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The Last of Us 2x2 | Watch Along (Patreon)

Published:
2025-04-23 14:00:14
Imported:
2026-06
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The Last of Us 2x2 | Watch Along

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Comments

James Germain

I present to u the new Ned Stark lol

FW27

So much pain

Turtle-man 2023

No spoilers obviously but as someone who played the game this series is going to treat your heart like a punching bag and as someone who saw it coming I'm still pretty raw about it

Ray H

Oh can’t wait to watch this one when I get home from work. HBO hates Pedro don’t they 😂

MJ Eid

Hope the girls mental health is ok.

Sydney

I’ve played the game and this is truly one of the most gut wrenching yet beautiful stories ever told. The writers are geniuses for taking this risk and still making something worth telling.

Chris Bruneau

I truly feel like "fuck this show" right now.

FW27

Putting the Ashley Johnson cover at the end was particularly cruel.

Slick447

All the best games make you cry 😢

Joey Johansen

yea fyi prolly the most emotionally devastating video game I've ever played in my 37+ years of life. And it's a looooong, long game.

TigerMyth

The second game info was leaked a couple of weeks before it went on sale. I refused to even buy it. Not only do they kill Joel but then they force you to play Abby. All preachy about the cycle of violence while creating one of the most violent video games ever and by violent I mean realistic to the real world violence.

Kyle

I was more confused because you have no idea who Abby is yet in the game

Cozzi

Maple: "Are you guys just bawling out when you're playing the game? Like, you crying out there?" Yes, yes we were. One of the best video games of all time.

Turtle-man 2023

I wrote my psychology thesis on this game right in the middle of all the controversy prior to the release and the year following with the review bombing and threats to the game director. I borrowed a line from a YouTube review, "if you finished the game and still felt like you wanted to kill abby then you may have beat the game you were playing with your controller, but you've lost the game naughtydog was playing with your soul"

PurportedGrey

Thankfully I played it without the leaks mudding my opinion especially when I beat it and saw that the leak said Abby was a trans character that killed Joel out of no where, which made me scoff at the unnecessary poisoning of the well, but I did form your opinion about it during my playthrough, it's a very pretentious and overbearing story that could be improved to a degree (a 4/10 becoming a 6/10) if we played/saw the flash backs leading up to this this moment. But I did love Abby, yes I hate her for Joel, but I did love her story, that's my only positive ill givr the 2nd games storytelling, but ill heap all the praise for its gameplayand mechanics, thats 10/10!

PurportedGrey

Yeah that last episode felt like Joel was way more of a punching bag compared to how he was portrayed in the game, I rolled my eyes throughout that "therapy session" in the last episode.

Chris Thompson

Should have happened episode 5 at the earliest. And cutting away after a couple leg hits was a terrible idea. Took so much away from the impact, especially when all you then see is that stick insect punching him once and the mess that was his face. This should have been the Negan-Glen scene, unflinching, but then again they clearly want you to start rooting for Abby so they utterly puss out, destroying what should have been the most impactful scene of the entire series. Because let’s face it, outside of killing Ellie, there really hasn’t been any ground set for anything else that might rival it.

Chris Bruneau

I just looked this up--The actual video game forces players to experience the story from both Ellie's and Abby's perspectives--so that means YOU play the character that killed Joel, that's absolutely F'd !!!!!

Turtle-man 2023

Congratulations, the creators have effectively turned you into ellie. You will not have a good time, and everything that happens after this will break your heart...

Albert Delarosa

In the game you run on revenge and hate, halfway point you play as abby, make you even more mad and piss off, don't even know why this happen til you play her side. By then you just too exhausted

Chris Bruneau

That's assuming I even keep watching. I gave up on walking dead because of this kind of BS

TigerMyth

Deleted. Too spoilery

Turtle-man 2023

Spoiler----- Yeah but it was a truly monumental gamble on the side of the developers, walk a mile in the shoes of someone you hate, and that is one challenge you can't overcome with a controller. It also asks you to come to terms with the fact that abby is in the exact same pain as ellie is now.

