The Last of Us - Spoilers, not spores - The Bear and Badger

Shinji

Moto70 wrote:

Joel? EDIT: Actually I'm just about to start watching The Killing so I'll keep my eye out for Ellie, see what she's like in front of a proper camera and not a mocap set-up.

Didn't realise that's who Ashley Johnson was. She's the teacher's wife, also plays that waitress the camera keeps looking at for no apparent reason during the NY scene in The Avengers

Escape

Moto70 wrote:

In the other thread I listed no alternative ending as one of my cons for this game.

It's unfair to ask for tons more from a game that's already novel, but I'd have welcomed a say in David's fate. Not just for its own sake, but because it would've forced a player-interpretable script to his end. As it is, he turns panto to become a conventional plot device.

The danger of opening up every possible choice is that it threatens narrative cohesion. It's a trade I'd take. It's our game, not a TV prog.

regmcfly

Have just finished. Damn.

stonechalice

Good eh?

regmcfly

Yeah. Does Ellie believe him? I have to think that she doesn't and is beginning to think about when she'll leave him.

EvilRedEye

I rewatched the last video from the video scene viewer and the way Ellie reacts when he's trying to bullshit her kind of makes me think she isn't really convinced.

Tempy

He lies to her to give her a reason to live, she plays along because she has some faith in him, more faith than she has in the rest of the people she's met.

regmcfly

Not sure I agree with the last part. After all she did in the restaurant, I think Ellie is at the stage where she trusts no one. I see it as her making the decision that her time with Joel is over.

Tempy

Could well be.

Moto70

I think that Ellie knew, and accepted, her inevitable outcome but upon meeting Joel and finding somebody she truly cared about she was happy to not die. Joel gave her a reason to carry on living and although she knew his explanation was a lie it showed her that there was somebody in the world she inhabits that finally, and truly, cared for her absolutely unconditionally...

stormyskiesahead

Yup, that was my reading and I'm happy with it. It's quite open to interpretation though.

regmcfly

That snow level - Silent Hill flashbacks for anyone else?

Ali

regmcfly wrote:

Yeah. Does Ellie believe him? I have to think that she doesn't and is beginning to think about when she'll leave him.

I think she knows he's lying but her simple OK and shrug, to me, showed she was actually OK with that. It showed that Joel was a flawed human, not a super hero, and it also told her, without need for any words, that Joel had saved her from the ultimate peril.

THinking, also, about the surgeon part, many have claimed that it's wrong to not be able to let them live. The truth is, you can leave two of them alive quite happily. The surgeon you're forced to deal with, however, is not the passive NPC many seem to claim. He isn't pleading with Joel or asking to have a sit down chat about the fate of humanity over a cup of hot cocoa. He's wielding a scalpel blade at him and threatening him. Things don't tend to work out well for people that do that to Joel, as we discover along the route. I also think ND presented the surgeon as a relatively inhuman representation of the organisation. I don't think it just coincidence that we don't see his full face. Take the hospital out of the equation and change his clothing and we've seen Joel threatened all through the game by masked protagonists, to Joel this is just another in a long line of 'bad guys' he has to get rid of to save Ellie.

Another little addition...people have said that Joel, towards the end, is growing more and more unhinged. I disagree. He does become more flawed, makes rasher decisions, but that's because he's becoming more human. At the beginning, all the survivors are aligned into organisations, fighting only for survival and profit, government, Fireflies and criminals (of which we have to assume Joel is one) alike. When we initially meet him, he's a cold, harsh, ruthless killer. He and Tess will happily dispatch people purely due to a poor business deal going sour, and they're good at it because they're careful, detached, emotionless and efficient. As Joel becomes more attached to Ellie, that carefulness and sterile emotional facade are lost. When Ellie is threatened in the worst way, Joel finally becomes the irrational, emotional and rage fuelled human being that he's so suppressed over 20 years. That last battle isn't just about Ellie. Remember how Sarah died. At the hands of a faceless military. What is Joel faced with between himself and saving his surrogate daughter? Corridor's full of faceless military. And people wonder why Joel slaughters every last one of them? I'd say it would be far less in keeping with his character and also betraying the character arc had we been given the choice to sacrifice Ellie at the end. Joel was absolutely focussed on saving Ellie. The fate of the Fireflies and doctors that stood in his way was sealed 20 years before...

