NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE T he Last of Us, a show I initially celebrated and later castigated, managed a successful exit from Season One — much like an adrenaline-spiked lunge through the safe-room door in Left 4 Dead. Mid-season criticisms of the show had a lot to do with where the show-runners’ emphasis was — telling subversive love stories in the end of days — instead of progressing the plot or maintaining the integrity of the world’s internal logic. What separates the first season’s climactic end from what came before it is the jarringly pro-life messaging throughout the finale.
(Warning: Spoilers ahead)
After fighting through pedophilic and cannibalistic Christians (apparently the only kind of believer Hollywood can imagine) and, before that, anarchists and zombies, Ellie (the young girl whose blood — technically, brain matter — may save the world) and Joel (her guardian-turned-father figure) finally arrive in Salt Lake City. After crossing the United States, the two protagonists are taken in by the Fireflies (a rebel organization with designs to replace the remnants of the federal government).
When Joel awakens in the Firefly headquarters, he is informed by Marlene, the leader, that Ellie is about to undergo surgery. Marlene then watches and waits, as Joel comes to the realization that the procedure to remove the purportedly salvific organism from Ellie would result in her death — something the young girl was unaware of when she was anesthetized.
Joel protests and is led away, whereupon he kills the guards escorting him from the facility and proceeds to kill every living man jack between him and Ellie. The scenes are grim and the firefights abrupt, as Joel kills a series of men, picking up their firearms (limited ammunition being a recurring theme and homage to the video game the show is based on) to kill the next man down the hall. Joel becomes flashes of John Wick, Rick Grimes, and William Munny — the semi-broken Western lawman archetype, a man who knows he damns himself every time his firearm rises but must see justice meted out all the same.
Stepping over the mountain of dead men, Joel makes it to the operating theater, whereupon he puts a round through the skull of the neurosurgeon and directs the attending nurses to remove the tubes from Ellie. Joel then carries the unconscious girl back through the abattoir made by his hand. As he makes for the one functioning vehicle in the garage, the leader of the Fireflies accosts him, demanding Ellie back for the good of all who could be saved if they could but harvest her material. All of humanity for the price of just one girl.
Joel isn’t having it; you can guess his response.
Despite the deaths of dozens and possibly, by the knock-on effect of potentially preventing the development of a cure, thousands, the finale is a pro-life statement. It’s pro-life because lives aren’t exchangeable. A young girl was scheduled to be killed because the world might suffer more if she were to live. There was no guarantee that her death would produce a panacea, either.
Like the pro-abortion argument that aborted children would grow up in poverty if they were allowed to live, so it’s really better for the kid never to know life (and for the parents to be spared added hardship), Ellie’s attempted killers — no matter how sympathetic their argument and dire the circumstances — argue that the possibility of a cure is worth the certain death of a young girl. The closing scene, Joel lying to Ellie about why they left the medical facility, is heart-wrenching. She thought she could save the world with the power of her body, not knowing it would cost her her life. And Joel, the adult and guardian, has to protect her against all others and, ultimately, herself by concealing the truth from her. Even if Ellie had known and consented to die on the operating table, Joel remains righteous in rescuing her. She is a child and cannot consent to her own destruction.
At the beginning of the episode, we watch Ellie’s birth. Her mother, heavily pregnant and pursued by the infected, runs into a dilapidated house where her friends are supposed to be. Finding herself alone, Ellie’s mom fights off the infected while giving birth to her baby girl — preserving life in the face of death. It’s a horrific scene, and in the aftermath, Ellie’s mother discovers a bite mark — the kiss of death. Ellie’s mom hands over her daughter, into whom the whisper of infection has already passed through the umbilical cord, to the team that has just returned, headed by Marlene. The mother then begs to be shot before succumbing to the infection. Marlene consents, and takes Ellie.
The Last of Us seemingly discarded its gratuitous social commentary for the finale — yet, in doing so, made an incredible pro-life drama piece, one that accepts the immorality in the sacrifice of a child.