The Last of Us has always prided itself on being a faithful adaptation, but that doesn’t always mean showing everything in the game, at least, not in the same order. Season 1 added the villain Kathleen, an ultra-zealous cannibalistic cult, and the heartbreaking standalone episode showing the love story between Bill and Frank.
In Season 2, we see this in the beginning with the addition of Gail, Joel’s therapist and the wife of the late Eugene. But after that, things more or less lined up with The Last of Us Part II. But in the penultimate episode of Season 2, this all changes with an attempt at a standalone episode that fills in the gaps left from the game, but quickly becomes too much of a good thing.
Warning! Spoilers ahead for The Last of Us Season 2 Episode 6.
In The Last of Us Part II, Ellie’s three-day quest to find Abby in Seattle is occasionally interrupted with flashbacks to her past with Joel: the prologue of the game itself shows Joel giving Ellie a guitar and playing it for her. Later, we see a birthday gift Joel arranged, where Ellie is able to explore the science museum. A year after that, we see them encounter the corpses of a couple who decided to leave Jackson, a sight that makes Ellie question the lies Joel told her about what happened in Salt Lake City when she was taken from the Firefly operating room. Eventually, Ellie goes back to the hospital and finds a tape that reveals the truth: Joel took her away from the Fireflies because they intended to sacrifice her.
Finally, we see what happened the night before the game’s main story began: the New Year’s dance, Ellie’s kiss with Dina, and Joel defending Ellie. Later, the two meet on the porch, where they have a fateful conversation about what Joel did and forgiveness: Ellie isn’t sure if she can forgive Joel, but she’d like to try.
In the series, all of these flashbacks are condensed into one episode, and some are changed entirely: the patrol is no longer where Ellie and Joel see an escaped couple’s bodies, but where they encounter Eugene bitten. And most egregious of all, the episode includes the beloved porch scene — a scene which, in the game, only shows up in the last moments of the game as a final emotional gut punch. But the TV adaptation is barely at the halfway mark of the game's story, dulling the emotional impact of the scene.
It’s easy to see why all of these flashbacks are restricted to one episode: this way, this episode can stand on its own outside of the revenge quest and replicate the same feeling as the Bill and Frank episode, which took place mainly in the past. There’s also an added benefit: by keeping Joel’s appearance to just this episode, Pedro could possibly be eligible for a guest actor Emmy, just as Kaitlyn Dever is campaigning for in the Guest Actress category.
But in the game, all of these flashbacks work so well interspersed throughout because it gives us a glimpse as to how Ellie is processing losing Joel. Grief, just like’s story, is nonlinear, and memory can jump from the good times to the bad times and back over the course of days. This episode is intended to be a heartfelt meditation on that point, but it ends up as a rushed look back that is almost too much to bear.
