SPOILER ALERT! This submit incorporates particulars from the Season 2 finale of HBO‘s The Final Of Us.
The Final Of Us Season 2 has come to an finish, however Ellie and Abby’s story is much from over.
Sunday night time’s finale is ends on fairly the cliffhanger, however it’s a 50-minute episode full of motion that must be unpacked earlier than we get to that ending. The episode picks up moments after the occasions of Episode 5, as Jesse (Younger Mazino) is trying to extract a crossbow bolt from Dina’s (Isabela Merced) leg. Bear in mind, Episode 6 was devoted to flashbacks of Ellie (Bella Ramsey) and Joel (Pedro Pascal) resulting in the enduring porch scene, the place Joel lastly tells Ellie the reality about what he did on the hospital in Salt Lake Metropolis.
So, when Ellie arrives again on the theater after torturing Nora (Tati Gabrielle), she decides to disclose all the pieces about Salt Lake to Dina, together with the knowledge she simply obtained from Nora that Abby’s dad was the unarmed physician who Joel killed. Dina appears to take the revelation in stride, relieved that Ellie has lastly informed her the reality, however given all the pieces they’ve already sacrificed to get so far, that is the second the place a couple of big questions begins to linger over everybody’s head: What would it not price them to maintain going? And, at this level, what’s Ellie’s honesty even value?
“Look the place Ellie tells the reality. She tells the reality on the center of probably the most non-public and shut relationship she has after — not earlier than, main as much as, throughout, or instantly after — confirming that she and this different individual are in love,” co-creator Craig Mazin informed reporters throughout a press convention forward of the finale. “Telling the reality is susceptible, and on this world, you inform the reality, you’re weak, you’re giving one thing away…Then, on her face, think about how shut it’s to the way in which Joel appeared when he was speaking to her. It’ll at all times be onerous.”
He continued: “What we ask of the viewers is to know why they’re mendacity. They’re not mendacity to govern. They’re not mendacity to be evil. They’re mendacity to guard themselves. After they cease mendacity, it means that there’s a rare belief there. However in each instances, after they fess up, Joel or Ellie, they consider they could be shedding the individual that they love due to it.”
Telling the reality does deliver Ellie nearer to Dina, a minimum of in the intervening time, however that will not essentially be the case by the tip of the episode, when Ellie’s actions start to essentially meet up with her.
By now, we additionally know that Tommy (Gabriel Luna) can also be in Seattle, so Jesse and Ellie got down to discover him. It’s a short-lived joint quest, although, as tensions between the 2 of them start to develop virtually instantly, particularly after they encounter a bunch of WLF troopers torturing a Seraphite baby. Ellie desires to intervene, however Jesse holds her again. Tensions escalate once more when Ellie spots the aquarium and realizes that should be the place Abby is, given Nora’s trace concerning the whale and the wheel. Jesse tries to dissuade her from going, insisting they need to discover Tommy and depart Seattle, which prompts an outburst from Ellie who’s, fairly frankly, bored with Jesse appearing as if he stands on an ethical excessive floor.
To make issues worse, that is additionally when Ellie finds out that Jesse voted towards sending a crew to Seattle within the first place. Notably within the present, Mazin defined that he and co-creator Neil Druckmann needed to place extra emphasis on Jesse’s standing in Jackson to, hopefully, make him seem to be one of the crucial reliable, level-headed characters — which solely makes this confrontation from the sport much more emotionally salient.
“She makes a degree that I believe is so strong that I begin to assume, ‘Oh, yeah, so there goes one other hero,’ as a result of she’s proper,” Mazin stated. “It’s not that what she’s doing is correct, however his perception that he’s ethical is so challengeable, and it’s so arbitrary that ‘I’m ethical and upstanding and sacrificial to individuals so long as they’re on the within of this wood fence, but when they’re exterior the wood fence, I’ll simply allow them to die, even when they’re a child.’”
However, to be honest, he and Druckmann stated they have been aligned early on about the way in which that Jesse would vote.
“I believe in our conversations of how Jesse voted, we have been each underneath the identical type of notion. He would vote to guard Jackson, as a result of Jesse is extra concerning the bigger group, a minimum of the group he belongs to, not the group of mankind, than concerning the particular person,” Druckmann stated. “There’s some overlap there between Jesse and Joel, as a result of I consider in related circumstances, Joel would have voted the identical means.”
