The Last of Us series has a high reputation and loyal fan base worldwide for its profound stories and vivid characters. With the broadcast of the second season of the series, the story also ushered in the most controversial and devastating moment in the game-Joel’s death, which was presented in the second episode of the second season of the series.
Although the series generally faithfully restored this key moment in the game, the change in an important detail cleverly “fixed” a problem in the original game that had caused many players to criticize.
Game
In the game The Last of Us Part II, Joel and Tommy encountered Abby who was chased by the infected while patrolling. They rescued her and were taken back to the cabin where Abby and her companions were. In the game, it was not until Tommy introduced himself and Joel’s name to Abby’s team that Abby’s companions realized that they were the people they were looking for. Subsequently, Tommy was violently knocked down and Joel was tortured to death.
Many players have questioned this handling method in the game: considering that Joel and Tommy are survivors of the apocalypse, have experienced robbery and killing along the way, and are extremely distrustful of strangers and remain highly vigilant, they believe that Joel and Tommy are unlikely to easily reveal their real names to strangers, and think that this is inconsistent with the cautious character of the characters and seems a bit abrupt.
Episode
In the second season of the series, Dina met Abby with Joel. When Joel found Abby, Abby didn’t know Joel’s identity. Joel’s identity was exposed after he returned to the cabin. At that time, Joel was worried that Camp Jackson might be attacked by infected people, and tried to contact Tommy by radio, and believed that Abby’s team would help him return to town to fight against the infected. At this time, Dina accidentally called Joel’s name without knowing that Joel had found other survivors. It was Dina’s inadvertent call that made Abby’s companions instantly see through Joel’s identity.
The series made a key adjustment to this point when dealing with Joel’s death scene, thus resolving the controversy in the game.
The show changed the way of revealing the identity from Tommy actively reporting his name to Dina accidentally calling out his name, which made the revelation of Joel’s identity more like a coincidence rather than an illogical misjudgment of the character. This treatment is more in line with the level of caution that Joel and Tommy should have as experienced survivors, making the whole scene more convincing in the narrative and avoiding some of the controversy that the original game had caused.
The content of this part of the game is indeed controversial, and now the content of The Last of Us show has verified that the game’s treatment of this part is unreasonable, which can be regarded as bringing an end to the controversy among the player community.