TigerMyth

Should be noted that Cohh was so afraid of the backlash he would get for not liking the game, his original thoughts video was edited so much it appeared he liked the game. Then he took heat for the clearly edited Thoughts video so he released the unedited version and yeah, he really didn't like the story at all.

Turtle-man 2023

Understandable, but this isn't mindless violence for the sake of shock factor. The story is as impactful as it is divisive but I will say this, art imitates life with this story. You can choose to walk away and move on with your life or you can subscribe to the same vengeance that the character and alot of the audience is feeling.

PurportedGrey

Yeah, I think this is where I’ll tap out. I wanted to see how they recreated that scene—and to be fair, they did a great job augmenting it. But I haven’t really liked Bella in this role so far this season. I don’t think I’ll enjoy the rest of the show with her being the main focus. Last season, she came off like a high school student doing a scene read. Now, she’s finally made the character her own—like Pedro did for Joel last season—rather than mimicking Ashley Johnson’s performance. But it feels like she’s now acting how Ellie should’ve been last season: a 13-year-old in a brutal world, shouldering way more responsibility than a real-life kid that age ever would. Look at the games—Ellie’s goofy at times, but not during life-or-death moments. The show version disobeying orders and casually entering a building with a clicker felt off. Maybe it's nitpicky, but it seems like she's playing an over-the-top version of Ellie instead of someone hardened by this world—which was the whole point of Parts 1 and 2, per Neil Druckmann. Bella is a good actress—she killed it in Game of Thrones—I just think Abby’s actress would've been a better choice for Ellie. She looks the part and has the acting chops, too. It’s always been odd they picked Bella, especially when there were other talented options who fit the character’s look. That could've helped avoid some of the backlash the weirdos are complaining about with her "hotness" and her being non-binary. Why would the creators take that risk? Either way, I'm interested to see if there is gonna be a drop off like Glenn's moment in the Walking Dead. Hope yall enjoy the rest of the season!

Turtle-man 2023

The leaks ended up poisoning alot of people into hating something that hadn't even come out yet, I played it to the halfway point and stopped at the narrative shift and it took a long time for me to go back because I feel the game did that good of a job of putting me in ellies shoes. I'm thankful I went back and finished it because it is such an amazing story

Ben Rafferty

To be fair it was the roots in Jackson that were hit in the pipe that caused the horde to go there not Abby but yeah I understand how you guys feel. I also understand Abby's pov of everything, it just sucks cause it's just a constant cycle of revenge now.

Lee Hambly

Wait, wut? Bella is writing and directing the show now? Her portrayal of the character doesnt dictate the character's actions.

PurportedGrey

You're acting like actors don’t regularly ask or push to do things differently in scenes—there are millions of examples of that. Bella still performs based on her interpretation of the direction she’s given, but actors aren’t robots who just follow commands. If you’ve taken acting classes—whether in school or in a professional or semi-professional setting—you’d know that what I’m saying about Bella’s performance in Season 1 is valid. Actors do have agency in how they portray a character. Especially with how relaxed the set seems to be, I wouldn’t be surprised if she has more freedom now compared to Season 1. It’s a collaborative process—everyone contributes to the final product. You’re not completely wrong though—the writing and directing are definitely part of the issue too. They’re doing a solid job overall, but some of the character moments just feel off, like they don’t fully land or make sense in terms of motivation or tone. And just to reiterate, in case it wasn’t clear: I like Bella. My criticism isn’t personal—it’s just my honest take on the show after two episodes. I’m not planning to continue watching, not just because of how these moments are handled, but also because of how the overall story plays out (which I’ve mentioned in another comment—I love the game, but I really hate how pretentious and overbearing the story gets from this point forward).

ZitherManifesto

I've been waiting for this ep for you girls since they announced the show

Kyle

Believe me you aren't going to miss anything you probably haven't seen before. And the ending will most likely leave you unsatisfied.

Athasin

I keep flip-flopping between thinking it was a good idea that the show writers decided to tell the audience Abby's motives from the start and wishing they hadn't until halfway through the story, like what happened in the game. Because not knowing and wanting to know was one of the driving forces of the story.

