There is a moment inThe Last of Us Part 2where Ellie breaks into the Seattle aquarium and is ambushed by a ravenous dog which she promptly kills when it tries and fails to stop her. You feel bad in the moment, leaving a poor canine to drown in its own blood as you press on and search for your real target - Abby - but in the context of the story, it’s just another corpse on a growing pile of bodies.
Ellie’s journey of revenge has her killing hundreds of people and animals to reach her target, even seemingly innocent bystanders who are caught in the crossfire. But it doesn’t matter. It is a core theme of the narrative that Ellie is so consumed by the loss of Joel that she devolves into a tool of perpetual bloodshed, where her suicidal tendencies and willingness to do awful things in service of misguided justice bubble to the surface.
None of this happens in theHBOshow’s second season, and it is infinitely weaker because of it.
HBO Is Afraid Of Making Us Hate Ellie In The Last Of Us
Alice, the deceased dog I mentioned earlier, isn’t killed in the show as Ellie breaks into the aquarium. Speaking at a recent event (viaPolygon), showrunner Craig Mazin explained to the press exactly why this decision was made:
“There are two cardinal rules in Hollywood. One: don’t spend your own money. Two: don’t kill a dog,” Mazin said. “Because it’s live action, the nature of violence becomes much more, well, graphic. It’s more graphic because… it’s not like there’s an animation between you and it, [and] it’s very disturbing”.
Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann added that Alice’s death being added to the show would have been “one too many.” You know, in an adaptation of the story in which Ellie kills only what appears to be a handful of people and some of her most impactful murders are now framed as accidents. Ellie previously killed Owen and Mel in cold blood, only recoiling in horror upon discovering Mel is pregnant after she’s already bleeding out. In the show, a single gunshot happens to go through both of them and spells their doom. Ellie appears distraught at her actions here, where, in the game, that regret only ever appears in small glimpses that never once stop her from pursuing her goal.
Ellie begging for her life when held at gunpoint by Abby in the season finale is also weirdly out of character. She isn’t afraid of dying, but losing the people she loves.
This not only changes the perception of the narrative into something more sanitised and incidental, but it also disrespects the core themes of revenge, grief, and violence that the game is built upon. Naughty Dog wasn’t afraid to make players profoundly uncomfortable when it came to The Last of Us Part 2, as it systematically twisted a character we came to cherish during the first game into a villain.
I love Ellie, but the depths she was ready and willing to sink to to reconcile with Joel’s death were stomach-churning. But in such a broken world where violence is often the first and last resort, it is a devastatingly genuine depiction of grief that isn’t afraid to alienate us.
Alice’s Death Is Essential To The Last Of Us Part 2’s Narrative
When we first encounter Alice and kill her as Ellie, she is just another dog, and we’ve been forced to kill dozens during the campaign. It’s only once we start to play as Abby that we learn this canine was beloved, often joining WLF members on patrol as she saves our skin more than a few times. We stroke Alice behind the ears, play fetch with her, and learn that beneath the violence she is, like many of her human caretakers, just trying to live a life worth something.
Once Ellie’s actions are subverted, it turns her into a monster, and we’re unable to view her actions in any way other than disgust. HBO hasn’t bothered to take this same trajectory, as if it’s afraid of viewers hating Bella Ramsey’s depiction of the character or what impact not explaining every little thing about this nuanced story will have on the audience.
It’s already confirmed that Abby will be the central focus of the third season, but with how certain events have been depicted in the second, there’s no telling where it’ll go.
We’re also more likely to react with hostility when a beloved dog is killed in a show, film, or a game instead of humans. They’re cute and oftentimes vulnerable, so taking their life away is a step too far. But that’s exactly why showcasing that Ellie is willing to sink to this level is so important. It’s a key part of her journey and the gradual deconstruction of her character, long before we are given control of Abby.
In refusing to portray this in the show, I’m unsure what sort of story we’re going to see told once Ellie is on the farm raising a child with Dina, only to leave her life behind as she murders countless more people in Santa Barbara. She does not have what it takes, and HBO’s refusal to faithfully adapt the source material only hurts it.
If you aren’t willing to tell a story that isn’t afraid to make viewers incredibly uncomfortable and take beloved characters to distressing, depressing, and violent places, then just don’t adapt The Last of Us Part 2.It won’t and, as the second season shows, it doesn’t work. Alice being killed by Ellie is a harrowing moment, and this poor creature didn’t deserve death just because it tried to defend its home from an intruder.
It’s not fair, but nothing about this story is, which is precisely why it’s so powerful. In running away from this hard truth, HBO is well on its way to butchering one of the best stories in video game history.
