Stop calling The Last of Us a love story

Over And above again Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin, the storytellers behind HBO The last of us – based on Naughty Dog’s PlayStation game, which Druckmann co-directed with Bruce Straley – claim their story is about love. Love is most evident in the bond Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) forge in a world of discord. They also argue that in addition to diligence and altruism – Bill and Frank’s romance in episode 3 or Henry and Sam’s brotherhood in the series’ Kansas City arc – there is a darker side worth exploring. Like Kathleen (Melanie Lynskey), who leads Kansas City’s resistance to fascism in a long-simmering rage over her brother’s death, and of course Joel’s ultimate decision to murder a building full of fireflies to stop the operation that Ellie will kill hope for healing.

Love, Druckmann and Mazin cl aim, contains much. Mazin so describes it in Vulture

Love is behind the most extreme decisions we make and the most extreme behaviors we engage in. Do you love this person more than these people? Parents keep saying things like this to their kids: “I love you more than the world itself.” Do you? For Joel, the answer is, “Yes, I do.” This is profound, and the ambiguity of love’s positivity is what we should advance. What Joel did in the name of love is a selfish act, but an understandable one. It sets in motion a chain of events that cannot be undone. If you look at an intractable conflict between people or races, eventually you will find someone doing something out of love. This love manifests itself in fear, hatred, xenophobia, racism, religious superiority. These things that start out as small seeds grow into huge things that we can’t figure out how to get out of.

This assertion tends to go unchallenged; so the two keep repeating it. That’s the benefit of talking about an abstract but universal idea like ‘love’ – it’s something that may look different to everyone, which means anyone can read a story like this The last of us slightly different, which makes it all the richer. But when either Mazin or Druckmann address it, they cite other emotional drivers that are notable not Love, which although too broad to define in general terms, can generally be understood as a deep affection that is often disruptive and even irrational.

People uproot their lives and move around the world for love. They quit their jobs and change jobs. They pledge to take care of animals they may have hated at first or children they never considered. They write poetry and sing and scream and sob. They starve so that another can eat.

Joel and Ellie look at each other and smile while standing on the edge of an ivy-covered balcony in HBO's The Last of Us

What the characters in The last of us do instead of is mourn. They process their collective trauma, poorly in most cases, but sometimes — in the case of Bill and Frank, or most successfully with the Jackson community — they are able to grasp a simulacrum of what they have lost, even when they do mourn about it. Joel’s basic trauma in The last of us is the loss of his daughter; Her absence reduces him to the grim shell of a man for the first half of the show, and treating Ellie as her surrogate is why he takes on a warmer presence in the second half of the series.

How Joel feels about Ellie could be love It could also be something else entirely, a selfish need for what he lives for in the post-apocalypse, to be the daughter that was taken from him. Ellie isn’t the object of Joel’s affections, she’s a vessel for his grief – he even calls her “Baby Girl,” his pet name for his long-dead daughter. Ellie could potentially love Joel back too. Or she could just trust him in a world where she can’t trust anyone, happy with what Joel sees behind him. Or she might see him as an infatuated man, indulged in for lack of opportunity. Or, or, or.

For this reason, it is difficult to accept Mazin’s efforts to attribute love as a root cause to opposing ideas such as “fear, hatred, xenophobia, racism” or “religious superiority”. It’s poorly supported by the show’s lyrics.

Joel gets up from a hospital bed while Marlene talks to him on HBO's The Last of Us

In the universe of The last of usLove isn’t so much a multi-faceted emotion as it is a catalyst for things that are already there. It’s also a retrospective justification for perpetrators like David, the preacher in frozen Colorado who leads his congregation to unwitting cannibalism, as well as Joel’s latest killing spree against the fireflies. Attributing all of this to “love” undersells Mazin and Druckmann’s own work, as well as that of the cast who bring the story to life, oversimplifies what could be rich text if it were interested Why these characters think Your actions are driven by love.

On some level, Mazin seems to understand that. In the same Vulture interview, he makes perhaps his most revealing statement about the ethos of storytelling The last of us

Good stories don’t build on themes like “brotherhood” or “anger”; these are just words. Good stories are built on arguments: It’s worth killing everyone to save the person you love. We can discuss that.

For some, “Did Joel do the right thing?” may be the animating question The last of us, but that reduces all the work to an elaborate and violent trolley problem. The better question iS”Does Joel have one? understandable thing?” because then the question arises whether or not The last of us achieves its goals.

Well, as Mazin says, we can discuss the ending. The tricky part, and why it’s worth questioning the showrunners’ rationale, is that the Why of all this is so important when it comes time to answer the question that anyone who’s enjoyed the show wants answered: What’s next?

Joel and Ellie walk into the distance and nothing but the road and blue sky above them can be seen in HBO's The Last of Us

Another thing about love: for it to be real and have a lasting presence, there has to be some kind of symmetry. A mutual respect and communication. The show’s tragedy is that this is absent from its pivotal relationship between Joel and Ellie – the heartbreak of that final take comes with the knowledge that that potential bridge has been destroyed. What makes it all the more powerful is the way it’s written around the world as well The last of us.

For a show set in a world changed by the Cordyceps Mushroom, The last of us has always made a point of keeping the root cause of its apocalypse on the periphery. Reflecting the world view of his characters, Cordyceps is something to avoid. The infected are like zombies, but faster, stronger, and over time take on truly nightmarish forms capable of horrifying violence. What’s more, they won. Nature reclaimed much of the planet as humanity disintegrated into factions and tyranny as mycelial networks of Cordyceps has taken root and blossomed. Here lies the advantage that the Cordyceps Pilz has us all under control: it is connected.