[ELLIE opens the door to SAM’s room.
ELLIE: Have a good night.
SAM: (sighs) How is it that you’re never scared?
ELLIE: Who says that I’m not?
SAM: What are you scared of?
ELLIE: (sighs) Well, let’s see. Um, being by myself. I’m scared of ending up alone. What about you?
SAM: Those things out there… What if the people are still inside? What if they’re trapped in there without any control of their body? I’m scared of that happening to me.
ELLIE: Okay. First of all, we’re a team now, ‘kay? We’re gonna help each other out. And second, (sighs) ...they might still look like people, but that person is not in there anymore.
SAM: ...Henry says that they’ve “moved on”. That they’re with their families. Like, in Heaven. Do you think that’s true?
ELLIE: ...I go back and forth. I mean, I’d like to believe it…
SAM: But you don’t.
ELLIE: I guess not…
SAM: Yeah, me neither.]
<<TLOU PODCAST THEME SONG>>
CHRISTIAN: This is the Official The Last of Us Podcast. And I’m your host Christian Spicer.
As we all await the release of Part II, I’m revisiting The Last of Us Part I and talking with the visionaries and talents who made it. We’ll be recapping the story while diving deep into the making-of.
If you haven’t listened to Episode 1 yet, do that now because we are walking through this story chronologically, and that means in today’s episode we’ll be working our way through the rest of Summer and I’ll be talking with Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson (aka: Joel and Ellie) and I’ll also be talking with Art Director Erick Pangilinan, and of course Writer and Creative Director Neil Druckmann.
<<MUSIC ENDS>>
Now last we left off, Joel vowed to transport Ellie to the Fireflies, after leaving behind his recently-infected partner, Tess. He and Ellie make their way out of Boston, and into…
[SFX of explosion
JOEL: Jesus!
ELLIE: Whoa, nelly. What the hell was that?
JOEL: That would be one of Bill’s traps.
ELLIE: Your friend a bit paranoid, maybe?
JOEL: That’s putting it lightly.
ELLIE: What’s the deal with this guy?
JOEL: Well he helped us smuggle stuff into the city, he knows how to find things.
ELLIE: Well let’s hope we don’t blow up trying to find him.
JOEL: Ellie come on just
SFX of trap
JOEL: Oh shit! God-damn...
ELLIE: I got you
JOEL: God damn it Bill!
ELLIE: What just happened?
JOEL: Another one of Bill’s stupid traps!
JOEL: Cut that rope and help bring me down!
ELLIE: On it!
SFX of Clickers
JOEL: Shit, here they come!
ELLIE: Joel?
JOEL: Just give me the rope. Ellie? How’s it looking?
ELLIE: I’m going as fast as I can!
JOEL and ELLIE struggle, ELLIE cuts the rope and JOEL falls to the ground and encounters BILL
BILL: Get off your ass, and on your feet.]
CHRISTIAN: We're meeting Bill, which as a player, I expect Bill to die. I expect to like Bill, I expect Bill to die and I expect Joel and Ellie to be worse off because of it. Um, who is Bill to Joel? And then in that moment, who is Bill to Ellie coming into this from a, a new perspective?
NEIL: You know, when we work on the story, we write everything on index cards and we outline it on this big cork board and every section has a purpose. So one of the things we wanted to explore the stories, like how are people surviving the people that are kind of situated in a place, what are they, what do they do to survive? So there's, we've seen so far, the military, which is surviving by these very kinds of oppressive means and means people don't have freedom of movement. They might not have as much food as they want to, but they're mostly protected from the Infected.
Um, that's one version. And then we want to say, okay, what if someone, uh, could survive by themselves? So it does two things. One is it, it sets up, okay, here's another way to survive in this world and what are the pros and cons of that. But the other thing is it reflects, it's almost like Bill's living, he's taken Joel's philosophy or what Joel believes his philosophy is to the nth degree is like Joel believes like you don't get attached to anyone.
[BILL: That sorta shit’s good for one thing. Getting you killed.]
You live by yourself and that's how you survive.
[BILL: I realize it’s gotta be just me.]
And we get to see, okay, well this is what that looks like.
[JOEL: Bill, it ain’t like that. It’s--
BILL: Bullshit. It’s just like that.]
