'The Last of Us’ Season 2, Episode 2 Recap

Looking for a recap of season 2, episode 1? We have you covered.

I played The Last of Us Part II for the first time a couple years ago, right around the debut of the HBO adaptation. Even though the video game released in 2020, I somehow staved off the title's nuclear spoilers until after my play-through. (I blame my pandemic brain fog, as well as Animal Crossing, the only game I poured over at the time.) In Part II, the devastating moment we all just witnessed in the TV series—Joel's death at the hands of Abby, an open-wound personified—is unlike anything I've experienced in any entertainment medium.

At the time, I remember struggling to describe the enormity of the twist to friends. I often said something along the lines of, "It's like you booted up Super Mario Brothers, only to have Mario die in the first hour of the game!" Now, the intersection of HBO viewers who love The Last of Us but safely avoided the story's cataclysmic spoiler will have to reckon with the fact that Pedro Pascal is no longer the driving force behind the series. This show belongs to Bella Ramsey now.

If you need someone to commiserate with, I highly recommend this week's edition of The Cliff-Hanger, which hits inboxes Monday morning. In it, my colleague, Josh Rosenberg, asks the question: How does the hottest show on TV move on without its biggest star? Honestly, I don't envy Josh's duties this week. Instead, I have the (somewhat) easier task of breaking down the episode itself for all of you at home.

So, as soon as you're able to wipe the image of a bloodied Pascal from your mind's eye (good luck!), let's recap The Last of Us season 2, episode 2, "Through the Valley."

Feeling some anger toward Kaitlyn Dever's Abby right about now? That's fine! Understandable, even. But don't get all parasocial about it, just as many gamers did upon The Last of Us Part II's release. When I spoke to series co-creator Craig Mazin before episode 1, he seemed fully aware of the potential for Joel's live-action death to trigger another round of backlash.

"I'm hoping that as people encounter the events of the show that they will encounter them as we intended," he told me. "There are lots of upsetting things that happen. We're a show that started with killing a little kid. Bad stuff happens, but also some beautiful things happen too. I'm hopeful that people take it as it was intended."

Well, since Abby is the perpetrator of this episode's fateful death, it's only fitting that it begins with her, too. We first see her in what appears to be a dream located at the Seattle hospital where Joel killed many a Firefly en route to saving Ellie's life. Abby's subconscious must've known that 4/20 weekend puts twins in vogue—yes, I'm still thinking about Michael B. Jordan's dual role in Sinners—so she sees her doppelgänger bumming around in the hallway. "Don’t go in there," says Hallway Abby. "I’m telling you. Don’t go back." When Main Abby refutes, Hallway Abby bluntly replies, "His brains are on the floor."

Later on—right before Abby, uh, takes a nine-iron to Joel's face—she reveals that her father was the Firefly doctor who was about to operate on Ellie in pursuit of a cure for the cordyceps pandemic. "That was my dad," she seethes to Joel. "Guess you already figured. The nurses said you barely even looked at him as you pulled the trigger."

Just about everyone in The Last of Us has trauma beyond the zombies of it all, and this is Abby's—so much so that she revisits the site of her father's death over and over again in her dreams. "I was nineteen," she'll tell Joel later. When Abby wakes up, she's at an abandoned, rich-looking cabin in the woods—which is close enough to Jackson to see buildings and billowing smoke from the window. Even after the hike from Washington to Wyoming, Abby's crew is still dubious of her designs to kill Joel. Out of earshot, Owen says, "The plan is to convince her to go back." Good luck with that.

Back in Jackson... everyone has a hangover. Especially Ellie. The ever-sturdy Jesse—who is still played with the upmost charisma by Young Mazino—picks her up for a patrol shift, then proceeds to badger Ellie about her feud with Joel. "My shit with Joel is complicated," says Ellie. "I know that, from the outside, it probably looks really bad. It has been really bad. But I’m still me. He’s still Joel, and nothing’s ever gonna change that. Ever. So you can all stop talking about us, worrying about us, and thinking about us. All right?"

I feel you, Ellie. Unfortunately, Jackson's resident bigot, Seth, is clearly still talking, worrying, and thinking about Ellie. So, he offers an apology and a steak sandwich before she leaves town for the day. Seth admits that he "obviously had a few too many" before he hurled a slur at her. Ellie isn't having any of it—justifiably so. Plus, no one likes a cold steak sando.

