by Brandon J Trimble

Dr Jennifer Hazel, a psychiatry physician, has said, “The narrative design in The Last of Us is ascendant. I would not hesitate to cite it as the best written game of all time, if not for the portrayal of the characters therein. It is, in my opinion, the current pinnacle of storytelling in games, a feat it achieves through a raw and often painful observation of the human condition.” The Last of Us is a study of how far an individual would go for someone they love. It explores loss and the primal instinct for survival following and in the face of loss. No matter what, you keep finding something to fight for and you fight to spend every second you have with each other. The story of Joel and Ellie is one where you protect the ones you love, the world be damned.

The Human Condition

The Human Condition is defined as: “The positive and negative aspects of existence as a human being, esp. The inevitable events such as birth, childhood, adolescence, love, sex, reproduction, aging, and death.” The Human Condition has been a muse for poetry, music, novels, theatre, film and video games. The Last of Us has made its mark and exceptionally so. In Orange Lightning’s video The Last of Us – The Cure for the Human Condition, he outlines it wonderfully. “The world is the way it is because of a human condition that everyone is afflicted with. The cordyceps infection that turns people into literal monsters is a recent affair. There’s a whole other disease that goes back to the dawn of man and makes us capable of the worst crimes against each other – rationality; the thing that makes us human also makes us monsters.”

Narrative Structure

The Last of Us’ narrative follows a linear chronological structure. There are clues that this was not always the case and may have originally followed an ‘In Media Res’ approach with regards to the introductory scenes of the game. The game opens at the beginning of the outbreak and tosses us straight into the action. We are immediately met with emotional trauma and we will explore this more shortly. After this brief, but powerful introduction, the opening credits roll and Joel wakes up twenty years later. This following part introduces us to a ravaged world where we are grateful for a reprieve from the emotional action that we just went through to take some time to ease into what this world has become and what is going to be expected of us, the players. The introduction of The Last of Us primes you for what you are going to face throughout the game and places you, readily, in Joel’s shoes so that you can empathize more with his actions throughout the game.

Character Analysis

Sarah

Joel’s daughter is our first introduction to the world of The Last of Us. We play first as Sarah, where our experience is carefully constructed through her by the developers. She has fear in her voice, doesn’t know what is happening and is timid in her steps as we move her through her home trying to find Joel. We play as her when Joel fires a gun in the game for the first time and takes the life of his infected neighbor. We are right there with her as she rides in the back seat of the car with her father Joel and uncle Tommy. Sarah hears her father and uncle talk about the events unfolding, she sees a neighbors farm burning and voices her concern when her father urges Tommy to keep driving at the sight of a family that needs help.

The safety of the car is short-lived as the infected begin to drive the populace into a panic and Tommy struggles to navigate the car through a crowd of people. The car is struck and Sarah is hurt. She is carried from the previous safety of the car into her father’s arms where we move as Joel, yet very much experience the chaos that ensues through Sarah’s reactions. The panic of the crowd of people, crashing cars, nearby and visually experienced explosions, burning buildings are all delivered carefully and with the accompanying soundtrack builds the suspense and tension.

Sarah is important to the player because she shapes our experience of this world through how she moves, her confusion, her fear, her desire to help and her trust in the people and world that is very much the norm for us the players. She is Joel’s entire world and for us, we have experienced everything through her and so she is our world within the world of The Last of Us. Tommy hangs back to give Joel time to get Sarah to safety. Joel and Sarah reach the entrance to the highway and overpass where an armed soldier is waiting. This soldier is not without orders or fear. “It’s not zombies. It’s not the infection. Joel’s daughter is taken by a man who would hold his own just as tightly… and it’s not quick, it’s not painless, she cries and whimpers until her breath goes silent and her eyes go cold. All around them the world falls apart while Joel’s dies in the mud.”(The Cure for the Human Condition)

Our innocence as the player is quickly killed so that we must continue on as Joel, so that we can more fully understand him as the story continues to unfold. The decision for Sarah to be played by the player is an important one and shapes our entire experience through the game.

Tess

We don’t know how long Joel and Tess have been together during the twenty years since the outbreak, but we know that they are smugglers, they are survivors and Joel does care enough about her to clean her up when she is hurt, take on the most painful of charges that he could be given, and to struggle with his grief for her when she is gone.

