The fifth episode of The Last of Us premiered on Friday on HBO and HBO Max. It brought viewers back to Ellie and Joel (Bella Ramsey and Pedro Pascal), who were awakened in the middle of the night by two men armed with firearms. The smuggler and his teenage companion were attempting to flee Kansas City at the time of the meeting.
A militant faction headed by the furious Kathleen has seized control of the city in the Midwest and occupied it (Melanie Lynskey). Her brother Michael was murdered by FEDRA, which is the Federal Disaster Response Agency. FEDRA, along with the remains of the United States military, is responsible for running quarantine zones. FEDRA is one of the last surviving pieces of the government.
This is also an interruption to the main journey that our heroes are on, which is to bring Ellie to the Fireflies, a rebel organization that seeks to reproduce Ellie’s immunity to the fungal sickness that has transformed billions of people into monsters. Getting Ellie to the Fireflies is our heroes’ real objective.
Anyone who has played the PlayStation game that served as the show’s inspiration will be acquainted with the duo that is now holding Ellie and Joel at gunpoint; nevertheless, fans may be startled by how much more information about their past is provided by the adaptation. As we go further into the sinister fifth episode, it is time for spoilers.
The collapse of FEDRA
The first scene of the episode is a flashback, and it shows how Kathleen’s civilian militia group was able to overthrow FEDRA ten days before Joel and Ellie arrived in town. The people rose up against this tyrannical organization, and they basically killed its members in the streets. It is violent and awful, and 8-year-old Sam, played by Keivonn Woodard, sees part of this carnage as his elder brother Henry, played by Lamar Johnson, hurries him into hiding in an attic. Sam observes some of this violence as his older brother Henry tries to protect him.
When speaking to a group of FEDRA accomplices who are being held hostage, Kathleen offers them clemency in return for the whereabouts of Henry. Even when one of the individuals speaks, she gives the order for her thugs to murder everyone in the group nevertheless. It would seem that in her pursuit of revenge she has lost any capacity for compassion.
Henry, the older sibling, tries to reassure his younger sibling by drawing a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles bandanna (in Raphael red) around the younger brother’s face just before they leave their hiding spot. It not only looks great, but it also provides a welcome break from the continuous intensity. In real life, actor Keivonn Woodard has a hearing impairment, much as the character Sam does in the video game. This is an intriguing development, and it makes the character’s interplay with Henry and Ellie even more interesting to see unfold.
Converging on each other
Henry witnesses Joel killing many members of Kathleen’s scavenging team, and this leads him to the realization that our hero may assist him and Sam in escaping the city. They forge a shaky partnership in spite of what Joel refers to as his “asshole voice,” and they go into the underground maintenance tunnels.
By driving the sick into these tunnels, FEDRA was able to successfully rid the city of its infection. Kathleen and the other people were unaware that FEDRA had supposedly cleaned the area of monsters. When our foursome travels into the tunnels, the camerawork and lighting are really beautiful at this point.
After some time has passed, we find out that Henry worked with FEDRA to ensure that Sam could get treatment for his leukemia. In order to do this, he was forced to hand up the brother of Kathleen’s opposition commander. Henry is originally written off by Joel as a rat, but in the end, Joel concedes that Henry was right to do whatever it needed to keep Sam safe and that he did the right thing.
A tragic aside to the main narrative
Even though the dwelling area in the sewer where Ellie, Joel, Henry, and Sam stop for a moment to catch their breath is vacant, it is obvious that it was once a location where people were able to exist for a considerable amount of time. Joel comes upon a sketch made by a toddler that depicts two individuals armed with weapons and the words “Danny, Ish, our defenders.”
In the event that this has peaked your interest, we discover the outcomes of these people’s stories in the game via notes that are strewn around the environment. The events described in that version took place in Pittsburgh, but the names and the set of the performance are the same, thus it’s possible that the events played out in a similar manner. However, you should be cautioned that it is terrible.
In the aftermath of the breakout, Susan, Kyle, and their children came upon a survivor by the name of Ish, who led them to his refuge deep under the sewer system of the city. They were able to dig themselves a safe haven underneath the post-apocalyptic wasteland on top, and their survivor group eventually expanded to include about fifty individuals (one of whom went by the name Danny).
