The Last of Us and One of the Most Powerful Tropes in Writing.
The Last of Us was one of the most anticipated ‘videogames-to-TV series’ adaptations by the gaming scene. Certainly, casting Pedro Pascal as Joel helped the series become the success it was. Bella Ramsey’s cast as Ellie was perfect as well. They both developed a natural chemistry on scene, and their characters feel like an extension of the actors’ personality. It all flows very naturally and unforced.
Netflix on the other hand, has tried its ‘video game adaptation’ of The Witcher. We know the games were adapted from the novels, but the character that Henry Cavil portraits, is heavily influenced by the game from CD Projekt Red.
The Witcher can feel like a hit or miss in terms of the characters. Cavil’s Geralt is by far the best character in the series; Dandelion is also a wonderful addition to the series, the little time we see him on screen. Now for the rest, Yennefer can grow on you, but at times she just feels plain. Once you see her backstory, you start to understand a lot of the weight she carries, and why she is the way she is.
Other characters like Triss Merigold, are just too far off. It seems that the only one that truly studied his character was Cavil. He is a fan of the game and has read the novels too. Cavil is very fond of the 'geek' culture.
A well-developed father-daughter relationship can be one of the most powerful tropes in writing.
Now, to me the other character that steals the show is Ciri; Freya Allan is another good cast member, and the chemistry between her and Cavil is great. As the series progresses, both characters’ connection deepens; they begin to understand each other, and their role in the world. A well-developed father-daughter relationship can be one of the most powerful tropes in writing.
The first season of The Witcher was great, the second deviated a bit from what everyone was expecting. You can see a more evident influence from the show runners and writers. Season 3 unfortunately will be Cavil’s last season due to discrepancies with the show runners, some even mention disrespectful treatment. Nothing good can come out of that. Consider the series poorly, and forcefully done after its third season.
Liam Hemsworth will be performing the role of Geralt. Who knows what the series will focus on. I think the fact that the first season focused a lot on the journey between Geralt and Ciri was what made it great in the first place.
It is also the reason I think The Last of Us was such a successful game, and consequently series adaptation. As mentioned earlier, Pascal and Ramsey’s chemistry feels natural. Their characters are both flawed but they find purpose and redemption throughout the whole series.
Joel had a life-changing moment when he lost his daughter, Sarah. He lost all hope and was ready to commit suicide. A rather fortunate turn of events forbade him from ending his life, and he was given a second chance. When he was ready to pull the trigger, he flinched. It’s like for a mere fraction of a second, he regretted his final decision; he gathered hope where there was not and tried to keep on living.
Later, Joel implicitly lets Ellie know that she is the reason he found strength to move on and to keep on living. Their father-daughter relationship did not start on the right foot, but it evolved into something truly meaningful, they found purpose in each other.
Ellie on the other hand, has experienced loss too. She never knew her parents. Her father estranged her family, and her mother had to be killed just after giving birth to her because she was infected. Another traumatic event was the one we experienced through the 'Left Behind' DLC, and on Episode 7 of the series.
Now, we can be very all scientific about how Ellie became immune. I don’t like the idea that because her mother was bit by a cordyceps infected she passed her antibodies to the fetus. Ellie was just a couple of days away from birth. Perhaps something more interesting would have worked, like Ellie was a genetically altered embryo so she could be immune to the cordyceps; this will open up conspiracy theories about the government knowing about a possible outbreak beforehand, and consequently about the existence of the parasitic fungus.
Anyhow, her mother got bit just before going into labor and gave birth to Ellie; she asked Marlene to kill her before she became feral and lost all her rationality. It is implied that Ellie suffers from abandonment issues. Her character is belligerent, and she will not take ‘crap’ from anyone.
So, there you go, you have two very flawed characters that are intertwined by fate. It is no surprise that neither of them wanted to collaborate with each other at first. It was the journey that changed their perspectives and gave each other, and themselves, a ‘second chance’.