Jesse and Ellie hit the road, where they are promptly greeted by a sent-from-the-heavens snowstorm. They take shelter in a place Jesse used to frequent with his old patrol partner: Eugene. All of us at home know that Eugene is Gail's late husband; in Joel's therapy sesh, we learned that Joel had to put Eugene down for unknown (to us, at least) reasons. Now, we don't come any closer to solving that mystery, but we do learn that the man was a huge pothead. The hideout is basically a dispensary, right down to a big ol' gas mask. Right on 4/20, baby! Get it Eugene!

In The Last of Us video games, it’s Tommy—not Dina—who who is with Joel when he dies.

Please allow me one more moment of levity before we move to the tough stuff. Join me in welcoming Gabriel Luna’s Awesome Jacket as a new principal cast member on The Last of Us.

Okay, moving right along. I hate to inform you, dear reader, that some random extra pops open some random pipe—which is full of mushroom nerves. (I Googled the biological name for this an embarrassing amount of times and still couldn't find the answer.) It alerts the—deep breath—infected army that was cryogenically frozen under the snow in Wyoming?!?!?! Make it make sense! In any case, the Greater Jackson Area is now in extreme peril. This sets off two series-changing events: 1/ The infected chase Abby right into Joel's good-samaritan arms, and 2/ They unleash hell upon the city of Jackson.

The ensuing madness must've amounted to a full year of HBO's VFX budget. Almost as soon as Joel saves Abby's life, she proceeds to trick him (and Dina, by the way) into riding straight into her hideout. At the same time, we see Jackson's military might in full effect. Flamethrowers, exploding gas cans, guns, canines, more guns... Jackson is truly operating in Easy Mode. Then, a Bloater (the legal term for a big boy Infected) corners Tommy, who manages to pump out just enough fire to take it down. By the end of the episode, Jackson is safe—but not without major casualties and structural damage.

So, where does Tommy go from here? The actor behind Tommy, Gabriel Luna, gave Esquire's Eric Francisco a hint. "There's this scene that follows the events of the second episode," Luna said. "I won't get into too heavily, but there's a transition that happens, a passing of the torch so to speak. It felt not only was it happening in the story, but in our work and in our production. It's exciting moving forward. It's a terribly tragic episode. But now the world expands."

The Last of Us is fully Bella Ramsey’s show now.

I already teased some of Abby's big monologue, so let me pause for a second. Writing this recap before episode 2 drops, I truly don't know how many of you knew about Joel's death in advance. When I spoke to Mazin, he seemed to feel the exact same way. But he did seem to think that the HBO audience will take the news a bit better than the gamer community did in 2020. It's funny—he even brought up Game of Thrones as the series that taught TV audiences to prepare for the worst:

I may have to flee. I don't know. I think that there is a fundamental difference in the way you experience a television show than the way you experience a video game. One of the strengths of the video game medium is that no one says, 'So I was playing The Last of Us and Joel did this.' No. I moved him. I did it. Also, I think we're used to television shows hurting the people we love. Game of Thrones knocked everyone on their ass when Sean Bean died and then two seasons later knocked everybody out on their ass again when they did the Red Wedding. If it's done correctly, if it's purposeful, if the deaths impact the story around them and change things permanently in with the characters we care about, then we understand why it happened.

I hate to write these words, but Abby's crew puts Dina to sleep before watching in absolute terror as Abby bludgeons the living hell out of Joel. It hit me just as hard as it did when I played the game. Truly, nothing prepares you for Joel's bloodied, swollen face. Abby shoots taunts him with a speech that feels like she rehearsed it quite literally a thousand times. "I am going to kill you," she says. "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." As if he was ready for this karmic blow, Joel doesn't say much at all—only that she hurry up. "You stupid old man," Abby retorts. "You don’t get to rush this."

This is HBO, after all, so watching Pedro Pascal die on screen isn't enough pain for us all on a Sunday night. Next, Ellie wanders in. Abby's minions pin her down, just in time to watch her drive the broken shaft of the golf club through Joel's neck. "I’m gonna kill you," Ellie screams. "I’m gonna kill you! You’re gonna die. You’re all gonna fucking die!"

Abby's team simply packs it up and leaves, presumably heading back to Seattle. The last shot we see is Jesse, Dina, and Ellie making their way back to Jackson—dragging Joel's corpse through the snow.