#quickbooksonlinevsdesktop

[wordpress-blaze-215726769]

Same Story, Different Feel: HBO’s The Last of Us Season 2 Softens the Game’s Brutality

Sorry folks, I'm going long here.

Back in 2020, in the throws of the pandemic, Sony and Naughty Dog Entertainment released The Last of Us Part II, which was one of the most interesting public dialogs of an AAA game at the time. It was such a highly rated and reviewed game, but it was one that many didn't enjoy going through. There are many things about the story that I won't go into now as it spoils the game and the season of television I'm writing about, but as I play this game while I watched The Last of Us season 2, I understand the discomfort with the story it's trying to tell.

While The Last of Us season 1 (and Part I) is this road trip of an adult and child finding family in each other at the end of the world, leading to a second chance, season 2 and Part II is a story about revenge and community violently ripped apart by revenge. The first season covered all of the first game with some changes from my perspective, such as being softer and having fewer mushroom zombies (that's what I call the Cordyceps infected) that you'd experience in the game. While they kept the main things the same, a lot of the characters, from my perspective, were less hardened by the world.

Pedro Pascal just emotes more pain on his face. Let alone the show having Joel being Latin man versus just being white Texan can change some of what you imagine his background is compared to the game Joel. Things like the Bill and Frank episode of season one – Long, Long Time, while a great piece of television, I feel makes the world a bit too saccharine for what the original story was trying to tell or what I got from it. The second season goes further in these changes from a more complex story with complicated allegories that didn't work for me when I watched it, which bothered me.

The Last of Us season 2 picks up five years after the events of the last season (just like the game), where Joel and Ellie, still played by Bella Ramsey, have pretty safe lives in Jackson, Wyoming. The americana small town feel is here in full effect. Joel's brother Tommy (Gabriel Luna) and his wife Maria (Rutina Wesley) run the town well and check on Joel and Ellie. Joel and Ellie's relationship is strained when the season begins; we see Ellie as a young adult pushing the boundaries of what she can do and who she is, with Joel catching the most hell from it.

Pascal and Ramsey play the frayed relationship very well, as Pascal's Joel is sad, confused, and understanding in each interaction with her. He can't fix it and just needs to give her time. Now Ramsey's Ellie in this season is not a carbon copy of the game counterpart like last season. These are two very different Ellie characters. Ramsey's Ellie is a young hotshot taking unnecessary risks, wanting to enjoy life, and still figuring herself out while refusing to listen to any advice from people older than her, even her peers like Jessie (Young Mazino) and Dina. Ramsey's Ellie has to learn the hard way.

This feels in stark contrast to how Ellie and Joel are portrayed at the beginning of the game, where while still frayed, it feels that Joel is more worried that she is becoming like him than just being a rebellious 19/20-year-old. Where the show's Ellie on scouting missions is having fun looking for mushroom zombies with Dina, the game one is more "Ah shit, here we go again" like the CJ GTA: SA meme than excited. It's work and acceptance of the world and the killing. Game Ellie is more of a killer than TV Ellie; Ramsey's Eillie still has some innocence left in her. This change, for me, feels like the show Ellie represents in many ways what the player is supposed to feel while playing as Ellie in the game. The difficulty of the situation affects one's sense of morality and ethics. I struggled with it at the end of the first game and during parts of the second one. While the game Ellie doesn't really show much emotion to these things, as Joel didn't in the first, Ramsey's performance is full of emotional resonance to the things she chose to do and go forward with from the middle of the season toward the end.

Her relationship with Dina, as her partner and love interest, is played by Isabela Merced as a smart, resourceful, and more even-keeled person than Ellie, even if she is seen as more of a free spirit. In the show, she is at first Ellie's best friend and secret crush and is treated by Joel like "my daughter's best friend," who also looks up to and learns from him. Pascal and Merced work well together in the little bit of scenes they have together. Most of the season hinders on the Ellie/Dina's burgeoning relationship and the ride-or-die journey together. Their relationship feels like extending some of the heartwarming storytelling parts of the Bill/Frank episode throughout the season.

There's also a very strong episode late in the season about Joel/Ellie's parent and child relationship over the course of the time jump. This might be the strongest overall episode of the season and a good use of the bottle episode format. It's a refreshing break from many of the darker moments of the season that can get trying, at least in a binge setting. The vignettes of Joel getting to experience things he didn't with his own daughter and Ellie having stability for years add to the sadness of their frayed relationship for the rest of the season.

Now, let's talk about Abby. Abby, played by Kaitlyn Dever, is the main antagonist of season 2 of the show. In the game, she's the other main character you play, and it switches between her and Ellie for two completely different perspectives of the world they are in. Abby is connected to the ending of season one and is the consequence of Joel's actions at the end. Her entire goal is to get to Joel. She's a powerful character early on in the season's first two episodes and Dever plays her well even though she's physically different than the game Abby. In this show, Abby is very much Ellie's dark twin, a storytelling trope often used, and it's done well here. They are very similar in size and look, and her determination to get to Joel at all costs leads her to make some similar risky mistakes as Ellie makes as well. They split, though, as it seems that Abby is more mature than Ellie in terms of her relationships with her peers and within the structure of the society she comes from in Seattle. Abby is a soldier and acts accordingly with clear mission goals and direction, even though it's based on extreme emotions and a need for revenge.

