In “The Last of Us” recap for season 2, episode 2, Jackson Hole faces an invasion, Ellie gets stuck out on patrol and Joes comes face-to-face with his past…
By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
Much like those of us who read George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” novels before “Game of Thrones” happened, the game players who faithfully made it through “The Last of Us” and “The Last of Us Part II” knew tragedy was lurking just around the corner.
But unlike “Game of Thrones,” which famously liked to dish out the most painful moments in the ninth installment of a ten episode season, there was no waiting around for inarguably the most difficult and controversial moment in “The Last of Us.”
Joel Miller made the impossible choice at the end of the first season when he decided to save the life of his surrogate daughter Ellie over the chance that he immunity to the Cordyceps infection might actually provide a cure. Sadly, Ellie had to die to provide that cure and Joel just couldn’t abide losing another child after his actual daughter Sarah perished at the very beginning of the fungal apocalypse.
So Joel gunned down soldiers, advisors and even the doctor about to operate so he could save Ellie.
But five years later, Joel’s decision comes along with a reckoning because Abby — the surviving daughter of that doctor he shot and killed — has come for vengeance. Unlike Joel, who has settled into a new life with family at Jackson Hole, Abby has been training and seething inside for the moment she finally comes face-to-face with the man who killed her father.
An unexpected fall ends with Abby running directly into Joel and it’s not long before she’s finally got the opportunity to exact her long awaited vengeance. But her pain soon gets transferred to another because this kind of bloodshed doesn’t happen without more death and that’s surely coming in the future.
For now, let’s recap “The Last of Us” season 2, episode 2 titled “Through the Valley.”
On Patrol
The episode begins with a dream sequence as current day Abby runs into her younger, 19-year-old self at that Firefly facility in Salt Lake City where her father was killed. The younger Abby wants to go into the room to see her father’s body but the older version warns her it’s nothing she wants to see because that image will haunt her for the rest of her days. Of course, Abby went into that room because seeing her father’s dead body has continued to serve as the driving force for her desire for revenge.
When she awakens, Abby is surrounded by all of her friends who have traveled with her to Wyoming on the search for this mysterious Joel.
With the temperatures dropping and snow hammering the mountainside, the group gets a clearer image of Jackson Hole — a town complete with walls, armed guards and patrols that provide a whole lot of protection but an almost impenetrable barrier to stop them from getting inside. Abby decides to take the next watch, which requires her to climb up to a higher peak but after she leaves, Owen tells the group that he’s going to need their help — they need to convince Abby to give up this hunt and return home.
Back in town, Ellie wakes up to a pounding on her door with Jesse waiting on the other side to retrieve her for the morning patrol. She believes there’s some kind of tension between them so Ellie comes clean that she kissed Dina — Jesse’s ex — but it really didn’t mean anything. At first, Jesse acts surprised and angry but then he tells Ellie that he already knew and doesn’t give a shit.
A smirking Ellie gets dressed and heads outside where she tells Jesse that she prefers to go on patrol with Joel. She tells him that despite the problems they’ve faced lately — a growing chasm between them that apparently has everyone close to them talking about it — Ellie promises that it’s still her and Joel. They’ll get through this together.
But Jesse tells Ellie that Joel already went on patrol with Dina so she’s stuck with him for the day but not before a stop by the diner because Maria has requested an audience with her.
When they arrive, Tommy is laying out emergency procedures for a potential invasion coming for Jackson Hole. It seems one of the scouting parties found that some of the infected have actually buried themselves beneath other bodies to stay warm enough to hibernate through the cold and a few of them popped up from the ground like zombies coming back to life. Between that and Ellie’s story about a “smart clicker” that strategized a way to beat her, the whole town is rattled.
Tommy finishes laying out his plans and warnings to the town people when Maria grabs Ellie and takes her to the kitchen where Seth — now sober — is working. He apologizes for his insulting remark and that he ever thought about that hateful word he used against Ellie and Dina. He then offers up some sandwiches for Ellie and Jesse to take with them while they’re out on patrol.
Ellie doesn’t seem very receptive to the apology but Jesse takes the sandwiches and they’re off.
As Jesse and Ellie get further away from Jackson Hole, they realize that the snow is coming down hard and the temperatures are dropping. Despite calls for them to get back home, Jessie and Ellie realize that turning around now would be more dangerous than staying put.
Thankfully, Jesse has a hiding spot in this part of town where they feed the horses and get inside a building — one that’s been used to grow weed — and they start to hunker down until the weather lets up.
