I’m going to give everyone the benefit of the doubt that they have enough intelligence to understand that episode wasn’t glorifying murder. But regardless the second season will undoubtedly involve repercussions and callbacks to the massacre.
I said specifically it was a "glorification of a mass shooting," which some people feel was justified given Ellie's lack of say in the matter and/or the infeasibility of the scheme to inoculate people. Joel "saves" Ellie's life by means of violence, which makes it a myth of redemptive violence--a story that enshrines the belief that violence saves. Sure, there's some moral ambiguity, but the point is, had he not rescued her, she would be dead. His actions, I submit, are "admirable" as used in the definition of glorification: "the action of describing or representing something as admirable, especially unjustifiably."
I’d argue the episode was clearly challenging the concept of redemptive violence most notably in its visuals and editing choices. If you came out of that episode thinking there wouldn’t be repercussions for Joel’s actions (the murders and lying), when we’ve already seen our protagonists hunted for justifiably killing a cannibal, I don’t think you fully grasp the themes playing out.
Big props. It's a valid stance. I don't think there was any glorification in it, only the will to survive at all costs. The doctor picked up a scalpel and told Joel, "I won't let you take her." Joel did what he did. Joel didn't take out the two nurses, though, because they were unarmed. He only waxed folks who already had firearms in the hospital. They had no problems engaging Joel, so Joel had no issues engaging them. In fact, it started on the stairs when the two goons were taking him down at gunpoint. Joel neutralized them. I just can't see you, me, nor anybody else, laying over, without a fight, when certain death was coming both Joel and Ellie's way. That's not my main point, though. You can start with any life and speak to the sanctity of it, and we'd be right. On the flip, the virus started the sh1tshow, the world governments made it worse, and now every living person is forced to bear their experiences over the last 20-years in their actions. That's what we are: a collection of our individual experiences. To that end, nobody in that world has the luxury to sit in their furnished homes, unscathed; everybody is operating on a baser human instinct, and that is to survive. It changes a person. I think for the fruitcakes in this world who would mass-shoot-up a hospital, without an apocalypse on their backs, their predetermined skulduggery puts them in a different class than the characters in The Last of Us. Joel didn't kill because that's how he gets his jollies. He killed because he had to, lest he be killed and Ellie, too. I think the show did its job. Joel's romp through the hospital was supposed to cause an intestinal reaction for those of us who abhor violence and killing. On the same token, it was justified as a kill or be killed situation.
I think Joel's actions at the hospital are purely instinctual. His world view has become "kill to survive". It's not kill for killing's sake. It's not kill as a last resort. It's what he does to keep himself alive, without much further thought or emotional/empathic feeling, or guilt. Once he decided he wanted Ellie to also survive, killing anyone that might prevent or risk her survival was ok in his book. He didn't glorify anything or do it for personal satisfaction or anything that could lead to the thought he was enjoying what he was doing. He simply wanted her to continue living, as he now felt something for her, unlike the first half of the show. He didn't weigh the benefit of her possible sacrifice to save humanity (assuming that the cure was even possible, and share-able), versus the choice to keep her alive and possibly doom humanity to live in that world forever. He also didn't tell her what actually happened, so he wouldn't risk losing her in that sense either.
Of course there will be repercussions for Joel lying to Ellie. I know nothing about the game, so I can only speculate about whether Joel will get his comeuppance from the Fireflies for the massacre in the hospital. Up to this point, Joel has done a lot of merciless killing long before he met Ellie (he told her as much in KC) and throughout this season's story arc, and he has yet to pay for any of it. We'll see.
In the existential sense, we all have to pay to survive, so why would Joel get demerits for not letting himself be killed?
'The Last of Us' creator says the Cordyceps fungus danger is 'real' and 'has always been here' "HBO's post-apocalyptic series, "The Last of Us," imagines a world where the parasitic Cordyceps fungus, which typically infects ants and insects, has evolved in such a way that it can control the human race.""
Right, why didn't they just thank him and pay him his promised reward? I think the showrunners insinuated the cure is being exposed to the infected at birth. She wasn't breastfed, but Ellie's cord was cut with the knife after it was used to kill the infected.
Just got around to watching this. It’s ok, nothing great. Is it just me or does the swearing bothering anyone else? I’m not opposed to swearing at all but it just seems almost forced if that makes sense.
Nope. Doesn’t bother me. It works within the context of the show. Unnecessary sex scenes in shows that don’t add to the narrative. That bothers me a bit more.
I feel like it does not work within the context of the show. Maybe the odd F bomb would be ok but there are way too many from Ellie. It just seems completely pointless.
Funny, live through a fungus apocalypse and hear the F bombs drop. I think F bombs would be the least of ones worries. Cuss your A off for all I care just don't infect me bro.
For me it goes to her character and the tough exterior she tries to project and is also from her days in the orphanage/training facility where she was picked on. For me it goes to the core of her character who is hopeful in the inside but a tough nut crack on the outside. It also contrasts with Joel’s daughter who was the opposite.
I don’t doubt it but micro is nasty fungal Infection not won’t turn you into a zombie but it will eat your brain and you’ll die from it.
Those are good points. It just feels too much to me. Maybe I’m just nitpicking because I can not really get into the show. I’ve watched every episode so far and it feels very meh to me. If I never watched another episode it wouldn’t bother me at all.
Not to me, but I watch shows such as Game of Thrones, etc. often which employ swearing on the norm I would be surprised if a bunch of people brought up in a post-apocolyptic violent fungus-zombie-violence-laden world didn't swear every other second - I know I sure would lol
Not at all. One of the things that always pulled me out of The Walking Dead is the lack of real swearing. I'm sure if most of us were in a situation like that we'd be swearing like Hudson from Aliens.
