In the recap for “The Last of Us” season 2, episode 1, Abby plans for revenge and Joel figures out that being a father to a 19-year-old girl is just about the toughest job in the world…
By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
It’s been over two years since “The Last of Us” season 1 came to a close so it’s understandable if you have vague memories about what unfolded in the final episode but here’s a very brief version to catch up.
After transporting Ellie across the country and through a sea of Cordyceps infected ghouls, Joel finally arrived at a Firefly base in Salt Lake City where his young traveling companion was supposed to help cure the fungi infection that effectively ended the world. You see, Ellie is completely immune to the Cordyceps infection and doctors believes they can use her to create a cure to end this plague on humanity.
Unfortunately what the rebel group fails to tell Joel until after he arrives is that Ellie won’t survive the procedure. But her death could potentially save millions.
None of that matters much to Joel because he’s come to love Ellie like a daughter — and after losing his actual child at the start of this apocalypse, he’s not about to watch another one get sacrificed. So Joel uses his considerable skills to mow down the Fireflies before eventually making it into the operating room where he shoots and kills all the doctors and nurses.
He takes Ellie away and drives off in the only working vehicle at the facility. When she wakes up, Joel lies to Ellie and says that the procedure didn’t work and they were forced to leave while also failing to tell her that he gunned down everybody inside the Firefly facility.
They eventually make it back to Jackson, Wyoming — the growing town where survivors are thriving thanks largely to Joel’s brother Tommy and his wife Maria, along with a new community of people now avoiding the Cordyceps infection.
Now that we’re there, let’s recap the first episode of “The Last of Us” season 2 titled “Future Days”…
Slowly
The new season opens on a graveyard in Salt Lake City where the few remaining survivors of the Firefly colony are burying their dead. These are the remnants leftover from the massacre Joel perpetrated in order to save Ellie from being killed during surgery.
The leader is a girl named Abby and she’s thirsty for vengeance because one of the people Joel killed was her father, who was one of the doctors attempting to perform the surgery on Ellie. Her group is trying to decide the next best move, especially with the Fireflies effectively wiped out in one fell swoop thanks to Joel.
As much as Abby wants to go after Joel, the details about him are scarce — he’s in his 50s, he’s got a scar on his right temple and he’s supposedly quite handsome (it is Pedro Pascal after all, why bother ignoring those smoldering good looks) — but otherwise they don’t really know anything about him. Owen — another member of the group — tells Abby that he’s heard about a guy named Isaac running a rebel team out of Seattle and perhaps he might be able to provide some resources that eventually lead them back to Joel but for now they are out of options.
Abby agrees to forgo her desire for revenge for now but she makes Owen promise that this hunt isn’t over until Joel is dead and buried. Oh and one more thing…
“Slowly. When we kill him, we kill him slowly.”
~ Abby
Owen agrees and after placing her necklace on her father’s grave, Abby prepares to leave Salt Lake City behind.
Five Years Gone
When our story picks up, it’s five years later and we’re back in Jackson, Wyoming — a community that has only grown larger and more populated since we saw it last season.
That’s when we’re reunited with Ellie, who is engaging in a training session for hand-to-hand combat against a much larger opponent. While she’s sporting a bloody nose, Ellie is more than holding her own before eventually catching her sparring partner in a triangle choke and eventually an omo plata — a shoulder lock — that forces him to tap out and submit.
Ellie’s coach is Jesse — another integral member of the Jackson community, who plays a major role in season 2 — and he informs her that she still needs work, especially after taking a punch to the face to start the sparring session. Ellie is particularly upset after Jesse says that her sparring partner pulled his first punch giving her the bloody nose because if he went full force, she would have been knocked unconscious.
Jesse knows that would have resulted in quite a reprisal from Joel and that’s not what Ellie wants to hear. She tells Jesse no more pulling punches when she’s being trained.
Outside crews are working on pipes inside the Jackson city limits when they find that weeds and branches have grown inside, undoubtedly the result of time and lack of upkeep over the years. Inside one of the houses we find Joel — a few years older with a little more salt and pepper in his hair — and he’s working to repair some circuit breakers when he says hello to a “kiddo” except it’s not Ellie.
Instead, we meet Dina — Ellie’s best friend and a person much more willing to engage with Joel these days than his adopted daughter. Dina asks Joel why Ellie seems so mad at him but he doesn’t have an answer.