Back on the mountaintop, Abby is watching down below when she decides to climb to a lower point to get a better vantage point. Unfortunately, she slips and slides down a valley into a flat spot below — and she sees a human arm sticking up from the frozen ground.
A moment later rumbling from underneath the ground starts shaking and Abby soon discovers that the infected have just been there dormant waiting for somebody to wake them up. Mushroom sprouted heads start popping up from the ground and Abby begins sprinting away to try and escape the infected coming for her.
Abby makes it back to a building surrounded by fences and she climbs over but the infected are hot on her train. In fact, the infected crash into the fence and they’re nearly scratching and clawing their way through until a helping hand reaches out to grab Abby to save her from certain doom.
That hand belongs to Joel — and he’s with Dina offering to help Abby survive but only if they get moving right away.
Obviously, Abby accepts the save, jumps on the back of Joel’s horse and they ride away to avoid the infected. Sadly, there’s no way they’re making it back to Jackson Hole so Abby has another suggestion — ride up the mountain to a cabin where she’s been staying with her friends. They have weapons and they’ll be able to take out any infected that follow them back.
But Abby clearly has a much different plan in mind now that she’s come face-to-face with the man who killed her father.
You Need Me on That Wall
Back in Jackson Hole, Tommy is growing concerned that he can’t reach Joel so he informs the radio operator to keep trying him every 10 seconds until she gets a response. She’s not able to reach Joel but Jesse finally answers when he learns that Joel and Dina never returned from patrol and they’re not answering repeated pleas from the radio.
So Jesse and Ellie leave their safe hiding space, jump on the horses and go looking for Joel and Dina.
While all this is happening, the horde of the infected first going after Abby have now alerted another group of infected sprouting up from the ground on another ridge. The two groups converge and head for the much bigger and inviting target — the town of Jackson Hole.
When one of the spotters sees the horde sprinting towards the town, he rings the alarm and Tommy soon realizes that they’re going to have to defend all they’ve built because this might really be the end otherwise.
Tommy arms up with the rest of the soldiers, who have been trained for this exact moment, praying that it would never come. Once the Cordyceps horde gets close enough, the Jackson Hole army unleashes drums of gasoline from the walls and then lights them on fire with the massive explosion taking out a huge number of the infected.
But size of the horde is too big to take out that easily and Tommy soon spots a bloater — the giant, nearly indestructible infected monster — sprinting towards them but the creature isn’t coming directly at the side of the wall that’s been reinforced. Instead, it’s moving towards another part of the wall that’s going to be easier to crash through and Tommy leaps down to warn everybody that the infected are soon going to be inside.
While women, children and the elderly go into lockdown in basements all around town, the soldiers prepare to arm up for an even bigger fight.
Sure enough, the bloater busts through the wall and the infected get inside.
As the horde comes into the town, snipers start picking them off while Tommy and his smaller brigade armed with flamethrowers prepare for an attack. Sadly, a couple of the soldiers run away in fear but Tommy won’t back down as he unleashes the flames and the infected start getting mowed down but not enough of them to stop the invasion.
In fact, the infected begin breaking through shop windows and crashing into buildings, climbing the stairs and going after the soldiers shooting at them from the roof.
That’s where Maria and her small group of soldiers are continuing to pick off the infected when she starts hammering bullets into the bloater. The creature looks up and spots Maria firing so it begins moving towards the building where she’s stationed.
Realizing the bloater is going for Maria’s building, Tommy pulls out his gun and starts shooting to get its attention. Sure enough, the bloater abandons its original plan and instead starts coming after Tommy.
He lures it into an alley where he loads up the flamethrower and just waits for the bloater to arrive. When the creature finds him, Tommy blasts the bloater with a constant stream of fire but the Cordyceps infected bloater is not backing down.
Tommy continues to flame on but his tank soon runs out of fuel and he’s left with his back against the wall and the bloater still coming after him. But a few steps is all the bloater has left before it collapses and dies in front of him.
As for Maria, she makes her way down to the dog pens and she unleashes them to go after the infected. The dogs tackle and bite through the throats of the infected as the rest of the soldiers start catching up to the rest of the infected invading the town.
For now, Jackson Hole has been saved from the invading horde but plenty of lives were lost and the tragedy this town feels is only going to multiply in the coming days.