Athasin

No matter what I don't think Abby was right to torture Joel just because he shot her father in the head (and deep down we know it was because of that one death, not because of the massacre). Kill him sure, but the way she did it was literally overkill... which now that I'm thinking about it... game Abby probably hadn't planned to torture him to death. Game Abby didn't even get a chance to give a monologue to tell him why she was doing what she was doing. Joel decided to dismiss her the moment they put the tourniquet on and *that* is what set her off to go looking for something and she found the clubs. Them deciding to make show Abby want to torture him from the jump means that I actually lost sympathy for her.

MarisoL

They Robb Stark me here 😢

Athasin

And yeah we were sobbing while playing. The second Last of Us game came out during COVID (2020) and I remember bawling after that cutscene and then having to take an hour break to just bring myself to continue playing. Because it straight destroyed me that he died before they could make up. Vengeance and wanting to know why Abby did it (they didn't tell us who she was or why she wanted him dead at the beginning of the game, hell they didn't even tell us she wanted Joel dead so we didn't even know he was in danger until his leg got blown off) was the only thing that kept me playing.

Athasin

You play Abby in the beginning too. I think that's what got so many players mad because they made us (as Abby) lure Joel (and Tommy) to that lodge not knowing that we were leading Joel to his death. Then they made us sit in that guilt and hate for half the game before telling us why she did what she did, and by that point, some of us didn't even care. So I think that's why they're going a different route with the show. Right off the bat they're telling people Abby's motive so we don't just despise her.

lindelofstan

It should be noted that Abby did not cause the horde to go to Jackson. The roots would have woken them up and sent them to Jackson anyway

lindelofstan

Yeah obviously, but I think when it comes to the "Abby did way more harm than Joel ever did" claim, that one's pretty obviously false

lindelofstan

1. They absolutely should not have added 3 filler episodes for no reason lmfao. This was the ideal time for this to happen 2. In the game you cut away after the first hit, and you don't see Joel again until Ellie enters, so not sure how you reached the conclusion that they cut away too early and didn't show enough. 3. They absolutely don't want you to root for Abby here, the whole concept of the story is fundamentally built on the audience hating Abby at this point 0/3 good takes, impressive

Phil Wu

sobbing into the corsairs

MJ Eid

This thumbnail XD theres no way.

Chris Thompson

Dude, I don’t give a fuck about the game, never played it. I’m only going by what’s on the screen and as a TV show it doesn’t remotely work and proves that being so slavish to the fans is never a good idea. It’s called an adaptation for a reason, the writers need to ADAPT the game to a whole different format so it really is up to them to flesh things out and make the game’s story their own. And if they want you to hate Abby right now, then why did they go to the clunky-ass effort to explain who she was, why she was going after Joel and how it affected her?

Athasin

In regards to Pedro Pascal I saw someone say, "This time he died on a mountain instead of under one," and I felt the need to share that here.

MJ Eid

PEace you wont be missed.

MJ Eid

Ariana just out here reliving the PTSD of an entire generation of gamers over and over.

Sebastian B.

This shit killed the pope, I'm sure of it

ZitherManifesto

Just think, Joel died thinking he failed as a father again.

DTGstl314

The showrunners have confirmed that this was not the last time we'll see Pedro Pascal on screen this season (but yes, Joel is very much dead) - presumably he'll appear in flashbacks. I don't think Abby can be considered straight-up evil - if the roles were reversed, Joel may well have done the exact same thing. Her decision to drag it out and make it as brutal as possible isn't at all defensible, but her desire to kill him was absolutely based on a valid grievance. He murdered her father. Yes, murdered - shooting an unarmed person who poses no immediate threat to you in the head at point blank range is absolutely murder. I don't think killing Joel brought her whatever closure she was seeking, and now it seems pretty inevitable that it will ultimately lead to her own death - the cycle continues. Abby just made Ellie experience the same thing at the age of 19 that she experienced herself at the age of 19, but worse, because Abby didn't directly witness the actual murder of her father as it happened. Kaitlyn Dever delivered a rockstar performance, which apparently affected her very personally. They were supposed to film this scene in early February 2024, but Dever's mom died three days before they were going to shoot this. Series co-creator Craig Mazin told her to take all the time she needed, and they shot the scene a few weeks later. Dever's personal loss was obviously still weighing pretty heavily on her, so I think it made the scene feel a lot more emotionally authentic on her part.