It seems in these past five years, Joel and Ellie have grown apart and the once tight relationship between them has fractured and frayed. Joel can’t explain why that’s happened, although deep down he certainly has to believe she doubts that he told her the truth about that Firefly compound from years earlier and the mistrust between them has only festered ever since.
As much as Joel wants to mend fences with Ellie, he also knows she’s now 19 years old and teenagers rarely stay close with their parents at that age. It’s a phase that they just have to outgrow plus Joel has been getting some timely advice when it comes to the Ellie situation.
“I can’t hold myself responsible for another person’s emotional state”
~ Joel
That phrase alone tells Dina that Joel has been going to therapy with the local psychologist named Gail. He denies it at first but the finally admits that he’s been seeking help with his mental health before swearing Dina to secrecy.
Meanwhile, somewhere outside the walls, Ellie is getting some target practice with her de facto uncle Tommy, who has been teaching her to shoot. She seems much more in tune with him these days than her own father until Tommy tells her that she’s being taken off patrol this week and instead she’s going to man the wall at the edge of town.
That doesn’t sit too well with Ellie, especially after Tommy tells her the order came from Joel.
She demands to be put back on patrol and her insistence is a not so subtle reminder to Tommy that he’s dealing with his brother’s daughter and like it or not, Ellie has adopted a whole of his traits.
“I swear, you and my brother, same goddamn fucking person”
~ Tommy
As for Joel, he arrives at Gail’s house for their next therapy session but he soon discovers over a couple of glasses of whiskey that his doctor is already three sheets to the wind. It turns out Gail is struggling because today is her birthday and it’s the first time in over 40 years that she’s not celebrating with her husband Eugene because he’s dead.
To make matters worse, Gail reveals that Joel is the one who killed Eugene.
Now we don’t learn any more details but Gail admits that she understands that Joel had to put her husband down but it doesn’t make her anger and resentment any less real. She know deep down that she should forgive him but she just can’t and Gail truthfully just hates Joel to his very core.
That also leaves Gail unwilling to deal with Joel’s bullshit today because as much as he wants to understand why Ellie is so hostile towards him, he’s also not willing to divulge what actually caused the gap between them.
Gail knows that Joel is withholding the truth from her and without that information, she just can’t treat him properly.
Smartyceps
At home — now living in a detached garage away from the house where Joel resides — Ellie is working on her pistol when Dina arrives so they can go out on patrol. These two are clearly very close friends but it’s pretty obvious that the feelings between them have shifted, at least where Ellie is concerned because she’s not just looking at Dina as a bestie anymore.
As they prepare to go on patrol, Jesse reads them the riot act about following commands and listening to Kat — the leader of the expedition for the Alpine Run — and reminds Ellie and Dina that for all their rebellious behavior, they have to remember that other members of this community actually look up to them.
On the horse ride heading out on the trail away from Jackson, Dina asks Ellie if she plans on attending the dance later that night to celebrate New Year’s. It seems despite business as usual for all the members of this community, the New Year countdown has begun with the clock flipping at midnight.
Ellie doesn’t seem all that interested in the dance but Dina suggests that perhaps they should go together because she won’t be attending with Jesse — her on again, off again boyfriend. Dina even ribs Ellie about her lack of options because her best friend hasn’t hidden the fact that she’s gay but rather her options are apparently limited in Jackson.
That’s why Dina jokes that maybe Ellie should get with Kat — again — after they previously hooked up in the past. You see Kat is “the other one” and Ellie can’t help but laugh at that reference.
Before arriving in town, the group finds an ominous sign that perhaps they should turn around and head back — blood trails and splatters that reveal something terrible happened here. But rather than fleeing, Ellie and Dina decide to investigate, much to the chagrin of Kat and the other members of their scouting party.
When they arrive in town, the group finds several dead infected and a bear that’s been torn apart and killed. None of this looks great but Ellie and Dina decide they need to investigate the local town grocery store, which is seemingly where this group was held up before getting infected and turning into more of the Cordyceps zombies.
While Kat doesn’t agree with the plan, Ellie and Dina are going to do it anyways and so they reach the outside of the building when they hear the familiar sounds attached to the Clickers. They hear two separate, distinct sounds, which means there’s one infected zombie for each of them to tackle — not ideal but something they’ve handled before.
After getting inside, Ellie and Dina work together to lure the infected Clicker out until the open with a distraction. Ellie ends up diving on the Clicker’s back and stabbing it to death with her knife, showing just how much she’s learned in these past few years.
