The Last of Us Part II Spoiler Discussion Thread

[audemarzz]

I could go on and on why I disagree with this but first I'd be interested in your opinion on Druckmann's take on why this happened. Of course you don't have to agree with him, but he's gonna articulate it better than me anyway.(as I have basically the same take ).



(the vid should start right before he addresses this particular criticism)

I saw this response somewhere else it puts it nicely as well.
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On Joel's death (discussed from 15mins)... It's very hard to believe that Jackson just invites people to join them in any kind of relaxed way (regardless of a few notes trying to prove as much). What they have is extremely precious. It's exactly the kind of place that could be targeted by a group with very bad intentions. And even when genuinely good people join them surely they are thoroughly vetted and checked to make sure they haven't been bitten at least? The point being that even if Jackson has taken in lots of people, that wouldn't mean Joel has lost his skepticism when meeting strangers. Everyone in Jackson would have it drilled into them to, before anything, protect what they have built.

Amazingly, Neil makes the point that in this world anyone can die at any time to justify Joel's death. But that's exactly the problem! Joel and everyone else LIVE in this world and should be well aware of that. He was aware of it before, maybe more so than any other character. Living within protected walls for four years wouldn't make him or anyone else forget about the cruel world just outside. Surely we aren't expected to believe that in four years no one has run into any bad folk beyond the fence?!

"Joel's looking for hunters, and these people aren't hunters." Huh? How does Joel know that? These people are actually battle hardened soldiers. Does Joel judge people on how they dress now? They are just people wearing warm clothes in winter. They could be good or bad or in between. Also, Joel supposedly doesn't suspect Abby because she's a girl the same age as Ellie. Why?! Ellie has proven herself to be extremely dangerous. Ellie wears normal clothes. Nothing adds up about this. Parents don't automatically trust every kid that looks like theirs and Joel isn't stupid. Or at least he wasn't.

The most revealing thing is when Neil sums it up with "what this story needed was a brutal cruel death for everything that happens afterwards". Well, exactly. Everything else feels like rationalization for the fact that plot came before character here. Audiences are sensitive to things like that. People felt it in this scene, and I certainly felt it in other big moments where the game lost me. I enjoyed so much about the game but unfortunately some really big moments just felt fatally false. (And arguing that "we know the characters better than you" or "we spent ages working on this" is just patently silly. By that logic, any story that people work hard on is beyond criticism and if it comes across false to you, well you're just wrong.)
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This is a decent reply though

 

[Uchiha God]

something something babble

I’ve addressed all this nonsense in posts in this thread and you’re posting one of the youtubers I was referring to as a babbling idiot

 

[NoMorePie]

THAT mother fukking big mutated ass steroid BLOATER CLICKER MONSTER

literally put everything I had into trying to kill that thing

Trying to wrap my wound for the 50th time and those damn stalkers come trap me and that BIG MUTATED ASS STEROID BLOATER CLICKER MONSTER just running right at you

I start running but it's too late and bytch ass abby getting demolished and I'm like

 

[Jmare007]

I saw this response somewhere else it puts it nicely as well.
---
On Joel's death (discussed from 15mins)... It's very hard to believe that Jackson just invites people to join them in any kind of relaxed way (regardless of a few notes trying to prove as much). What they have is extremely precious. It's exactly the kind of place that could be targeted by a group with very bad intentions. And even when genuinely good people join them surely they are thoroughly vetted and checked to make sure they haven't been bitten at least? The point being that even if Jackson has taken in lots of people, that wouldn't mean Joel has lost his skepticism when meeting strangers. Everyone in Jackson would have it drilled into them to, before anything, protect what they have built.

Amazingly, Neil makes the point that in this world anyone can die at any time to justify Joel's death. But that's exactly the problem! Joel and everyone else LIVE in this world and should be well aware of that. He was aware of it before, maybe more so than any other character. Living within protected walls for four years wouldn't make him or anyone else forget about the cruel world just outside. Surely we aren't expected to believe that in four years no one has run into any bad folk beyond the fence?!

"Joel's looking for hunters, and these people aren't hunters." Huh? How does Joel know that? These people are actually battle hardened soldiers. Does Joel judge people on how they dress now? They are just people wearing warm clothes in winter. They could be good or bad or in between. Also, Joel supposedly doesn't suspect Abby because she's a girl the same age as Ellie. Why?! Ellie has proven herself to be extremely dangerous. Ellie wears normal clothes. Nothing adds up about this. Parents don't automatically trust every kid that looks like theirs and Joel isn't stupid. Or at least he wasn't.

The most revealing thing is when Neil sums it up with "what this story needed was a brutal cruel death for everything that happens afterwards". Well, exactly. Everything else feels like rationalization for the fact that plot came before character here. Audiences are sensitive to things like that. People felt it in this scene, and I certainly felt it in other big moments where the game lost me. I enjoyed so much about the game but unfortunately some really big moments just felt fatally false. (And arguing that "we know the characters better than you" or "we spent ages working on this" is just patently silly. By that logic, any story that people work hard on is beyond criticism and if it comes across false to you, well you're just wrong.)
---
This is a decent reply though

The fact the person who wrote that answer went to that length to justify why he didn't like it kinda shows the value the game and that scene has, imo.