DTGstl314

Fair, but she probably expedited it. Unintentionally, obviously. Whatever one wants to say about her, she remained committed to her promise to not kill anyone other than Joel. They easily could have taken out Dina and Ellie if they had wanted to (and probably Jesse as well once he arrived), but they didn't, because killing Joel was their only mission.

Juliana Silva

you should react to joel's death in the game, to me is even more brutal

DTGstl314

Supposedly part of the reason they revealed Abby's motives before she killed Joel was for Kaitlyn Dever's own personal safety. Laura Bailey, the voice actor for Abby in the game, had to deal with getting death threats when the game was released from a lot of gamers who apparently all need to touch grass. She's an actor, not the person she was playing, and some people seem to struggle with stepping away from the screen and realizing that none of this is real, and nobody actually died. Anyway, I think as soon as Abby said, "that was my dad", the viewer is forced to step back from their preconceived opinion of her - we like things to be black and white, but life is a lot of gray. It was easy to hate her when she just seemed like a bad guy on a generalized revenge mission and we didn't know the deeply personal loss she suffered. Her desire to kill Joel was based entirely on genuine emotional pain and grieving that she was experiencing because of what he did. When you're forced to imagine all of this from her frame of reference... yeah, of course she wanted to kill Joel. He went on a mass shooting spree that led to the death of her unarmed father as he was trying to save the world.

DTGstl314

The thing is, as messed up and indefensible as the horrific way she killed Joel was, I don't think she enjoyed any second of it, and I don't think it gave her the closure she was seeking. In her mind, Joel was a monstrous mass murderer who ripped apart her entire world, and she wanted him to experience an amount of physical suffering that she felt was comparable to the amount of emotional suffering he had inflicted on her. She probably thought knowing that she made her father's murderer suffer for his crime would bring her some peace, but all it really did was keep the cycle going. I wonder if she's aware that she likely just signed her own death warrant, and perhaps she doesn't care anymore, because she feels like she has nothing left to live for.

DTGstl314

Non-gamer here - I didn't root for Abby or want her to do what she did... but I absolutely got why she did it. I do think they wanted you to experience some sense of empathy towards her - the moment she revealed that the doctor was her dad and you see her start to cry, you realize that her pain is very real and valid and she has every reason in the world to want Joel dead. Even Joel seems to acknowledge that he understands why she's going to kill him when he slightly nods his head after she reveals her motive to him. I think he knows at that moment that he's going to die and that his own actions are what led to his imminent death, and he's just trying to brace himself for it. Negan was just cruel for the sake of being cruel and as a show of dominance to remind all of the witnesses that he was in charge. Abby's cruelty was a trauma response to the pain Joel inflicted on her.

TinCan Cosmanaut

Alot of gamers and gaming streamers flatout stopped playing the game after this point. They spent $60 on. Some came back months or years later to see how the story ends.

DTGstl314

I feel like the comparison to Ned Stark is a bit off, because he was a genuinely innocent man (Joel was not), and the person responsible for Ned's death was doing so mainly as a proud display of his own capacity for cruelty. Joffrey thoroughly enjoyed the pain that he was inflicting on the Starks, and that was largely the point. Abby wasn't motivated by a desire to make Ellie or any of Joel's other loved ones suffer - she went out of her way to shield Dina from having to witness it. I don't think they put Dina to sleep just to prevent her from trying to thwart the execution of Joel, I think Abby thought "what I'm about to do this man is going to be completely horrific, and I'm not going to force you (Dina) to witness it, because I have no personal beef with you". That Ellie was forced to witness it was unintentional, and if Abby truly wanted to make Ellie suffer for the sake of making her suffer, she could have dragged out Joel's torture even longer. The moment Ellie comes into the room, Abby stops punching Joel, and when Abby's boyfriend (can't remember his name) told her to end it, she did so without pushback because she knew there was no point to continue torturing him in front of Ellie.

