*SPOILERS AHEAD FOR THE LAST OF US SEASON 2*
We’re a few episodes into Season 2 of The Last of Us on HBO, and, boy, have we all got emotional damage YET AGAIN from this show! That one big thing happened at the end of episode two, and now we’re picking up the pieces of our broken psyches. And so have the characters in the show!
Here’s where it gets confusing to fans of the game, though, because the set-up to that one event (which I will detail in the next paragraph, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED TWICE NOW!) has been so different for the characters we know and love in this new televisual format. That’s the nature of adaptations, right? You try to do the source material justice, but you’re going to tweak things here and there to suit the media format, or just because of genre or budgetary limitations.
Joel is dead (there, I said it), but the supporting cast doesn’t have the same background, placement, or even personality as their video game counterparts. So, here we are. We’re in a place where we now need to take stock of what motivations our main players have after the subtle changes made to the story.
Not a lot has changed for Ellie in the show. Her guilt and lust for revenge are at the forefront of her character because she was present for Joel’s execution at the hands of Abby and her W.L.F. friends. What has changed is timing and circumstance. Instead of a few days, Ellie has had three whole months to stew after being laid up in the hospital.
Also, unlike in the show, Ellie and Dina were the second people to embark on the Seattle journey, following Tommy. So, you could say, Ellie had an extra motivation to save her last link to Joel in this world from certain death at the hands of the W.L.F. This was a positive motivator rather than the negativity of rage, guilt and revenge that the show’s version has.
Ellie is extremely angry, but the time to reflect could make her either more explosive or make for a slower maniacal build, so she can get to the right state of mind to commit the atrocities she’s about to commit in the hospital in Seattle. That’s not to say the two Ellies don’t have differences. I can’t imagine Game Ellie holding back her outbursts at the council meeting, unlike Bella Ramsey’s version. It’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out.
Naughty Dog’s original vision had Joel and TOMMY being the ones who saved Abby from the horde, and ultimately ambushed by her friends. Hell, it was Tommy who volunteered their names to the group. He was incapacitated and unable to stop Abby’s 6-over-par round of golf with Joel’s head. He desperately wants to even the score and is the first person to make the trip to Seattle. Some of that is also to protect Ellie from herself, but it’s mainly a quest for revenge.
Tommy, in the show, was instrumental in fending off the infected horde in Jackson, taking a leadership role on the front lines. It was a devastating moment for the colony, but he was where he was meant to be. Yes, Joel died at the same moment, but he hasn’t got any real guilt about it. There’s understanding. He understood that sooner or later, the bad sh*t that Joel did could have caught up with him, and Joel wouldn’t want anyone to take stupid risks over a dead body.
He is, however, motivated by family and strives to protect his home. This includes Ellie and, to an extent, Dina. It also includes trying to prevent stupid crap they might do to bring a war back to Jackson…
It’s yet to be seen whether Tommy makes the trip to Seattle in the show, but he’s the first one to go in the source material. Gabriel Luna’s Tommy doesn’t have to live with the guilt of being with his brother when he is killed or thinking he could have stopped it. In fact, he knows for sure he was in the place he was needed the most: Jackson, killing a Bloater and saving his wife and child. Yeah, he’s angry, but this Tommy doesn’t feel like he’s on a quest for revenge. The only way I see him going to Seattle is to try to protect his extended family, Ellie and Dina.
In The Last of Us Part 2, Dina doesn’t have any sort of existing relationship with Joel, but her romance with Ellie is beginning to blossom when he is killed. Their first kiss at the dance had only just happened, and their romantic trajectory was off the charts, having already slept together by the time Abby went clubbing. Sure, she has some empathetic anger, but her main motivator is Ellie. If Ellie’s going, then so shall she.
Isabel Merced’s Dina is a whole lot more messy. She treats Joel like a father figure, showing she has love for the man. She is also Joel’s partner when they save Abby from the infected and are ambushed in the chalet. She is present when Joel is shotgunned in the knee and then killed hours later. There is so much guilt and anger in her; she almost rivals Ellie.
She obviously has an affection for Ellie (as seen in Seattle), but at the point of leaving Jackson, that’s all it was. It had been three long months since the kiss at the dance and a romance hadn’t progressed at all. Heck, she even returned to Jesse while Ellie was healing up.
Dina is as motivated to kill Abby and the W.L.F. as Ellie is. She loved Joel and wants the blood of their attackers, especially Tigress Woods. She may be pregnant, but there’s no way that this version of Dina will be as sidelined as the character in the game. Her rage is too powerful to let that happen, although it may be medically taken out of her hands by Seattle Day 3.
Why do I need to talk about Jesse? Not a lot has changed with him, and the show doesn’t seem to give any sort of hint that he’s going to appear on the West Coast. However, he’s a pivotal character, so let’s do a quick once-over. His motivation is Dina. Although they had broken up in the game, he’s still with her in the show (I think?!).
As a leader of Jackson township and Dina’s boyfriend, he may follow them to the Pacific Northwest to save them from themselves. Neither version of Jesse knew about Dina’s pregnancy before the trip, so he’s likely to be very protective if and when they meet up again.
Well, buckle up, kids. It’s gonna be a bumpy ride. I’m not saying it won’t be good because Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann have proven pretty capable at adapting this story so far, but it’s not gonna be The Last of Us as we know it. That no longer makes sense in the show’s story.
You can’t put the characters through the motivational merry-go-round and expect everything to play out exactly the same. Blindly following the game’s path after diverging so hard is a recipe for disaster. It could be messy, and you might not like the hard right turns the characters you know and love take, but these AREN’T the same characters as in the game. These are the show’s incarnations.
I’m sure it’ll be great. But, as Scar would say in The Lion King, BE PREPARRREEEED!
