[WARNING: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for The Last of Us Season 1 Episode 6, as well as The Last of Us and The Last of Us Part II.]
Did the acoustic version of Depeche Mode’s “Never Let Me Down” leave you fooled?
Certainly, The Last of Us’ sixth episode seemed to set the table for Joel’s (Pedro Pascal) untimely demise. He had all the bad omens that signify impending doom on post-apocalyptic TV: a reunion with a long-lost relative, hallucinations of his dead daughter, a major revelation that reframed him in the eyes of someone who cares about him, worsening mental health, and a last-minute decision that proved he has a good heart… even though it’s buried under several layers of concrete. If this were The Walking Dead, Joel would be a goner. The Last of Us is doing things differently.
HBO
Yes, Joel has been stabbed by the splintered end of a baseball bat, lost a lot of blood, and has fallen off his horse while fleeing the armed bad guys on the college campus. Yes, he closed his eyes and didn’t stir as poor Ellie (Bella Ramsey) pleaded with him to wake up. Yes, things look bleak — but, surprise! With 99.9 percent certainty, Joel’s not dead at the end of Episode 6, and he’s probably not going to die during the events of the first season.
While Joel’s situation is certainly dire, this is almost exactly how events played out in the first game. In the source material, Joel receives a similar mortal wound in a battle on the college campus. The fight in the game is a bit lengthier and more violent. Joel also doesn’t directly kill the man he was fighting; instead, they both fall off a ledge. The man dies, and Joel is impaled by a shaft of rebar. (Rick Grimes knows the feeling.) He and Ellie escape on their horse, and he slips out of the saddle and becomes unresponsive exactly as he does on the show. It then falls to Ellie to nurse him back to health.
If that’s all you care to know, stop here. Massive spoilers regarding eventual fates of characters in The Last of Us (the video game) and its companion, The Last of Us Part II, follow.
HBO
The source material sees Ellie bring him to an abandoned mall (which we’ve caught brief glimpses of in trailers), and later a cabin. While she’s able to stitch up his wound, she needs antibiotics to stop him from dying of complications related to the injury. She succeeds in finding them, and Joel is eventually healed — but where she gets the medicine (or rather, who she gets it from) winds up becoming a major plot point for the next stage of the game.
Looking ahead, it seems likely Joel will endure and survive the trip to Salt Lake City and through the end of Season 1. The Last of Us Part II, however, offers a tragic end to his story. Without getting too deep into spoilers and characters who haven’t arrived yet, Joel is killed rather early on in the sequel by a woman who learns that he killed her father. It’s possible that’s why The Last of Us is placing emphasis on Joel’s myriad dark deeds: it’ll be heartbreaking — but not entirely out of left field — if he dies by the hand of someone whose family he destroyed. For now, though, fans of the HBO show (and Pedro Pascal) can breathe a sigh of relief.
The Last of Us Season 1, Sundays, 9/8c, HBO