As soon as they cut up, Ellie units off for the aquarium. On the similar time, as an enormous storm is brewing, it appears as if the WLF are launching an assault towards the Seraphites. Ellie finds a small boat and launches it into the water, however a wave rapidly overturns the boat, sending it and her washing ashore on an island off the coast of Seattle. And on that island, she is confronted by Seraphites who very almost hold her. They’re stopped solely by the sounding of an alarm that tells the Seraphites their village is underneath assault.
Extra on that later, Mazin guarantees.
“I’ve so many questions, and I perceive that the viewers does too. I type of wish to guarantee them that these questions are appropriate and will likely be answered,” he says. “What’s going on? How did that warfare begin? Why? How did the Seraphites begin? Who’s the prophet? What occurred to her? What does Isaac need? What’s taking place on the finish of Episode 7? What is that this explosion? What’s all of it? And all of it can change into clear.”
It’s mainly a stroke of luck that permits Ellie to flee and make it to the aquarium, which is the place issues actually begin to go off the rails. She finds Mel (Ariela Barer) and Owen (Spencer Lord) arguing within the depths of the constructing and holds them at gunpoint, demanding to know the place Abby is.
She tells them to level to Abby’s location on a map, however when Owen reaches for a gun as a substitute, Ellie instinctively fires her personal, killing them each. Relaxation assured, the viewers will not be speculated to be rooting for Ellie at this level, Mazin and Druckmann say.
One way or the other, they managed to make this sequence much more jarring than within the video games by including a horrific interplay between Mel and Ellie. As Mel, who’s pregnant, is bleeding out, she instructs Ellie to chop the infant out of her. Ellie is in shock, and she will’t even make an incision earlier than Mel stops respiratory, however Jesse and Tommy discover her nonetheless kneeling over Mel’s physique, knife in hand, who is aware of how lengthy later, haunted by what she’s executed.
“I keep in mind when [Craig] described it earlier than I learn it, he’s like, ‘Oh yeah, I made it darker.’ And I’m like, ‘How may it’s darker?’ After which I learn I’m like, ‘Oh yeah, it’s darker,’” Druckmann stated. “However… generally now we have to go there, and it was essential for this second to, in the event you’re rooting for Ellie, make you are feeling soiled, as a result of that’s what collateral harm does.”
At this level, everybody, even Ellie, is beginning to query this mission. Ellie has extra blood on her arms than she ever anticipated, and he or she hasn’t even discovered Abby but.
“This second additionally known as for Bella to have and show such a profound stage of remorse and failure. On this second the place you do really feel like, ‘Oh my god, how am I nonetheless on this journey with you?’ I believe it’s essential for individuals to see that it’s not like Ellie goes, ‘I’m cool, no matter, it occurred, let’s preserve going for Abby.’ This breaks her,” Mazin defined.
However, will this be the factor that lastly will get Ellie to drop her vendetta and go dwelling? It definitely looks like it, as Tommy and Jesse collect her up and produce her again to the theater, the place she resigns to the concept she will likely be leaving Seattle with out confronting Abby — or, a minimum of, she thinks she is going to.
As Ellie and Jesse are speaking within the theater, they hear a commotion within the foyer. They run out to search out Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) holding Tommy at gunpoint. She shoots Jesse within the head earlier than pointing her gun at Ellie, who’s begging for her to not shoot anybody else. The display screen cuts to black because the gun goes off once more, leaving audiences to query what the hell goes to occur subsequent.
Within the ultimate scene of the episode, Abby wakes up in what seems to be a WLF compound, and the phrases “Seattle Day 1” pop up within the nook of the display screen, indicating that we’re about to relive these nightmarish three days once more, simply from a unique perspective this time.
It’s tough to choose a spot to begin dissecting these ultimate moments. At the start, Mazin sought to quell anxieties concerning the upcoming third season by letting viewers know “we haven’t seen the final of Kaitlyn Dever, and we haven’t seen the final of Bella Ramsey, and we haven’t seen the final of Isabela Merced, and we haven’t seen the final of lots of people who’re at the moment lifeless within the story.” And that’s all he’s keen to say, for now.
