps do not delve into each single plot level of the episode, there are clearly heavy spoilers contained inside, so go watch the episode first if you wish to go in recent.
Does Ellie consider Joel?
In this episode, Joel and Ellie make it! They’re in Reno, they usually discover the docs they have been looking for this entire time. They simply must let the docs run a number of assessments, after which they will experience off into the sundown collectively, their surrogate father/daughter bond intact and wholesome and completely nice. Right?
But sure, backing up a bit, I like how this episode will get again to some quiet time between Joel and Ellie, who get to joke round and feed giraffes and be typically wistful about their journey collectively. They have clearly and absolutely develop into a surrogate father/daughter pair to one another, which is saying one thing, given how reluctant they had been to even be in the identical house again initially of the collection.
Andrew: There are good moments. But now that Joel is absolutely open to letting Ellie occupy the function of his lifeless daughter, there is a form of manic, nearly determined be aware to his relationship along with her on the episode’s outset. Joel’s stolid, monosyllabic veneer is gone, and now that it’s, he is speaking an excessive amount of; he is all of the sudden too keen to attach.
Kyle: You might additionally argue he is all of the sudden too keen to guard his surrogate daughter on the expense of humanity…
HBO
Unlike nearly each different group of individuals we have run into in The Last of Us universe, there does not appear to be something particularly sinister concerning the Reno Fireflies. Yes, they resolve fairly rapidly that the one technique to examine and transmit Ellie’s immunity is to take away her mind (This is defined considerably in one more episode-opening flashback the place we meet Ellie’s mom and do the truth is be taught the unimaginable true story of how Ellie obtained her knife, a joke I made a number of recaps in the past that ended up coming true).
But they don’t seem to be, so far as we all know, a neighborhood of sadistic evangelical vigilante brain-removers. They are, to borrow a phrase, placing the wants of the various forward of the wants of the few. And it is not that I do not really feel deeply for Joel, who’s clearly not prepared or prepared or capable of lose one other daughter. But his response to the state of affairs…
It leads me to my query: is Joel the dangerous man? Have we, the viewers, been hoodwinked by Pedro Pascal’s dadly charms into rooting for a monster?
The solely technique to come to the other conclusion is by being hopelessly sentimental about the entire thing. And Joel’s actions are made even worse as a result of, as Marlene factors out, Ellie would fairly clearly be prepared to sacrifice herself for that larger good.
That mentioned, I believe each the sport and the present do a great job of threading the needle between not defending Joel’s actions however nonetheless explaining them. By the time we get to those last scenes, we perceive how and why a really damaged Joel would primarily sacrifice the human race for this woman he met comparatively not too long ago. You do not need to agree with it to grasp it from Joel’s perspective, and I believe that is a tremendous narrative feat.