One of the most beautiful things you can experience in the series is how Joel and Ellie slowly start to become themselves as their journey progresses. It is what they experienced together what steadily binds them mutually.
Joel was too stern at the beginning; very distant and unattached. He wanted to ‘get the job done’. As the series progresses, we see how he slowly becomes the Joel we see at the beginning of the series, just when the outbreak happened. He is slowly becoming the father he was to Sarah.
Ellie keeps her strong wits but starts to trust Joel. She becomes very attached to him, and at one point in the series, when she was about to depart Jackson with Joel’s brother, Tommy, she resented the former because of his poor decision. She believed that they had formed a bond by now, and Joel's unattached and empiric decision upset Ellie.
We saw her, for a mere second, become the quarrelsome character she was at the beginning of the series, when she was a prisoner of the Fireflies. Those comparison points with both characters helped us see how much they have evolved as human beings, embracing their strengths and weaknesses.
Later on, there came a time when Ellie had to take care of Joel. She had to stand on her own, use all of her wits and what she learned from him, in order to survive. This event certainly cemented their relationship, and the whole father-daughter trope solidified in front of us.
Joel was injured and Ellie needed to mend him up. For the first time she was ‘alone’ and had to stand up on her own.
During the final events of the season, Ellie was put in a lose-lose situation for herself, and Joel had to make a decision. Ellie was to be ‘scarified’ in order to save humanity. Joel trusted his instincts and went on a rampage against the Fireflies. For his character, it felt like a ‘redemption’ trip or a vengeance drive.
He finally put a bullet in everyone who deserved it, even Marlene. For some reason it felt oddly satisfying the moment he shot her; not only that, he made sure she was dead by shooting her again, in the head. When he said that if he let her live, she will come back eventually was a highlight of the series. He read through her lies and made sure to cut all loose ends.
We rarely see a character show no mercy in situations like this. Oddly enough, this is a foreshadowing event that Ellie will experience in the future. In The Last of Us 2 she is about to consummate her revenge on Ally, who killed Joel. She hesitated and let Ally live, despite her brutally murdering Joel. It was one of the most anticlimactic things I have ever experienced in video games.
Why go through all that bother just to flake out in the end.
Take the sequel as you like. To me personally, it lost most of the things that made the first game great, which is the journey of redemption both characters had through their intertwined relationship. Joel came out as a true father figure, and Ellie became a strong character because of her relationship with him and all the people around her. Social experiences are what shape us as human beings. No one grows up alone.
Can the subsequent seasons match the hype? Showrunners are saying that we will definitely see more infected in season 2; that is definitely a good thing because it’s the essence of the show. They also mentioned that the first game is fully covered in season 1, and that the second game will be split into 2 or more seasons, as there are plenty of stories to cover.
Perhaps the show will recur to more flashbacks. This was used to cover the DLC called Left Behind. It was episode 7 where Ellie goes to the mall with her friend and they both got bitten by an infected. It was a powerful episode and certainly further develops Ellie’s character. You get to see how she dealt with an incredibly traumatic experience at an early age. It certainly took away her childhood what little was left of her childhood.
Despite the Last of Us 2 having a very anticlimactic end. I am looking forward to the subsequent seasons the show will bring. It is inevitable that we will face Joel’s death; let’s see how the writers and director approach this. Maybe Pascal’s role will still be used after his death in the form of flashbacks. I would hate to see such a good actor go away for good. That being said, it is also part of what makes a show stand out from the rest; whenever they decide to kill a beloved character, it brings in the viewers a bag of mixed feelings. In a way, it also makes us think about the brevity and fragility of life; we can lose someone dear in an instant, and there is nothing we can do about it. The feeling of helplessness is difficult to process.
Let's see what they do with the coming season. We'll have to wait a long time. In the meantime, we can still get our dose of Pedro Pascal in The Mandalorian Season 3.
What are your thoughts on the first season of Last of Us? Did you expect more from it? Let me know in the comments below.