However, the place do any of those characters stand with one another anymore? With Jesse lifeless, the place does that depart Ellie and Dina?
“I imply, how may it not have a drastic influence [on their relationship], particularly when he’s the daddy of this child, but in addition a really shut pal, a former romantic companion?” Druckmann mused. “Yeah, it’s going to imply a complete lot.”
Finally, they need audiences to really feel unsettled. In spite of everything, there may be much more story to inform.
“What I would like the viewers to really feel thematically on the finish of the season is that they aren’t the place they have been, however they’re not but the place they’re going to go. That there has at all times been a narrative that we’ve been telling concerning the good and dangerous of affection, however we change which facet is nice and dangerous generally…” Mazin stated. “We perceive that each Ellie and Abby are transferring ahead in bother. They’re in ethical bother, as a result of their certainty is starting to fail them, and we will see it right here with Ellie, for positive, as a result of confronted with the results of the issues she’s executed and the those who didn’t should die, she’s beginning to really feel perhaps a swing of the pendulum. We don’t know the place these two are going to finish, however what I’d hope the viewers feels is that they aren’t executed. They don’t seem to be executed rising, or they aren’t executed falling. We’ll have to attend and see which it’s.”
The Season 2 finale does appear to point that, on the very least, the start of Season 3 will focus largely on Abby. Nevertheless, Druckmann assures audiences who haven’t performed the sport and aren’t aware about the place this story goes that there’s an “epic nature to it of what’s about to occur, however this different story goes to be actually essential coming again to Joel and Ellie and all the pieces that you simply’ve seen up to now.”
“The query that we’re asking, and the factor we’re interrogating on this story is, once you’ve dedicated such horrible issues, relying in your circumstance, are you able to ever come again from that?” he stated. “We see in that porch scene, Joel is attempting to return again from what he’s executed, regardless that he doesn’t remorse it. Now, now we have these two characters which are on this downward spiral, attempting to do justice for the those who they love, and we’ll see how far that goes.”
At this level within the story, it’s not simple to root for Ellie, however she’s nonetheless our foremost protagonist. Up to now, we’ve been on her facet. We’ve needed to see her search justice for Joel. After the finale, it’s pure to be questioning whether or not Ellie is de facto justified, particularly given all of the collateral harm.
“As Ellie strikes by way of Seattle, her focus is so clearly on Abby. Even that second when Dina tells her their names, Abby is the title she repeats, as a result of Abby is the one who did it, that is sensible. However in that horrible scene the place Joel dies, Ellie says, ‘you’re all going to effin’ die’ not ‘Abby, you’re going to die,’ ‘you’re all going to die.’ There’s something type of prophetic about that. It’s virtually as if she put that hex on the market that she may now not management,” Mazin says. “I believe it’s clear to her that Mel didn’t should die. Mel didn’t damage her. Mel didn’t maintain her down. Mel didn’t damage Joel. We noticed much more than that, earlier than Ellie exhibits up within the room, Mel is attempting to assist Dina, is horrified by what Abby is doing and tries to cease it and fails, which is her personal disgrace.”
However, Mazin factors to Ellie’s dialog with Tommy towards the tip of the episode to provide audiences a touch as to the place all that is headed and whether or not Ellie will see the error of her methods.
“Ellie says ‘So, she will get to dwell?’ and Tommy says, ‘are you able to make your peace with that?’, and he or she says, ‘I suppose I’ll must.’ That’s attention-grabbing, as a result of what if one thing adjustments and also you don’t must. Now what? I don’t assume the story’s over,” he teased.
Added Druckmann: “There may be an obsession there that, in our conversations, the metaphor has been, usually, drug habit. That you may recover from it, and you’ll relapse, and the query is, can she totally recover from it?”
Begged to tease just a bit extra of what’s to return in Season 3, each Mazin and Druckmann replied cheekily with temporary solutions which are positive to excite players and depart those that haven’t performed much more confused.
“Rats, what ought to we discuss?” Mazin requested, to which Druckmann replied: “You already know, there’s a sure crane that you simply’re seeing in Episode 7 that could be very telling.”
