Despite this softness, five years after we last saw Joel and Ellie, something has shifted between them. Ellie seems to have figured out at some point that Joel lied to her about Salt Lake City and is mad at him for taking that choice away from her. Joel, on the other hand, is still stubborn and steadfast in his belief that he did the right thing by saving her life. He’s at least giving therapy a chance and talking about his feelings with Gail (Catherine O’Hara), the town’s only therapist. But since he can’t and won’t give up the secret about Ellie’s immunity, he can’t really open up about what happened and figure out how to move on from it, something that Gail repeatedly calls him out on.
Even for fans of the games who knew this rift was coming, it’s hard to watch Joel and Ellie barely acknowledge or speak to each other. Pascal and Ramsey may have very few scenes together in this episode, but they still manage to play off of each other’s energy so well. When their paths finally cross during the New Year’s Eve party at episode’s end, it’s an explosive release
It’s heartbreaking to watch these two people who are so similar be so at odds with each other. Especially when you can empathize with both sides. Tommy (Gabriel Luna) calls Ellie out on it when they’re on patrol together, saying “I swear, you and my brother? Same Goddamn fucking person.” And Dina (Isabela Merced) clearly cares about both of them when she asks Joel why Ellie is angry with him.
What makes this situation even more devastating is seeing Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) and her crew appear on the outskirts of Jackson at the end of the episode as well as an awakening of cordyceps within the town. We’re getting closer to whatever kind of revenge Abby has planned (if you know, you know), and a potential attack on Jackson by infected, so the clock has effectively started counting down on any chance of reconciliation between the two. Tomorrow is never guaranteed in the apocalypse, even in a town as utopic as Jackson.
But aside from the Joel and Ellie of it all, the rest of the cast, especially series newcomers Isabela Merced, Young Mazino, and Catherine O’Hara, do an incredible job of filling in the growing space between these two. They all offer new perspectives that either challenge or confirm Ellie and Joel’s beliefs about each other and how to approach the world and their interpersonal relationships. Ellie and Joel spent so much of last season with only each other to rely on, and now that they don’t even have that, they have to figure out how to let other people in.
This season might not be as much of a beat-for-beat retelling of the game as season one was thus far, but that’s not a bad thing by any means. We’ve already seen how well Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann can expand upon this world in meaningful ways with emotional episodes like season 1’s “Long, Long Time” and the chilling opening to the episode “Infected.” We can trust that everything added or changed from the game is in service of the greater story at large.