Tess is strong and smart. She is the boss in her and Joel’s dynamic. When alone they will talk openly and with banter, but when it comes to business; Tess does the talking and Joel is the muscle. Tess is driven by the guilt of actions that herself and Joel have taken part in. At first, smuggling Ellie is just a job, but when they discover that Ellie is immune to the cordyceps infection, Tess is offered something she will not refuse and will use all of her strength for; the chance at redemption.

For her the state of the world has been excuse enough to carry out what was necessary for survival. Ellie is hope for a world that can rid itself of this infection and begin to be renewed. In her desperation to make that hope a reality, Tess falls from strong survivor to victim of the infection she hopes to free the world of.

With the Firefly contacts that were supposed to receive Ellie dead, Tess turns to the only one she trusts and knows will follow through. Tess leverages the only factor that will motivate Joel. Herself. She knows that Joel feels no guilt for the world for what the world has taken from him. She knows what Ellie represents to Joel. She knows that Joel will do anything for those he cares about and so she leverages herself.

Bill

Bill represents, perhaps, those who would systemically thrive in an apocalyptic world. He sets traps, has multiple locations where he spreads supplies and equipment. He leaves notes everywhere and talks to himself. Bill is tragic because what is left of his sanity is thriving on the lie that being alone is the only answer to “make it” in this world. He talks of those he had to leave behind for the betterment of himself. You learn that it was his partner that left him, which brings to light that Bill has fabricated a story that helps him cope.

You discover his partner dead, which visibly hurts Bill. Bill’s fabricated story then could seem like it is the better option. In a world where those you care about could die at any moment is it better then to avoid connecting with anyone to spare yourself the grief? Bill told himself a lie to protect himself, which may now take greater root.

Henry & Sam

Henry and Sam introduce a similar dynamic as to Joel and Ellie. Henry has taken on the responsibility of taking care of his younger brother Sam. Henry makes decisions and struggles with choices specifically from the role of brother-turned-protector/responsible figure. Henry can seem harsh at times. He checks on Sam, tries to teach him things from a harsh outlook and doesn’t communicate to his brother very well. In his conversations with Joel, you can see Henry clearly cares. Sam sees Henry still as his brother and the instructions from his brother as just being “mean older brother” instructions. The brotherly dynamic is well done, them both jumping to help each other at any chance, but still having awkward brotherly fights.

Sam is bitten and while hiding that fact, has an interesting conversation with Ellie during his final hours. This conversation shows divide between the beliefs and outlook of the generation born in the infected world and those who still remember how the world was. Just before, Ellie was talking with Joel and Henry as Joel told a story about how he and Tommy rented two Harley’s and rode across the country for Tommy’s birthday. Henry remembers barbecues and misses the safety that something as simple as a barbecue offered; people getting together casually, while now people are always dangerous and trusting one is always a potential threat.

Tommy

Tommy is the idealist. Looking to achieve that better world. We hear that he threw in with the Fireflies, trying to fight to establish a reigning group different than the military. He ultimately left them and we find him one of the leaders of a group, still trying to rebuild the old world that was lost. He seems to be succeeding for the most part. They have managed to get a power plant repaired and running. They have movies for the children in his community that live in a town.

Tommy is against taking over for Joel and getting Ellie to the Fireflies. Tommy remembers a brother that is a ruthless survivor. He refuses to take Ellie when he believes that she is one of Joel’s jobs, but when he sees later it is because Joel cares for her, he agrees to take Ellie for Joel. He recognizes the pain that Ellie symbolizes for Joel. Tommy loved Sarah too and he cannot deny his brother’s agony.

David

David is different than any of the hunters or survivors we have so far encountered because he goes beyond what survival demands. David takes what he wants and he enjoys it. He is a sinister hunter because he comes off initially as a nice person and trustworthy. He toys with his prey. David manipulates and uses what matters to people in order to gain their trust and gain influence over them. David’s people who were at the University are killed by Joel and Ellie. He has every incentive to kill her, but he doesn’t because he takes what he wants and he believes he can take advantage of her.

