Includes MASSIVE SPOILERS for The Last of Us Season 2, Episode 2, and The Last of Us Part II video game!
Pedro Pascal's Joel meets an early end in The Last of Us season 2, episode 2's ending is shocking, and it's worth taking a closer look at how it came to be.
For video game players, there's no surprise that this happened, but the manner in which Abby's motivation to kill Joel, but everything happened so rapidly that the details were easy to miss. Series-defining moments don't typically occur in the second episode of a season, and the series introduced a massive battle sequence to coincide with its emotional core narrative.
Joel Is On Patrol With Dina When They Find Abby
Joel Is With Tommy In The Game
The entire episode structure of season 2, episode 2, revolves around Joel's death, though the dynamics are different in the show compared to The Last of Us Part II. For example, Joel spends episode 2 with Dina rather than being on patrol with Tommy, like in the game. The horde of infected attacking Jackson is teased in the game, but it never gets quite as bad as in the TV series, with Tommy having to defend the town as it's swarmed, and people are killed.
Why The Infected Horde Targeted Jackson In The Last Of Us Season 2
The Last of Us season 2, episode 2 features a massive Infected change, and here is why the zombies make the decision to attack Jackson.
The character swap is a curious choice for this scene, but the season 2 premiere set up Joel having a closer relationship with Dina. This could end up tying to Dina's role in subsequent events between Ellie and Abby, with Dina possessing more knowledge about Abby, her friends, and their motivations for the killing. This also allowed Tommy to be present for the show's epic B-plot, and he'll likely receive the news of his brother's death in the next episode.
Joel Instructs Abby's Group To Save Jackson
Joel & Tommy Only Seek Shelter With Abby's Group In The Game
Joel immediately tries to take control, telling everyone to gear up and him.
The fact that there's a battle occurring in the distance shifts the mechanics of the scene quite a bit, as Joel is eager to get back to Jackson as soon as he arrives at the lodge with Abby and Dina. Joel immediately tries to take control, telling everyone to gear up and him. In the game, Joel and Tommy are brought in for shelter, and Tommy even says, "We'll just ride out the storm and get out of your hair." Tommy and Abby's group even exchange some pleasantries in the game before things take a turn for the worse.
Abby's Group Injects Dina To Knock Her Out
Abby's Group Beat Up Tommy In The Game
There's an important dynamic at play in the Joel death scene in both games, which is that Abby's companions aren't interested in killing anyone but Joel. In the show, they use a sedative to knock Dina out, with their intention being to kill Joel and be gone by the time she wakes up. In the games, Abby goes loud, initiating the violence by immediately shooting Joel in the leg with her shotgun, then her friends grab Tommy and beat him up on the side, hitting him in the head with a gun multiple times to knock him out.
Abby Reveals Her Motivation To Joel Before Killing Him
Abby's Motivations Are A Mystery In The Game
The dynamic of the scene is shifted from the games, as Abby directly reveals who she is and what her motivation is for killing Joel. In the game sequel, this is left as a mystery for the player to uncover as Ellie. Abby says "Joel Miller," and prompts him to guess who she is, to which he replies with "Why don't you say whatever speech you've got rehearsed and get this over with?" In the television adaptation, Abby actually manages to make it most of the way through her speech before he interrupts her.
One Subtle Moment In The Last Of Us Season 2’s Premiere Highlights The Story's Most Divisive Joel Debate
The Last of Us season 2 will feature a big debate about Joel’s character and his choices, with one moment from the premiere subtly setting this up.
The video game uses flashbacks to reveal pieces of Abby and Ellie's past, and it seems like the show will follow suit, as Pedro Pascal is meant to be in two more episodes. That said, they've already revealed this major detail up front, with Abby delivering a full-on villain monologue about who she is and why she's there to kill him before she does it. After he tells her to get it over with in the show, she delivers the same line as in the game, "You don't get to rush this," then beats him with a golf club.
Abby Stabs Joel In The Neck With A Broken Golf Club
Abby Delivers A Final Blow With The Golf Club
Joel's death scene draws many beats from the video game, such as Ellie making her way in and trying to save him, but ultimately being forced to watch as Abby kills him. Abby beats Joel mercilessly with the golf club, but in the TV show, she delivers the final blow by skewering him with the broken club stick, leaving it in him with Ellie to take out. The surrounding dynamics are fairly similar, with Ellie begging Joel to get up and screaming in agony as he lies on the ground being beaten.
In the video game, Abby delivers the killing blow with one last blow to the head. Then, as an additional sign of disrespect, Manny, the man who Ellie slices with her knife, spits on Joel's dead body. In both versions, Ellie screams that she's going to kill Abby as she's held down, and Owen prevents Manny from shooting Ellie. In the game, he kicks her in the face to knock her out before they leave.
Ellie Hugs Joel's Dead Body
The Video Game Cuts To Black After Ellie Is Rescued
In the TV series, Ellie witnesses Joel get skewered with the stick, then crawls over to him to hug his body as he lies motionless on the floor. It's a somber moment, but the episode's ending shows her, Jesse, and Dina trailing Joel's body back to Jackson. In the video game, we miss most of this, as Ellie wakes up from being knocked out as Dina and Jesse arrive to rescue her, then the game cuts to her sitting on her bed. Changes in HBO's version of The Last of Us are notable, but the scene is no less brutal.
The Last Of Us
- Release Date
- January 15, 2023
- Network
- HBO
- Showrunner
- Craig Mazin
Cast
Joel Miller
Ellie Williams
WHERE TO WATCH
- Directors
- Craig Mazin, Peter Hoar, Jeremy Webb, Ali Abbasi, Mark Mylod, Stephen Williams, Jasmila Žbanić, Liza Johnson, Nina Lopez-Corrado
- Writers
- Neil Druckmann, Craig Mazin
- Franchise(s)
- The Last of Us
- Creator(s)
- Craig Mazin, Neil Druckmann
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