Off He Goes
From a distance, Joel and Dina can see the town of Jackson Hole fighting for its survival with fire exploding outside the walls but they’re too far away to make it back in time. Abby assures them that the house where she’s been staying with her friends is only a minute away and sure enough, they make it there a moment later.
The group comes out to greet them, helping Joel, Dina and Abby inside to get warm. Mel — the doctor of the group — tends to Dina, who has some slight frostbite on her hands from being outside for so long. At the same time, Joel is making desperate calls back to Jackson Hole trying to reach his brother or anyone else and he shouts that they’re heading back in three minutes so mount up.
But when Joel turns around, there’s a gun pointed at Dina’s head after Abby has informed her friends that they’ve found the man they’ve been looking for.
Abby’s friends disarm Joel and Dina and she tells Mel to drug Dina and put her to sleep — she won’t want to see what’s coming next.
While Joel believes they’re being robbed, he soon realizes that he’s talking to soldiers from some kind of military outfit. Abby then tells Joel he has one chance to save Dina’s life — despite her group vowing not to kill anybody other than Joel.
But Abby doesn’t want to hear that noise so she doubles down on her threat and she asks Joel where was he last when he encountered the Fireflies. He answers Salt Lake City and now Abby knows for certain that she’s got her man.
Mel injects Dina with a drug that she says will put her to sleep for an hour and Abby begins laying out her reasons for wanting Joel dead.
Joel tries to save his own life by reminding Abby that he just saved hers but she’s not interested — the only life she’s known for the past five years is the one where she’s been tortured by thoughts of her dead father and consumed with revenge against the man who killed him. That’s when Abby shots Joel in the kneecap with a shotgun and then tells Mel to tourniquet the wound.
Abby then lays out to Joel the entirety of his assault against that Firefly compound where he shot and killed 18 soldiers that day and one doctor he killed in cold blood. She tells Joel that man was her father.
She also informs Joel that she’s spent the past five years in a militia based out of Seattle and Abby lays out the rules that they must abide by under their leader. They don’t kill or harm anyone who’s unarmed and that’s exactly what Joel is right now but none of that is going to stop Abby from exacting revenge against the man who murdered her father.
Abby: “But I am going to kill you. Because it doesn’t matter if you have a code like me or you’re a lawless piece of shit like you. There are just some things everyone agrees are just fucking wrong.”
Joel: “Oh just shut the fuck up and do it already!”
Abby: “You stupid old man. You don’t get to rush this.”
With that, Abby picks up a golf club and begins torturing Joel by beating him viciously from head to toe.
Outside, Ellie spots the house on the mountainside and she sprints up there when she sees Joel and Dina’s horses tied up outside by a gate. She approaches the house cautiously with her gun drawn and she makes it through a basement door when she hears some pounding upstairs.
Ellie carefully makes her way up the stairs — and in the room outside that door is Abby mercilessly beating Joel to death, now with her fists after the golf club literally snapped into two pieces.
When Ellie bursts through and sees Joel laying half dead on the floor, she tries to attack but despite her best efforts, she’s soon overpowered and tackled to the ground. That’s not before she gets one good swipe with her knife on Manny, who is angry and really wants to take it out on Ellie but the rest of the group won’t let him.
Ellie cries out in pain and begs for Joel to get up as his beaten, bloodied body lays barely clinging to life on the floor. She begs to let him live but Abby has no designs on Joel ever taking another breath after this moment.
So she takes the shard of the golf club and stabs it through Joel’s neck.
Joel expires staring back at the daughter he saved and Ellie is tortured through tears as her surrogate father dies after being brutally beaten and stabbed. That’s when Ellie makes a vow of her own to the people who just took Joel from her.
“I’m going to kill you. I’m going to kill you! You’re going to die. You’re all going to fucking die!”
~ Ellie
Manny takes a parting shot by kicking Ellie before the group loads up their weapons and gear to head back out for Seattle. Ellie rushes over to Joel’s side and removes the golf club from his neck but he’s already gone.
At the same time, Jesse makes his way up the mountain and finds the house where Ellie is left grieving for Joel and Dina is just now coming awake from the drugs she’s been given.
The episode ends with Jesse, Dina and Ellie riding towards what’s left of town with Joel’s body wrapped in sheets as they drag him back to be buried.
The pain and torment that Abby felt for the past five years after her father died has undoubtedly been transferred to Ellie, who is now surely going to begin her hunt to murder the person responsible for killing the only father she’s ever known.
“The Last of Us” returns for a new episode next Sunday night at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.