He has another gun the whole time he is with Ellie. James gets the drop on her but David lets her go with the medicine. He wants to follow her back to where she is keeping Joel. David is some kind of leader in his group, but he isn’t really respected since he gives orders to men not to kill Ellie, but they attempt to anyways while vocally slandering him.

Marlene

Marlene is the leader of the Fireflies and was a close friend of Ellie’s mother. Ellie’s mother Anna had Marlene promise her that Marlene would look out for Ellie. Anna died shortly after Ellie’s birth.

Marlene is torn by these two responsibilities of her life. She ultimately chooses to kill Ellie to harvest the mutated cordyceps in her brain to attempt to make a vaccine for the infection. Recorded audio journals that can be found in the Fireflies’ hospital gives a lot of much needed insight into Marlene’s frame of mind. She is heavily torn and suffering deeply for the choice that she has made. She is rationalizing her decision that she must do what is necessary to attempt to find a cure for the human race.

Marlene represents duty and unfortunately, mirrors us back to the armed soldier who was just doing his duty and following his orders. His orders and duty cost Joel his daughter.

Joel

All of the characters we have covered have influenced Joel throughout his arc. The Last of Us is a story about Joel and Ellie, but Joel is our main protagonist here. The story began and ends with him. He is the active driving character of the plot the majority of the gaming experience.

“Joel doesn’t give much away on the surface. He’s stoic, emotionally unavailable, and mercilessly practical. It is easiest to penetrate his psyche through his relationships with others; his behaviours around those close to him often betray his underlying motivations, which he would prefer to remain well hidden.”(Dr Jennifer Hazel)

Joel’s driving motivation is dictated by caring for others through a powerful natural paternal instinct. Joel shows symptoms of avoidant attachment and of someone who was parentified young. Avoidant attachment is where someone has developed a feeling where they will not b

e taken care of or looked after and so they have to look after themselves and those around them. We know that Joel has looked out for Tommy since they were young and Joel had Sarah when he was very young. Sarah’s mother is not in the picture and so Joel’s natural instincts and habitual instincts likely thrived as a single father.

We experience the agony of Joel’s loss. That is the beauty of the medium of video games. We experience the story the way other mediums cannot. We are active participants. Through being active participants we are naturally evoked a level of investment and responsibility with everything that happens. It is up to the developers to take full advantage and capitalize on the natural investment that comes with the interactive medium. Naughty Dog has done this with The Last of Us.

Joel went from being a child to taking care of Tommy, to fathering a child at a young age, before seventeen and finally to a single father when his wife either died or left. Sarah was Joel’s entire world. Dr Jennifer Hazel says this about about how Joel would have carried on; “Survival instinct would have taken over initially – natural resilience is the main component of grief and trauma reactions.”

Tess is a form of repurposing for Joel. He needs to protect and look after. It is all he has ever known. He likely invested initially in Tommy and gave over fully to be a survivor driven on by primal need. Tommy ultimately left because of “Nightmares from those years”. This is likely around the time Joel met Tess. Tess’ loss returned that pain to Joel and with her desperate request, leverages herself and his need to protect her, and recognizing that he will not survive without a charge; she gives him a purpose to follow after her death.

Bill acts as a twofold warning. A warning of what happens as a lone wolf and a warning of what happens when you don’t face down your demons. Henry and Sam are embodiments of Joel’s fears and reinforce his hesitation. With Tommy, Joel comes to realize the reality of giving Ellie over. Tommy’s refusal and then acceptance paired with Ellie’s honesty brings new light to Joel’s pain. He cares about Ellie and she cares about him. Ellie’s honesty absolves Joel of the pain he has suffered for twenty years. Her honesty brings Joel to the realization that “No one could have protected Sarah. The safest place for her was his arms and for twenty years he believed that wasn’t enough. But that was everything. Sometimes tragedy is inescapable.”(The Cure for the Human Condition)

Marlene sadly becomes an obstacle. Her duty makes her the mirror of the soldier that came bearing Joel’s tragedy twenty years before. Nothing will stop Joel. “The emotions that Joel must have gone through in that moment… This was his one chance to do things over again. The right way… and to save his baby girl because he couldn’t last time… and the guilt he must have felt. You can’t really understand what he went through back then until you understand what he would do to fix it.”(Briana White)

Joel’s final act of the game is to lie to Ellie in desperation to absolve her of her survivor’s guilt the way she absolved him of his tragedy. What he doesn’t realize is that the difference is it was Ellie’s honesty and she isn’t the kind of person that will accept a lie. Joel isn’t the only parent that has ever lied in desperation to protect their child.