James Germain

I was speaking in terms of killing off main characters but yes you are correct in that aspect

Tom Fehr

oh we definitely crying during the game

Eric Wall

I think Joel was so compliant specifically so Dina would okay. He’s pretty good at reading a situation and knew they were only there for him. Honestly, after seeing Jackson in flames, he was probably relieved to see Ellie cause that meant she wasn’t caught up in that chaos. Him just seeing her means she *is* safe, and him seeing her reaction was probably the most visceral display of how much she still cared anyone could’ve asked for. At least that’s always been my silver lining, that Joel died seeing Ellie does still care.

Adon Delgado

When she was yapping about her “unarmed” father as if he wasn’t about to kill Joel’s daughter it made me think of that Unforgiven quote “he should’ve armed himself if he was gonna decorate his saloon with my friend”

Zane Platt

I half agree with you. My main grievance is that the doctor was not unarmed and the doctor was also preparing to perform a surgery that was entirely unnecessary medically speaking. I agree though that Abby killing Joel was fair enough.

Zane Platt

She is a really talented actress. The idea that she can't act is something you are manufacturing. I do think she struggles at times to be as nuanced as Ashley Johnsons portrayals was, but it is far from bad

Nigel Douglas

great episode but i feel like abby's voice actress acts a bit like its a disney show. like shes just not believable with many of her more serious lines.

FW27

I think you’re giving Abby way too much grace. I agree completely with the premise that she isn’t some evil sadistic person who loves violence just for cruelty’s sake. But even someone who isn’t evil can commit an evil act. Her knocking Dina out doesn’t negate the fact that she threatened her safety twice. Even if it was for leverage, she was dead serious. She also knew Ellie suffered while experiencing Joel’s death and she didn’t care (at least not in that moment). She was completely justified in her quest for vengeance, but being justified doesn’t make you innocent or righteous - as we saw with Joel, now with Abby, and presumably will see with Ellie.

PurportedGrey

I'm not saying Bella can't act. What I'm saying is that in Season 1, her interpretation of certain scenes felt like she was trying to mimic another actress rather than making the role her own (like Pedro Pascal did for Joel last season). In Season 2, she is making the character her own, but in my opinion, she's overdoing it a bit. I blame both the directing and her for that. Given how casual HBO sets are known to be, I wouldn’t be surprised if she has some influence over how scenes are played out—she is the centerpiece of the story, after all. But back to my other point: she likely does have a hand in how scenes work. That’s how acting works—there wouldn’t be a Best Actor or Actress award if actors were just robots following the director’s, writers’, or EPs’ orders without contributing creatively to the process. None of this is set in stone facts but it’s a reasonable assumption based on what I've seen in all of the GOT, HotD, Succession and etcetera, and it shapes my OPINION about these shows. Would you rather me be one of the creeps complaining about her not being hot enough for the role?🤣 I'll reiterate that point, those people are freaks to complain about a young actress not being as attractive as her video game counter part who is supposed to be 13/14.

PurportedGrey

I've been laughing at the clip that's been going around of her "flirting" with Joel.

PurportedGrey

I get flamed any time I mention loving Abby's part of the game compared to Ellie's the last 4 years. It's probably the strongest part of the games story for me.

Athasin

That's insane! But considering all the hate Jake Gleeson got for playing Joffrey I shouldn't be surprised.

PurportedGrey

Ah a fellow Cohh fan. I just started watching him last year, that's kinda crazy and shows how toxic the whole conversation and criticism of the game became. I saw the same thing with Bricky's review years after it released, his comments were flailing him for his valid criticism of the game.

DTGstl314

Exactly this. He took Abby at her word that if he was compliant and honest with her that Dina would not be harmed, which is why he didn't hesitate very long in telling Abby that Salt Lake was the last place he saw the fireflies. He knew she already knew the correct answer to that question and that he was about to die, and he just wanted to make sure nobody else went with him.

DTGstl314

To be clear, there's no way you can defend the way she killed Joel. But her rage towards Joel was completely valid. Had she just shot him in the head without dragging it out, it would have been a little more defensible. I think the brutality was just her messed up way of trying to inflict what she thought was a comparable amount of physical relative to the amount of emotional pain she experienced after seeing her murdered father's brains on the floor.