Dude really feels strongly about what a character should and shouldn't do and that's fine. But as much as he gets pissed that "Joel is worried about hunters and these people aren't hunters" you can say the same shyt about him supposedly knowing they were battle tested soldiers. There's no way Joel could know that in that context

It's Tommy who invites them to Jackson, not Joel. shyt, he even asked them how long they've been in the cabin. The only fukk up Joel makes is giving his name

And of course he doesn't suspect Abby. She saved Tommy's life and it's nowhere to be found when him and Tommy are introducing themselves. There's no reason to not think she's "safe" up until she comes out of nowhere with a fukking shotgun

 

[Uchiha God]

The funny thing is a lot of the themes people have issue with and keep raging about are addressed in the game. Naughty Dog just didn’t hold people’s hands in an effort to respect their audience, but clearly nikkas is idiots.

Ellie has a conversation with Dina in which she mentions Bill and how being alone and paranoid kept him alive, and Dina says something alone the lines of connecting with people and being alive not being mutually exclusive, to which Ellie retorts “but you’re taking a risk though”. (I remember this shyt off top with only one playthrough)

nikkas played the first game and saw how Ellie helped Joel reconnect with his humanity. Dude became integral part of a safe community in Jackson, playing guitar on his spare time and trading with travelling passer-bys for coffee and shyt. But they expect him to be acting shellshocked and always on edge

edit - found video of it:

 

[Jmare007]

THAT mother fukking big mutated ass steroid BLOATER CLICKER MONSTER

literally put everything I had into trying to kill that thing

Trying to wrap my wound for the 50th time and those damn stalkers come trap me and that BIG MUTATED ASS STEROID BLOATER CLICKER MONSTER just running right at you

I start running but it's too late and bytch ass abby getting demolished and I'm like

"Rat king" was a bad name for that abomination. I thought it was just a bloater when you try to open that door and it's locked. Then when you make the lights go on and go back to that place and see they trail of blood and the whole on the ambulance...

Thank god I had 4 pipebombs to throw at that thing. The stalker that rips apart from him was more of a bytch to kill because I had little to nothing to fight it with

 

[HiiiPower]

 

[Hyperion]

I have way more to say on this, but for now: I loved the ending because of how real it is. Yeah, Ellie could've licked her wounds and went back to Dina, but this is the price of revenge. Is your "justice" really worth literally throwing everything away for?

She had everything, she won. But she wasn't at peace and couldn't let the path for vengeance go. It also didn't help that Tommy guilt tripped her, knowing what she had to go through. Dina wanted her to stay and tried to guilt Ellie into staying, but to Dina, she doesn't want to risk losing a loved one a third time. I can't blame her, why throw away the happy ending?

This is what the cycle of violence will do. Even just the act of choosing to go on a path of blood can result in you losing it all, even if it's not in the death of your loved ones. Abby gave her two chances, and both times Ellie threw it away. And when you play with fire for too long, it's inevitable that you'll get burned. The moment she put a blade to Lev's neck, she became everything she hated.

In essence, "Beware that when fighting monsters, you yourself don't become a monster... For when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you."

 

[King Jove]

Abby tough af tho.

She took on the most powerful infected mutation by herself. She made it off an island between 2 groups doing all out warfare with each other while they were gunning for her. She beat Ellie in a 1 on 1 with Ellie even being armed with a shotgun. It took for Abby to be tortured on pillars and being skin and bones because of malnutrition and Ellie still being armed with a knife for it to be even, and Abby was still giving Ellie the beats.

 

[kdslittlebro]

Abby tough af tho.

She took on the most powerful infected mutation by herself. She made it off an island between 2 groups doing all out warfare with each other while they were gunning for her. She beat Ellie in a 1 on 1 with Ellie even being armed with a shotgun. It took for Abby to be tortured on pillars and being skin and bones because of malnutrition and Ellie still being armed with a knife for it to be even, and Abby was still giving Ellie the beats.

Ellie a real one tho because she never backed down, and still gave her the fair one in the end when she coulda ended it easily

 

[Jmare007]

Abby tough af tho.

She took on the most powerful infected mutation by herself. She made it off an island between 2 groups doing all out warfare with each other while they were gunning for her. She beat Ellie in a 1 on 1 with Ellie even being armed with a shotgun. It took for Abby to be tortured on pillars and being skin and bones because of malnutrition and Ellie still being armed with a knife for it to be even, and Abby was still giving Ellie the beats.

I mean, if one character had to be tougher, it had to be Abby. She's military trained, became Brock Lesnar and had better skills. Ellie is an anger filled survivor, Abby is a fukking soldier/fighter.

I also liked that Ellie had the side wound as a handicap for the last fight too. Though Abby takes getting fukking stabbed like it's a slap in the wrist

 

[CouldBeWorse]

Reading this spoiler thread and it's like most of the "criticism" sounds like it's coming from people that have never experienced storytelling with more depth than a Marvel Movie.