Joel teaches a lesson that is subtly depicted throughout the game. The game opens with the ticking of a clock and Joel receives a watch as a gift from his daughter. Twenty years after the outbreak and Sarah’s death, Joel is still wearing the watch, despite it being broken. When Joel is reminded of his daughter through early interactions with Ellie or conversations with Ellie that brings up his painful memories, you will catch Joel glance at his watch or absentmindedly rub it. Time does not heal all wounds and it should not be expected to.

Ellie

The Last of Us is a story about Joel and Ellie as I have said before. Joel is the main character of the story, but by the end Ellie has become the main character; the reigns skillfully transitioned from Joel to Ellie. Ellie is a fighter, wildly curious and wise beyond her years. Ellie looks up to strong people and learns from them. Marlene is Ellie’s mother’s closest friend and Ellie’s only link to her family.

Ellie takes cues from Marlene early on and is wary of Joel. Ellie begins to form a bond with Tess, while Joel keeps his distance as a silent protector. Despite Joel’s resistance he still has occasional moments with Ellie but she sticks with Tess. While with Tess and Joel, Ellie openly declares her admiration for them and thanks them.

When Tess is gone, Ellie is left with Joel who has been distant and is now upset at the loss of his friend. In these moments Ellie’s interactions in a world she has never known or experienced really help to get Joel to open up to her more. She’s never walked through the woods or seen wildlife. She gets lost in the beauty of the world. Beauties that Joel has likely forgotten in the wake of his tragedy.

Ellie wants to fight. She doesn’t want to be a burden. She wants to contribute. In a world of survivors Ellie has to get Joel to teach her how to be a survivor and to overcome his natural tendency to protect her from the dangers of the world and protect her innocence. Ellie is eager to help and contribute, but in her naivety doesn’t fully understand what that means. She takes a life for the first time to save Joel when he is being drowned by an assailant. It makes her feel sick which triggers a response from Joel that she was not expecting. She expects him to be proud of her and to thank her. Joel still carries an instinct to protect and struggles to understand how to teach her to be capable in this world. He is angry because she ends up killing someone to help him. For him that is a failure on his part. He is not angry with her, but at himself and in incapable of communicating this to her.

Ellie pries at Joel and wears on him to let her help and after some time contemplating in silence Joel gives her a gun and lets her help. Ellie is visibly shaken after spending time behind the rifle. Her reaction is really deep and I’ve felt many interpretations from it. She is shaken from her role in killing the enemies, she is hopeful that she has made Joel proud and finally she is grateful that Joel has given her the chance to prove herself to him. From this point on she tries to further prove herself to him and bring up her own feats when they are apart in hopes of impressing him. This is due to Joel’s nature. Ellie picks up on some things and uses what she learns about him to try to wear on Joel.

Ellie reveals her fear of ending up alone to Sam. She is motivated to being capable and is a capable survivor in her own right, but she fears being alone. She is fiercely loyal and thrives on companionship. Despite the world she lives in, she continues to see the beauty around her. She goofs off, tells jokes, kicks around a soccer ball and takes a toy that Henry doesn’t allow Sam to have. Ellie learns that Joel is a man who speaks through his actions and that is why she comes to trust him and doesn’t give up on him. It is why she tirelessly wears through his armor. He proves time and time again that he will protect her and she reciprocates with her own loyalty.

By the time Ellie and Joel arrive at Tommy’s they have noticeably grown close. Joel’s guard is coming down. Ellie learns about Joel’s daughter from Tommy’s wife, Maria and she comes to suspect that Joel is passing her off to Tommy. “It’s here that she tells him that she’d be more afraid without him because with Joel she isn’t cargo. She isn’t a tool. She isn’t a cure. She puts herself in danger and is loyal to Joel because Joel is the only living person who’d do the same. Not for her immunity, but for her.”(The Cure for the Human Condition)

Joel is fatally injured at the University which puts Ellie in the position as protector and forces Joel into the role of being a burden, of needing help. Joel stubbornly tries to wave away the seriousness of his injury and even fights his need for help. Likely for the first time in his life, Joel has been in a position where he is truly helpless and Ellie is put in a position where her ability to survive is all on her.