Before they can celebrate too much, Ellie ends up falling through a rotted piece of the floor and it’s too far for Dina to reach her so she has to wait to find help. Down in the main part of the grocery store, Ellie begins to explore but she soon realizes that she’s not alone — the other Clicker is somewhere down here with her.
Ellie begins her hunt, not noticing that the Cordyceps infected ghoul is actually tracking her at the same time as she stalks around the grocery store. When Ellie finally comes face to face with the creature, she commands it to run at her like every other infected Clicker has done in the past but this one doesn’t follow instructions.
Instead, the Clicker runs away and seeks another path to attack — a completely unusual behavior for these creatures.
A moment later, the zombie attacks and jumps in Ellie and actually bites into her stomach before she’s able to raise her weapon and put the creature down. Dina shows up a moment later concerned for her friend but Ellie assures her that she’s OK.
It’s still a completely unsettling interaction because these creatures aren’t supposed to behave that way.
Back in town, Ellie and Dina sit down for a debrief with the town council where Tommy reminds them how dangerous it was to go into that building without any reconnaissance first, although his niece is quick to point out that he and her father would have done exactly the same. But more troubling is the interaction with this infected zombie because Ellie knows it should have done what it did.
It was smart — or at least smarter than the brainless creatures that wiped out the world’s population.
“I’m not saying it could do math or anything. But it didn’t run at me. It did what we do. Took cover. Planned. Waited. Lured me in. Stalking.”
~ Ellie
They’re dismissed and while Maria recognizes right away that Dina didn’t actually witness any of this, she believes what Ellie told them. Maybe it’s an isolated incident but it’s an issue they can’t ignore, especially if these Cordyceps creatures are somehow starting to evolve.
At home, Ellie is forced to use her knife to cut around the bite mark left by the zombie because she still can’t let her secret out to the world — that she’s immune to the Cordyceps infection. She knows. Joel knows. Tommy knows but if anybody else found out, Ellie could find herself in all sorts of trouble with people willing to do anything to try and obtain that same immunity.
Joel shows up trying to speak to Ellie but she seems uninterested in his attempts at playing father to her. He does offer to restring her guitar as some sort of peace offering and while she reluctantly accepts, Ellie still isn’t willing to meet him anywhere close to halfway.
Later that night at the dance to celebrate the New Year, Ellie finds Dina is a little inebriated — or actually she’s high — and becoming the center of attention for everybody. Jesse watches alongside her but when Ellie suggests that it’s only a matter of time before they get back together, he tells her not this time. Whatever broke them up, apparently has Jesse convinced it’s for good this time.
Dina eventually drags Ellie out onto the dance floor when the band slows things down and they’re held in a close embrace. Ellie tells Dina that every guy is watching her right now but Dina wonders if maybe they’re all watching Ellie — perhaps out of jealousy about who she’s dancing with.
That’s when Dina leans in for a kiss and Ellie very happily reciprocates because this is exactly what she’s been wanting. As they passionately lock lips, a man on the outskirts of the dance tells them that this is a family affair and so Dina apologizes as he looks at them with disdain.
The man’s name is Seth and he’s pretty clearly had a few too many drinks and that’s when he utters the word “dykes” but before Ellie and Dina can even really react, Joel appears out of nowhere and shoves the man to the ground. Joel shifts into attack mode ready to defend his daughter but Ellie wants no part of it.
Rather than thanking him for standing up for her, Ellie lashes out at Joel.
“I don’t need your fucking help”
~ Ellie
A stunned Joel is left wondering how did things get so bad between them while Ellie leaves with Dina and the celebration comes to an abrupt end. Gail watches from the sidelines and sees the ever widening gap between her patient and his adopted daughter.
After the dance ends, Ellie heads home where she finds Joel sitting on the porch fine tuning her guitar. They lock eyes for a moment but then Ellie just ignores him and heads back to her new garage house where she resides very much without him.
Other party goers continue to celebrate with one dropping a sparkler near those pipes that were being worked on earlier in the episode. But that’s when we see that the branches inside the pipes aren’t just twigs and vines — the distinct movement represents the Cordyceps virus growing and thriving, which means the entire population of Jackson is now at risk.
Outside the walls and the bright lights of Jackson, a scouting party arrives at the tree line and they realize that there’s a thriving community just ahead of them. The group on horseback see the town and it’s soon revealed that this is Abby and her team still on the hunt for the man who killed her father.
“The Last of Us” returns for a brand new episode next Sunday night at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.