LazyGunn

That was a very nice writeup and reflected my feelings on the matter entirely

EvilRedEye

I think it's interesting that pretty much the last thing you face as you prevent the vaccine from going ahead are the surgeons, who in a way represent our current civilisation to a greater extent than the other humans we've seen up to that point. As you kill the surgeon you're killing this guy who represents a civilisation that's accumulated medical knowledge over hundreds and years, while at the same time ensuring that that kind of civilisation will never rise again.

Ali

EvilRedEye wrote:

I think it's interesting that pretty much the last thing you face as you prevent the vaccine from going ahead are the surgeons, who in a way represent our current civilisation to a greater extent than the other humans we've seen up to that point. As you kill the surgeon you're killing this guy who represents a civilisation that's accumulated medical knowledge over hundreds and years, while at the same time ensuring that that kind of civilisation will never rise again.

Exactly. Joel has rejected that society. He's seen the pit of despair that it caused and the horrors that have been inflicted by those clinging onto it. It's why the giraffes roaming peacefully in the ruins of Salt Lake City are so important and iconic. Nature is quite happy with not having that civilisation around any more, and so, finally, is Joel. He's realised what really matters to him, and that's humanity. Not civilisation, but raw humanity. And if he sacrificed Ellie to save civilisation, he'd lose that humanity, and so would, in essence, all of us.

regmcfly

Ali I think you nailed the surgeons. A very cool idea for a "final boss" I might add, and there was a delicious irony in one of them calling me an animal when they were about to willingly kill a child for the "greater good"

Moto70

regmcfly wrote:

Ali I think you nailed the surgeons. A very cool idea for a "final boss" I might add, and there was a delicious irony in one of them calling me an animal when they were about to willingly kill a child for the "greater good"

Really?

It was certainly a tough choice and one I couldn't imagine many people making but killing a child to save a civilisation? Not sure that makes somebody an animal or how one person's actions (the surgeon) would mean that we had all lost humanity?

There are already monsters amongst us so are you saying that we have already lost our humanity?

It would appear that it hasn't crossed your mind that we may very well need these 'monsters' amongst us...

LazyGunn

Ali's like my mind twin on all this stuff, keep it up

I think i'd like to repeat tempys point about it being a warm game, because i think through all the cruelty and brutality, its about some warmth in human beings, and although i felt strange and a bit sad at the ending, it was a warm moment, joel is terribly flawed, hes just human, ellie is very smart but a very compassionate and strong and wise girl, and shes just human too - thing is though, i think the sheer incredible strength of ellies character makes it, and a huge motivator for joels decisions, and you can see him softening back into a man who once was a father even in the mid stages of the game. Giving Ellie a firearm in such a way was quite a unique way of describing that bond becoming apparent.

Without becoming some kind of generic supergirl, Ellie becomes a remarkable character with all the things you'd admire in a human being being aspects of her personality, including her ability to be contrary and an arsehole, its charming. I think i'd see Joel as recognising that as being far more significant than the trash he's had to save her from throughout the game

LazyGunn

Moto70 wrote:

regmcfly wrote:

Ali I think you nailed the surgeons. A very cool idea for a "final boss" I might add, and there was a delicious irony in one of them calling me an animal when they were about to willingly kill a child for the "greater good"

Really? It was certainly a tough choice and one I couldn't imagine many people making but killing a child to save a planet? Not sure that makes somebody an animal plus you are judging it from the bond you had with her.

Actually i think its not as cut n dry as 'saving the planet'. It might save the planet, it might not, you dont know if there are more people like ellie (this could form the basis of a sequel), you already know the fireflies have a political agenda and its not necessarily to create a utopia, theyre one faction of many in one country on a planet full of countries and i dont think that sacrificing ellies life would really be that significant at all, in terms of actually 'saving humanity'. I think about the content of Joel's lie at the end, and its given even more weight, because maybe he'd like to think there are more like her (he doesnt know, we dont know), maybe thats something he might comfort himself with, because im sure he's aware of the gravity of his decision. It could always weigh on him! But in the end there is absolutely nothing conclusive about the future of mankind on planet earth said by the end of the game, it simply ends Joel and Ellies arc in what is probably a grand theater of road trips and heroicism across the world. Thinking of it that way def suggests plenty of material for another game set in the same world

regmcfly

Moto70 wrote:

regmcfly wrote:

Ali I think you nailed the surgeons. A very cool idea for a "final boss" I might add, and there was a delicious irony in one of them calling me an animal when they were about to willingly kill a child for the "greater good"

Really?

It was certainly a tough choice and one I couldn't imagine many people making but killing a child to save a civilisation? Not sure that makes somebody an animal or how one person's actions (the surgeon) would mean that we had all lost humanity?

