I can’t believe they did it. Even before season one of The Last of Us was released, anyone who had played both Last of Us video games looked at a singular event in the second game as a major TV question mark. Could that happen on TV? How would people react? Surely, it would be changed in some manner because there was simply no way. Well, Sunday’s second episode of The Last of Us season two not only had that moment in it, it had it happen at the same time as the game, which is almost as shocking as the moment itself. Almost.
We’re talking, of course, about the death of Joel. Yes, we’re sorry to inform you, but that actually happened. You thought you were watching a Pedro Pascal show and now Pedro Pascal’s character is dead. It’s an event that’s going to set the stage for everything that follows this season and next.
Of course, we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves. Joel’s death came at the end of an already incredible episode featuring the biggest and scariest action scenes to date in The Last of Us. You don’t want to forget all that simply because of the ending. So let’s get back to Joel in a bit.
Just to hammer home that, yes, it’s going to happen, the second episode started with the same character as the first one: Abby. She’s in a hospital, terrified, when she sees herself and tells the other her not to go into the room. Someone’s brains are on the floor. Abby wakes up from the nightmare on the floor too. She and her team found a cabin outside of Jackson and now, in the daylight, notice just how big it is. They realize that infiltrating the city, as well as finding Joel, will be all but impossible. Nevertheless, Abby wants to press on, even though the rest of the group secretly decides they need to convince her to go back to Seattle.
Down in Jackson, Jesse wakes up Ellie to go on patrol and razzes her about kissing his ex the night before. It’s a tense morning because someone discovered that the infected have a new trick where they put a handful of bodies on top of the snow, hiding dozens below it. That means the whole town is on alert and Tommy holds a meeting to go over their elaborate emergency plans. It’s a good piece of story and a nice bit of exposition because, well, they’re going to need it.
After all but ignoring an apology from Seth, the homophobic commenter from the party, Ellie says she wants to go out on patrol with Joel. This is odd because last we saw them, they weren’t talking. Now though, she implies they’ve buried the hatchet and are sick of everyone prying into their business. (No spoilers but… remember this.) Unfortunately, Jesse says Joel has already left with Dina. He wanted to go with her, but decided to let her sleep.
And so it’s Jesse and Ellie heading out together as the people of Jackson make preparations for the worst. There’s also a huge storm cloud on the horizon too but Jesse says he’s not worried about it. That changes quickly, though, and Jackson calls everyone out on patrol back to the city. However, Joel and Dina don’t answer and Ellie and Jesse say they’re too far to get back. They shelter in an old 7-11. There, we learn more about Gail’s husband Eugene, who Joel killed, and he seems like he was a pretty cool guy.
Abby is keeping watch on everything going on when she sees two people on horses. She goes down to investigate but slips and falls down the side of a mountain. She winds up in a field exactly like the one Jesse described earlier, except much, much bigger. Jesse said seven bodies were hiding another 30. Here, there are probably 70 bodies on the surface so, yeah. This is bad. Abby isn’t aware of this though so is terrified when the ground starts to collapse and infected start to pour out. Hundreds. Thousands. Who knows? But the race is on and even though Abby is clearly a villain at this point on the show, we find ourselves cheering for her to get away.
This whole chase is wildly entertaining and intense as Abby narrowly avoids capture a few times, before eventually finding herself stuck between a building and a chain-link fence littered with infected. She’s about to be eaten, crushed, or both when someone comes out of nowhere and saves her. It’s Joel.
Here’s a good moment to say: really? What are the odds of this happening? Jackson has so many citizens and for Abby to be out in the surrounding area and just so happen to run into the one person she has traveled across the country for feels way too easy. Or, if you look at it another way, maybe this was karma finally coming for Joel. The world’s way to right the wrongs of his actions. It’s certainly something to think about.
Joel saves Abby, and as they and Dina try to figure out a place to go, Abby suggests the nearby cabin where her friends are. Clever girl. Off they go as a massive, massive horde of infected chases them. Eventually, another horde joins the chase and things look bleak. But that’s when things cut to Jackson and people working on the pipes. The living plants we saw at the end of last week seem to sense this is where the people are and, well, out of nowhere, the hordes change direction. They give up on Joel, Dina, and Abby and head the other way.
This is also about when Tommy realizes Joel and Dina haven’t radioed back in so Jesse and Ellie, who have been in Eugene’s 7-11, decide to set off into the storm like Han Solo on Hoth, desperate to find their friends at whatever the cost.
The person who saw the living plants runs to tell Tommy about it, but that’s also when the lookout sees thousands upon thousands running toward the city. They ring the bell. It’s time to take emergency measures as everything bad that could happen all happens at exactly the same time. Almost like it’s supposed to.
What follows is, without a doubt, the biggest action scene in The Last of Us history. (Which, we admit, isn’t a long history, but this is still a huge step above everything else.) Thousands of infected hammer on the walls of Jackson as people shoot them, drop barrels of gasoline that become bombs, and just try to survive. I’m not going to get into every detail, but it’s an incredible scene, especially Tommy’s fight with the Bloater when he unleashes an entire flame thrower on it.
On a normal show, you wouldn’t be able to top a scene like that. But, on The Last of Us, as epic as the invasion scene is, it’s about to be eclipsed by what happens once Joel and Dina got back to Abby’s cabin. Her friends take her and the strangers in and everything is nice… until Abby reveals the man’s name is Joel. Instantly, the entire vibe changes. The switch goes from “kind” to “evil,” and the group starts to carry out a plan they have clearly been talking about for years.
They put Dina to sleep and Abby starts in. She’s given this speech a million times in her head and it shows. She wants Joel to slowly realize who she is and why they’re there. It gets taken up a notch when she shoots him in the leg and has him wrapped in a tourniquet. She doesn’t want him to bleed too much. She wants him to suffer.
Abby explains that she’s the daughter of the doctor Joel killed in the hospital and that he killed 18 other people beyond that. As she goes on, Joel slowly starts to realize there’s no way out of this. He accepts his fate and tries to get her to kill him quickly. Abby refuses. She beats him with a golf club, just like in the game. It’s sinister. It’s intense. And, it’s also kind of deserved. Yes, Joel saved Ellie, but at what cost? Nineteen lives? Millions more if they made a cure? Since he’s the star of the show, we’re supposed to feel sympathy for him, but step back and think about the other point of view for a minute. It’s a classic Last of Us moral dilemma.
Ellie sees tracks in the snow and follows them to the cabin. Inside, she quickly realizes what’s happening and tries to intervene. She gets a slash or two in before she’s restrained and forced to look at the bloody mess on the floor she knows is Joel. She screams at him to get up but he can’t. He’s all but gone. Then, Abby takes the golf club that she snapped in two after beating him so badly and stabs him in the neck. Joel is dead. Ellie vows she’s going to kill everyone there but they leave her alive anyway. That’s their code.
Back in Jackson, the horde has been defeated, but the destruction and casualties are beyond measure. We see the people of Jackson start to regroup. Abby and her friends begin their trip back to Seattle, and Jesse and Dina bring Ellie, and Joel’s body, back to town.
This was an episode of The Last of Us that none of us will ever forget. If you played the game and knew Joel was going to die, you can’t believe you got to see it on TV. If you didn’t play the game, you probably still don’t believe that it actually happened. It did happen. Pedro Pascal just died on the show you watched for Pedro Pascal. What does that mean for Ellie, the people of Jackson, Abby, and others? We’ll find out throughout the rest of the season and next.
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