(The following contains spoilers forThe Last of Us Season 2, Episode 2, “Through the Valley”)
Season 2 of HBO’s popular zombie dramaThe Last of Usis in full swing, with two episodes aired and five more to go. After a relatively sedate premiere, Episode 2 dropped a twist that shook the fanbase to its core. Or at least, those who hadn’t played the show’s source material, the video gameThe Last of Us: Part II.Those who have played the gamehave known all alongthat Joel (Pedro Pascal) would die at the hands of Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) early in the season, and have been sitting on that knowledge since before the show began.
But for those viewers who didn’t know what was coming, Joel’s deathcame as a complete shock. Or it would have, if these kinds of “anything can happen” story moves hadn’t become so commonplace in zombie narratives. Series creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann (who also created the games) likely had no choice but to follow the game’s story lest they draw the ire of longtime fans, but it still couldn’t help but feel like a cheap way to raise the season’s stakes.
Season 2 Episode 2’s Storytelling Leaps
To get to the gruesome twist, “Through the Valley” relies on a pretty big leap in storytelling logic. Abby and her band of former Fireflies have managed to figure out that Joel is living in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, which has become a heavily fortified encampment. As Abby tries to figure out a way to breach the guarded walls, the infected begin to awaken, climbing out of the snow and making their way towards the town.
After nearly being overwhelmed by a wave of infected, she’s saved in the nick of time by Joel, who happens to be in the same location when the zombies hit. Obviously, Abby knows Joel is nearby. But it’s still a pretty massive geographical area, sothe fact that Joel is in that exact place at that exact moment feels more like the writers nudging things along to make Joel’s death happen, rather than an organic story development. After five years of searching, Abby and Joel meet basically through sheer blind luck, which isn’t totally implausible but feels rushed from a storytelling point of view.
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A Shocking Move at the Expense of Character
Zombie narratives have always featured shocking deaths, from the gutting finale ofNight of the Living DeadtoThe Walking Deadkilling off major characterspractically every season. It’s become something of a genre convention at this point, and areflection of the fact that anything can happen in a zombie apocalypse. It’s also pretty common for those deaths to come at the hands of fellow humans, since zombie stories are as much about the violence of the living as the undead.
All that is to say that Joel’s death inThe Last of Uswas surprising on some level, butfelt more like an attempt to shock the audience rather than a move that makes sense from a story and character perspective. This is partly because Pedro Pascal is a major star, and audiences are conditioned to expect that big names don’t typically get taken out so abruptly. But its impact is also dulled by the fact that viewers only just met Abby in the previous episode, and haven’t seen her defined by anything outside of her thirst for revenge.
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The Last of Ushas frequently explored the gray area, where good people are willing to do bad things to survive, and it gives Abby some justification for her revenge quest. Joel did kill her father after all, an unarmed doctor at the Firefly encampment. But at this point in the season,Abby isn’t a very defined character, so her vengeance doesn’t resonate beyond the scene’s shock value. Perhaps if Abby had killed Joel later in the season, it would have given more opportunity for the situation to take on more complexity and weight.
The move also doesn’t give anywhere for Ellie and Joel’s relationship to go. It’s undeniably poignant that Joel died before he and Ellie could reconcile whatever caused their estrangement in the five years between Seasons 1 and 2, forcing her to live with the guilt of her unresolved feelings, butit also has the effect of cheapening Joel’s character, making him essentially a catalyst for Ellie’s growth. After investing an entire season developing their bond into a surrogate father/daughter relationship, Joel’s death at this early point in Season 2 doesn’t really feel earned on an emotional level.
As with any adaptation from one medium to another, the creators are always going to have to juggle the expectations of the previously established fanbase with those who are new to the story.Not having Abby kill Joel early in the season likely would have upset fans of the game just as much, so it was probably inevitable that it would happen at the same point in the series. But for those who came intoThe Last of Uswithout prior knowledge, Joel’s death can’t help but feel like a bit of a misstep. It’s a case wherefidelity to the source materialcan’t help but come at the expense of storytelling.