Justtired

Yes, I cried at that point in the game. Even when I played it a second time and knew it was coming, I still lost it.

TigerMyth

If you didn't like it, the left assumed you were a conservative monster so Cohh or whomever edited the original thoughts video, was clearly spooked about being too critical. I assume people didn't understand his chat comments vs what they saw in the Thoughts video and called him out so the original was released. I think it was this incident that caused him to skip Hogwarts Legacy. Same for Skillup. He didn't release a review of the #1 sales game of the year because he was too "busy". He lost my respect with the too busy comment. Just say because of the political nonsense he didn't want to wade into it. Too busy to review the most anticipated game of the year. Ok Skillup.

TigerMyth

I just checked. Both videos are still up. The edited was about 5 minutes long which is normal for his thoughts videos. the original was almost 18 minutes which is insanely longer than normal.

Wilwayco Holland

A lot of us quit the game after this because they make you play as Abby almost immediately after and it was just. Not great. Especially considering we didn't even know Abby's motivations in the game before she killed him, they actually explained it in the show. We were called sexist along with every other horrible label gamers get for not liking the game :shrug:

Sam

Never understood that, its not immediately after, its quite a while after that happens, we spend quite a bit as ellie before the swap, I think people just misremember because they couldnt see past what happend. Not to mention , even tho how shit it is that it happend for us players, if you look at it objectively Abby is probably the most justifiable character between her joel and ellie when it comes to their actions.

Lee Hambly

You think "entering a building" or "disobeying orders" is akin to delivering a line a bit different? Ffs dude, just own it, don't squirm... why squirm? No one is convinced by this nonsense.

PurportedGrey

1. First of all, nice misrepresentation of what I was actually saying, Lee. 2. You're acting like I didn’t acknowledge after my first comment that, yes, the writing and directing haven’t been strong in these first two episodes. I’ve been mostly referring to the new scenes, not the adapted ones (though the writing still carries over some of the same issues I had with the game). I’m not going to keep justifying myself when I feel like I’ve given fair criticism based on what I’ve seen so far and my own taste in entertainment. 3. What exactly are you trying to say with the “just own it” and “don’t squirm” remarks? I’ve calmly and clearly stated my opinion on the show throughout this whole thread. Honestly, outside of your first comment—which I gave some credit—you’ve just been a dick. Compared to MJ and Zane, you’re now dancing around trying to say something disparaging instead of directly “calling me out” over this made-up idea of what my actual issue with the show is.

Oli

The entire point of the game was that it was meant to be uncomfortable, and the reveal was meant to make you question your judgements and biases. People criticized this part of the game because it didn't go how they wanted it to, not playing further as they were unwilling to understand the point it's making and focusing instead on their own emotional response. This stubbornness is a similar flaw in the main characters.

Kevin Landon

When i played the game I was super pissed, i wasnt sad until the end scene of the game

CK12341

Im not saying this about you, I cant possibly know your intentions, but to just shrug off the conversation around this game and what happened is so very, very, incredibly disingenuous. The conversation was RAMPANT with sexism and homophobia (still is to this day), and pretending like everyone who had issues was mislabeled is fucking silly lol.

Zane Platt

Because a lot of people and a hell of a lot of gamers are sexist, stunted, and stupid... Also, unless you are braindead, the implication was obvious regarding who she was and what her motivation was.

Zane Platt

I do find the show version of her way more sociopathic when it comes to THE scene though. She seems to oddly enjoy what she is doing (when Joel killed her father, he didn't take pleasure in it and actually had a very clear purpose) and she is doing it after aiding in the death of hundreds, and while being awful to her friends (the difference in the game between how she treats her friends and how Ellie tries to protect hers is a massive differentiator and makes it very hard to root for Abby throughout most of the game)

Zane Platt

I have never had an issue with why Abby did what she did. I understood it in the game and I understand it in the show. My issue has always been the way it happens (the show version is even worse in this sense because she comes across like a straight up sociopath with no redeeming qualities) and the way the game struggled at times to have character dynamics that were as compelling as Joel and Ellie's was/is (Dina and Ellie come very close and I think the show will actually do a better job because it can focus on more than just Ellie and Abby's perspectives)