Despite Ish, Kyle, and Danny’s best attempts to maintain security, the infected were finally able to get inside via “one open door,” which ruined the whole plan.
Inadvertently entrapping a group of children, Kyle sealed himself and a few other children within a room. Instead of allowing these youngsters to starve to death or get sick, he shot them all, wrapped them in a sheet, and scribbled on the ground, “They didn’t suffer.” After that, he decided to end his own life.
When Joel first saw the skeletal bones, he exclaimed, “Jesus Christ.” It’s very awful stuff to be sure. Susan, Kyle’s wife, was able to escape the sewers with Ish and a few other children, but after learning that her family had been killed, she became despondent and attempted to go back into the sewers. Ish was successful in stopping her.
“There is not a single aspect of my existence that does not want to give up. It would be so simple to give in to the demands of this world. But I’m afraid I can’t help you there. “I have too much faith in humanity,” the final note that he left behind reads. “I’ve seen that despite everything, we can still be decent. We will be successful. I have to keep my composure… for her sake.”
After that moment, it is unclear what became of them; nonetheless, let’s make the assumption that they made it to a secure location and lived happily ever after. That seems like it would happen in this dreadful imaginary universe, doesn’t it?
The opposing viewpoint
Our heroes emerge from the tunnels to find themselves in a suburban setting, when an enemy sniper fires a bullet right in the middle of their celebratory mood. This scene is modeled after a portion of the video game. Joel is successful in sneaking up on the individual and eliminating him, but not before he calls for assistance. Ellie, Henry, and Sam are cornered as Kathleen and her henchman Perry lead a large group to their position.
Although she is aware that Henry abandoned her brother in order to rescue Sam, she makes it quite plain that the children will not be permitted to continue living.
She asks, “Have you ever considered the possibility that maybe he was destined to pass away?” “This is what happens when you mess with destiny,” the speaker said.
At precisely the moment that she is getting ready to kill Henry, a horde of infected emerge from beneath and begin slaughtering Kathleen’s soldiers. The large one is referred to as a Bloater in the games; these late-stage infected are very resilient and powerful, as is seen when it rips Perry’s head clean off. Kathleen is killed when a youngster who has been turned into a Clicker pounces on her and tears her to pieces after the child has attacked her.
A grim twist
Ellie, Joel, Sam, and Henry seem to have escaped unharmed and have located an old hotel in which to take a break (this also happens in much the same way in the game). While Ellie and the other two guys are sleeping in the adjacent room, Sam and Ellie are pretending to read comics together, but the young man is obviously preoccupied.
In a message to Ellie, he asks, “If you turn into a monster, is it still you inside?,” setting the stage for an emotional gut-punch for both Ellie and the audience.
He confides in his new friend that he was bitten during the chaos, which is essentially the same as being given a death sentence. She then reveals to Sam that she is immune to his injury before applying some of her own blood to it. Which is something that seems like a nice idea, but neither of them appears to be persuaded. The game does not have either of them admitting any of these things.
Ellie gives in to Sam’s anxiety and agrees to stay up with him, but she soon falls asleep. When she comes to, she finds him sitting up and turned away from her. She quickly realizes that the illness has taken hold. The violent creature who assaults her is Sam’s replacement; nevertheless, the fact that he is still deaf indicates that some part of his human personality may still be there.
When their struggle gets them into the room with the grownups, Henry pulls out a revolver and kills his younger brother, who was the beneficiary of so many of Henry’s selfless acts. He takes a fleeting shot at Joel with the weapon before bringing it around to face himself and pressing the trigger.
“Oh God,” exclaims Joel as he, Ellie, and everyone else in the crowd attempts to digest the horrific spectacle that had occurred.
Saying farewell
Ellie and Joel bury their friends close by, and the teenager sets the reusable notebook from the Magic Slate that she had been using to chat to Sam on top of the grave of one of the deceased boys.
It says “I’m sorry” on the note.
In spite of the emotional turmoil they are experiencing, Joel and his friend continue their trek west in the hopes of finding Joel’s brother Tommy and the Fireflies. That was a difficult part.