On Joel's death being out of character.

He's literally been living in peace for 4 years with his brother and surrogate daughter. Jackson is a thriving community, the only things Joel is killing these days are infected during sweeps, THIS DUDE STARTS THE GAME OUT POURING HIS HEART OUT SINGING AND TELLING CORNY DAD JOKES. This is not the same Joel that's been a smuggler and living in a Boston QZ for years. He just got through a pretty harrowing experience fighting a horde with Abby, she offers them a safe place to hide during a fukkin BLIZZZARD. They mention multiple times that Jackson lets visitors and traders though. Joel and Tommy giving their names out, in that situation is 100% in character with a softer, peaceful Joel. If you can't understand that(you're allowed to not like it), you probably get all your opinions from some YouTuber who can't get p*ssy.

Not to mention, in part I:

-Joel literally teams up with Henry in part 1, who introduces himself by ATTEMPTING TO STRANGLE JOEL TO DEATH
-Henry and Sam leave Ellie and Joel for dead, save them, and Joel immediately tries to kill him, then decides to team up, again.

Clearly, this white man yall love is not as street smart as you want him to be.

At the end of the day, yall can mask the reasons however you want to, people who keep saying they don't care that Joel died but how he died are upset because they played through all of the first game too stupid to realize that Joel wasn't a fukking hero, or a good person. He was a lonely old man, that didn't want to lose his "daughter" a second time. No matter the cost.

We spent the majority of the game wanting revenge for Joel and put all this effort in only to fukking save Abby and let her free. Killed all her friends, everyone she cared about and Ellie drops her guard and let's her go. If anything, at that point Abby should've killed Ellie. The fact that neither one kills the other is just stupid. We all know Joel or any male lead would've got the job done. The fact that Ellie even let's her go after just getting 2 of her fingers bitten off was just dumb on top of dumb.

You have quite literally, missed the entire fukking point to the story, jesus christ.

You start the game as Ellie, the girl who wanted to sacrifice her life for humanity, selfless, wanting meaning to her life and all the death she's experienced. By the time you switch over to Abby, Ellie is damn near completely consumed for her quest for revenge. You start Abby's campaign as someone who was consumed by revenge, achieved revenge but still has PTSD, still has nightmares.

She starts doing shyt that isn't self serving(like revenge) in attempt to redeem what little humanity she believes she has left through helping Yara and Lev, enemies that should not have spared her life. Only after getting those supplies for Yara and going through that adventure with lev, do the nightmares stop and then she comes to find out that while that whole journey was taking place, Ellie has murdered all of her friends. She's once again consumed by revenge, almost achieves it yet again but decides that revenge isn't worth losing Lev, the only one she has left and spares Ellie.

Ellie after killing a pregnant woman, begrudgingly agrees to leave Seattle in order to get Dina home due to her pregnancy. Abby shows up, kills Jessie and disables Tommy, and then gets spared by her.

Ellie on the farm doesn't even want to think about Joel. In her journal, she says she's jealous that Dina can talk about Jesse so much, Dina suggests she try to talk about the good times with Joel, that it might help with her issues. Ellie doesn't even want to try, likens the memories to food poisoning.

At the end, Ellie goes to the boat, seemingly alright with not killing Abby after seeing her destitute state, but sees an image of a dead Joel, which once again triggers her desire for revenge. When she's about to kill Abby, an image of an alive Joel comes to mind. She spares Abby.

The story is not about revenge or forgiveness,or about making you feel bad but wanting to dealing with and moving on from the trauma caused by the cycle of violence.

If Ellie ended up killing Abby, then the story would been a 100% waste of fukking time.

At the very end, Ellie can't even play the guitar properly, her worst fears confirmed, she's alone, Dina has left her, she has no revenge and she has no one to blame but herself. She recalls her very last conversation with Joel. A scene with Joel where she literally states that she wants to forgive Joel from the trauma his lie cause her. She chooses to leave Joel's guitar behind and walks away. She's decided to move the fukk on.


You can not like the story, but the shyt I'm reading online isn't criticism of the story, it's people who can't even comprehend the shyt

It's not even that deep, they hit you over the head with the fukking themes and yall still don't understand

I can't wait for a few months to pass so that the merits/faults of the narrative can actually be coherently discussed.

 

[The G.O.D II]

Good endgame discussion with Druckmann, Johnson & Baker. Druckmann explains why Ellie let's Abby go, also Johnson hints that Ellie's story isn't over yet.

Everything that ive posted earlier in here as rebuttal to the major criticisms of this game was explained in this video by the creators/actors. I dont mean to be pretentious or seem like I’m so intelligent. But it’s clear as day the motives of characters and what the writers are trying to convey to the player. It’s hilarious when Druckman said the theme of obsession and ego comes from today’s culture. The reaction to this game just reflects that

 

[Winston]

.

 

[Brandeezy]

That Druckmann also mentions in that video, American Daughters (seen in Uncharted 4) is set in The Last Of Us universe but has nothing to do with characters we know. He hopes he gets a chance to tell the story one day