Ellie meets David and we see just how much she has picked up and learned from Joel. She is wary of David and finds herself captured by him. She cleverly escapes, where David finds her again in a restaurant.

He taunts her and she manages to get the jump on him. David hurts her and attempts to abuse her, but Ellie gets her hands on a machete. Joel runs into the burning building and finds Ellie repeatedly swinging the machete into David’s corpse. Ellie is pulled into the embrace of a man who has proven time and time again that he would throw himself in harm’s way to protect her; the man she sees as her father. This time she has proven that not only can she fight for herself, but she can protect him.

These experiences leave their scars and Ellie is left much how we met Joel twenty years after the death of his daughter. She is realizing as Joel had so long before that there is no clear answer in the world. Joel desperately tries to help her ailing soul during their quiet walk through Salt Lake, but it is not until Ellie encounters a contrast of beauty that pulls her out of her pain.

“…It’s got its ups and downs. But… you can’t deny the view though.”(Ellie) Through it all, Ellie has maintained an eye for the remarkable. Ellie wakes up in the back of a car, being driven by Joel, wearing a hospital gown and still feeling the effects of the drugs wearing off. She hears Joel’s lie. She challenges Joel again before entering Tommy’s community. He reaffirms his lie and Ellie responds with a packed “Okay.” I hear recognition of the lie. I hear pain that he has lied to her. I hear hopeful understanding of why he has lied to her. I hear fear of what Joel’s lie means.

Visual and Audio

It has to be noted that Gustavo Santaolalla’s score is essential to the delivery of the tension and emotion in this game. The contrast of the horror and beauty that is prevalent throughout the game effectively primes the player for each following moment. The beauty makes the horror more effective and the horror brightens the beauty. “…a contrast of death and Beauty became a theme for almost everything we put in the game…”(Neil Druckmann, Creative Director of The Last of Us)

Conclusion

The Last of Us effectively delivers through all aspects that it leverages throughout the game. It is a wonderful exploration of the Human Condition, rich with interesting characters and rooted in a father-daughter relationship that is wholly moving. The message that the experience sets out to convey is delivered powerfully and does not hold back. The story of Joel and Ellie is one where you protect the ones you love, the world be damned.

Works Cited

Brizee, Allen, et al. “Literary Theory and Schools of Criticism.” OWL Purdue Online Writing Lab, Purdue University, 24 Jan. 2018, owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/722/1/. Accessed 3 Apr. 2018.

“Grounded: The Making of The Last of Us.” YouTube, uploaded by PlayStation, 28 Feb. 2014, youtu.be/yH5MgEbBOps. Accessed 3 Apr. 2018.

Hazel, Jennifer, Dr. “Character Psychology: Joel, The Last of Us.” CheckPoint, 14 Apr. 2017, checkpoint.org.au/character-psychology-joel-last-us/. Accessed 3 Apr. 2018.

“human condition”. Dictionary.com’s 21st Century Lexicon. Dictionary.com, LLC. 4 Apr. 2018. http://www.dictionary.com/browse/human-condition>.

“IT CAN’T END LIKE THIS- The Last of Us Remastered PS4: Chapter 11 & 12

(Finale).” YouTube, uploaded by Briana White and Strange Rebel Gaming, 26

Aug. 2016, youtu.be/5oAqpklJkMc. Accessed 4 Apr. 2018.

“The Last of Us – The Cure for the Human Condition.” YouTube, uploaded by Orange Lightning, 4 Nov. 2017, youtu.be/rWLoCqtozBM. Accessed 3 Apr. 2018.

Naughty Dog. The Last of Us. Remastered ed., CD-ROM, Sony Interactive Entertainment America LLC, 2014.

“Neil Druckmann of Naughty Dog – The AIAS Game Maker’s Notebook.” YouTube, uploaded by Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, 3 Jan. 2018, youtu.be/D63XwbGPPqg. Accessed 3 Apr. 2018.