Now, back to the physicality thing I mentioned earlier in the game, she is an imposing woman. She's got muscles and is taller than Ellie; she's more brutal than Ellie in the beginning. She's not this dark twin. She's this huge foe to overcome, like Bolo in Bloodsport. She's such an imposing character that the lame-os online thought she was a transwoman because of their skewed idea of women's bodies and because they don't watch any Professional Wrestling where you can see a 5'8" strong lady almost every day of the week—playing as Abby is such a different experience, too. Her size and strength change how you move in the game as you literally beat up mushroom zombies. You got hands with Abby. You are choking them out. You actually feel powerful and the threat more than the zombies or any people. She's the epitome of you gonna get this work. While I didn't need Dever to be huge, as she does very well in her performance, she isn't as intimidating, and I wish they had figured out a way to make her look a bit more so than she does. Also, after episode two, Abby disappears as an onscreen character, and she becomes just a goal. That felt lacking, as the switch story dynamic is very effective for me.

I don't know if it's a spoiler to say that they don't fit all of the second game in this season and that it will go another season, at least. I feel we'll get more Dever, as Abby's story should be more of a focus. The move to Seattle for Ellie and Dina's journey is a good setting and reminds you of the Boston setting of the early parts of the first season. Ellie and Dina end up in the middle of a conflict that, like the game, you can tell is inspired by the Israeli/Palestine conflict. Unlike the game, this part of the story is pretty obtuse, with one group being the W.L.F. and the other being this religious cult, which is mainly called the "scars" in the show. In the game, they are the Seraphites. There's not much to understand about each group other than the violent acts they commit on each other. One is clear: a more guerilla force with the W.L.F., which was more military-based, took over from the FEDRA government that was running the city.

There are some really strong scenes with Jefferey Wright as Isaac, who he also plays in the game, but for just show watchers, you won't really understand what his goals are. I'm guessing that is also a season three thing we have to wait for. Ellie and Dina feel like the "Americans" are being injected into this allegorical version of real conflict and are confused by it all, like mashing the characters of Unforgiven into The Hurt Locker.

 There's a lot of pushing off of what I feel are some core details of the setting to the next season to focus more on the emotionality of the situation that hurts the overall season when compared to the previous one. The show also has massive action setpieces that overshadow entirely the ones in the first season. They reminded me of the big battle setpieces in Game of Thrones with just the pure amount of spectacle and bodies on the screen. Those are impressive and effective but left me wanting as I got to the end of the season as I feel they took away from elements of the Seattle segments of the season. This season is also shorter, and once the third is out, it will probably work well as book ends if both end up being seven episodes long.

A few actors gave some good performances that stayed with me. Young Mazino as Jessie I feel totally captured that character. Jessie is like Ellie's big brother and is like the chosen of the younger generation of Jackson to be one of the leaders of the community. Mazino pulls that off with an air of just being a good guy, a hero-type person that even Joel doesn't live up to. He's too good for this world and works with Ramsey's Ellie as someone she looks up to while feeling insecure around him.

I don't think Rutina Wesley gets enough time in the season, but at least it's more than last season. Maria is very much Jackson's leader, and she gets some good action scenes in this, but they change her dynamic in Ellie's journey, which I feel somewhat lessens the character. In the game, she sets Ellie on her mission; she's aware and is very much in charge, even as it makes Tommy look more like a screwup in some ways. I think they could've kept that while still having a more well-rounded Tommy.

Catherine O'Hara as Gail, the town's therapist, and while that concept is interesting, I feel we won't really feel like she adds a lot to the overall story arc in season three. Here, she's mostly there for Joel; those scenes are great with her and Pascal. Tati Gabrielle's Nora has some of the best scenes in the season and I can understand with the bald look why she's the lead actress for the new Naughty Dog game. Captivating screen presence. Some of the best of the season, but in the end, I was struggling with the why.

While, as you can see, I have many issues with this season of The Last of Us, I still think it's a fantastic HBO/Max series. I feel the story of TLOU still has strong connections to the deconstructed Western genre, and the game's lack of hope is softened in the show significantly. This story of revenge is less subtly explored in the show than in the game, as it's more passive versus an interactive experience. I still struggle with what I feel the game is saying and its views on the world that the show shares just with an injection of diverse character backgrounds. The Last of Us season two doesn't maintain the quality of season one, but it is still immensely engaging and will have people talking this year.

Score: B

Source: Same Story, Different Feel: HBO’s The Last of Us Season 2 Softens the Game’s Brutality