There are already monsters amongst us so are you saying that we have already lost our humanity?

It would appear that it hasn't crossed your mind that we may very well need these 'monsters' amongst us...

I don't disagree with you but you either need some serious clarity of purpose or some mental detachment to kill a child in the name of the greater good. I know I couldn't

Moto70

I'm not sure it is clear-cut? They say that geniuses are sometimes on the brink of insanity (one of my mate's brothers is super intelligent but my mate had to explain how buying rounds work to him and he just couldn't see the social aspect of it) so this surgeon may not have looked at it like you or I. During the game you had made a bond with Ellie but the surgeon has no such bond, he may look at 'killing' (I am sure he wouldn't have seen it as killing) this child in the same way of culling rabbits to cure myxomatosis?

We have it even within this forum, there are things people would do and things people wouldn't. I have come in for flack in the past because I will fight if I feel the need but it has been made clear to me that others here absolutely abhor violence and don't see any of my scenarios as being justified.

I said to my missus that I simply cannot fathom how the father of April Jones could sit in the same courtroom as her killer and not do a thing, this doesn't mean that I think any less of him but simply a case of we all act differently and I know that there is no way on this earth that I could even know where he was without acting. I think I could quite easily kill somebody that harmed my child.

Like I said we need all sorts of people to make civilisation, good and bad, some things are simply too horrific for the majority to carry out.

EvilRedEye

It's interesting to think about whether the Fireflies could have achieved much. They seemed pretty fucked. By the end of the game they're decimated and pushed back to their headquarters. Cutting Ellie to bits is one thing, creating a working vaccine is another; presumably they aren't well resourced. Marlene tells Joel that he can still do the right thing, even though he's further reduced the Fireflies' numbers and murdered their surgeons. Perhaps she/them are a bit deluded.

Moto70

EvilRedEye wrote:

It's interesting to think about whether the Fireflies could have achieved much. They seemed pretty fucked. By the end of the game they're decimated and pushed back to their headquarters. Cutting Ellie to bits is one thing, creating a working vaccine is another; presumably they aren't well resourced. Marlene tells Joel that he can still do the right thing, even though he's further reduced the Fireflies' numbers and murdered their surgeons. Perhaps she/them are a bit deluded.

Granted and I think along the same lines but we don't know what they've got. Yes the surgeon may be dead but the real skill would be done in the lab not in removing a brain, or at least this is what I suspect to be the case.

Deluded? Who are we to judge?

Tempy

Err, people watching a story and reading ideas into it via the things it choses to show us.

Moto70

Am I doing discussion wrong?

Tempy

By judging the Fireflies as being capable to create a vaccine via the assumption they have labs and scientists that are able to do it and then saying "who are we to judge" yes, a little

Moto70

Ah right, I presumed that because they thought they could cure the infection from working with Ellie's imunity they had more than a scalpel and a bucket at their disposal.

Also the 'who are we to judge?' bit wasn't to do with the story per se but more in that it is difficult to really judge when it is about something so different to how we currently live.

Ali

Moto70 wrote:

Ali I think you nailed the surgeons. A very cool idea for a "final boss" I might add, and there was a delicious irony in one of them calling me an animal when they were about to willingly kill a child for the "greater good"

Really? It was certainly a tough choice and one I couldn't imagine many people making but killing a child to save a civilisation? Not sure that makes somebody an animal or how one person's actions (the surgeon) would mean that we had all lost humanity? There are already monsters amongst us so are you saying that we have already lost our humanity? It would appear that it hasn't crossed your mind that we may very well need these 'monsters' amongst us...

Remember that only the Fireflies would have the vaccine, and only if it worked. And it's only vaccine against further infection, not a cure. A cure seems to be impossible. To have one side have the vaccine, who would definitely not be sharing it with their enemies, would be a very dangerous thing in my eyes. Beyond that, you have to remember that this is not humanity's story. It's Joel and Ellie's. To me, it ended fully in character for both. We're not playing Mass Effect or Skyrim, where you get to shape your own hero and destiny. We're playing as Joel and Ellie. Participating with their journey, but we have little influence on its outcome beyond getting them there alive to fulfill it.

Tempy

@moto70 If a story is worth it's salt in world building (and this is) you should be able to, by extension judge things. The game more than lays down enough exposition for you to speculate on what may or may not happen, as long as you don't claim it as an absolute.

Thing is, there is no evidence that any vaccine from Ellie would work, just like in real life it isn't as easy as 'scalpel open skull, pop out brain, look at, bingo!'

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