TROY: I definitely see, almost every character that, that Joel meets throughout this, uh, especially those that you meet, is you have to go through the thought experiment of, you know, there but for the grace of God, go I. Like, you look at Bill and it's like, I could have gone crazy. Um, I could have isolated myself and found a little, you know, shit-heel town that, uh, I could've just put up this barrier and, and all that I have to worry about is protecting myself. Uh, why did Joel choose to be a smuggler in a quarantine zone? Why did he choose to partner with Tess and do this? Why didn't he just isolate? Um, but I definitely do look at that relationship with Bill, um, which is primarily, it's, uh, we, we know that Bill and Tess have, are, are kind of like, that, that's the relationship, right? Joel is always kind of on the, the, the, um, the outside of that. He's the, he's the plus one Um, so that's why it's, it's kind of a, a tenuous relationship when you see Bill. It's like, Hey, what you, you know, I’m... friend? Friend?... [laughs]...uh, when they first meet, and, and the relationship between the two of them is, is contentious. Um, it's like you and I have commerce together, but we're not friends. Uh, it’s almost like Bill is, is Joel's weed dealer. You know?
CHRISTIAN: [laughs]
TROY: It's like, Hey, we're cool, but I’m, you know? This is the limit of our relationship, you know? Um, and it's, to me it was always a very interesting choice that Neil made in the script to, um, when Bill brings up Tess.
[BILL: How in the hell is Tess okay with this suicide mission?
JOEL: It’s actually her idea.
BILL: Really?]
It was like, you know, Did Tess put you up to this? Um, yeah, this is right after Tess has died and there's not that, um, Oh, Tess is, is, is dead. Um, and I've, I've thought about that moment a lot and it’s, is, did he, did Joel not tell Bill that because, it was like, then you and I have nothing to do with each other? Because the only reason why Joel is in front of Bill is because he needs something. He needs a car.
NEIL: Bill's like trying to say like, why are you with this kid? Don’t you like--And he kind of lays it out almost the themes of the game is like, don't you know what happens when you like rely on someone and like you're going to get yourself killed? And Joel's like, it wasn't me. It was Tess was like,
[BILL: Well then the broad’s not as smart as I thought she was.]
And then Bill starts insulting Tess notes just with Joel kind of stops him
[JOEL: Bill. Can we please just get on with it?]
And then we want it to show how Bill is,
[JOEL: Bill isn’t exactly the most stable individual.]
Again he just rambles to himself.
[BILL: Get all the supplies from the warehouse…
ELLIE: Ok. Well now he’s talking to himself.]
When you don't have another person to communicate with, you start going a little crazy and your mind splits just, you could communicate with anyone. You start communicating with yourself and we wanted to show that as you're walking around town, to say, okay, this is probably what this guy does when no one's around.
[SFX montage of BILL rambling
JOEL: Bill.
BILL: Joel. This way.]
He is just living this very kind of lonely, sad existence. And then, and then, uh, so much of his character came from the actor that played W. Earl Brown, uh, who was just phenomenal. I mean, I'm going to say that about every one of our cast members. Um, but he really kind of brought this, there's just like this anger and this resentment. And again, this kind of pushing away people, uh, that we really felt honest the way it came out of, um, Earl's performance.
[JOEL: What you know this guy or something?
BILL: Frank.
JOEL: Who the hell is Frank?
BILL: He was my partner.]
NEIL: I think the idea of Bill having a partner, um, you know, we are always trying to subvert expectations. Like you think it’s gonna go this way and if it went exactly as you predicted it’s gonna get boring. So you think you're meeting Bill because Joel needs a car cause he wants to get to his brother as quickly as possible to get rid of Ellie. And then we're going to subvert things by having a hoard of Infected in the school and it's not going to go at all how these characters predict it's going to go. But another way to subvert expectations is the second bill is this loner. Push everybody away and then find out he really cared about this person. And at first I think we conceived of it as just like a surviving partner, his best friend. And as I was writing those scenes, it just, I don't know, sometimes things just come out of you and it, it felt more interesting to say, okay, this partner is his lover as well. And when we shoot these scenes, we first do a table read where we kind of get the actors to say the words for the first time, maybe improvise some changes, um but really make that part of the storytelling process-
TROY: Every chance I get the, to, the opportunity to talk about specifically the character of Bill, um, I love bringing up the fact that, uh, Earl, what W. Earl Brown, what he brought to that character specifically, um, was he, he infused that character with the soul. Um, Neil and Bruce did such a great job of giving it framework, and especially Neil, writing the character. But one of the, the first moments that I remember seeing Neil's MO, which would be, I'm going to present you with something and I'm going to give you the opportunity to make it better, uh, or to flesh it out, was sitting at the table read for this one scene, and, the scene is when we, um, uh, discover that Bill has a partner. And that was the specific word that was used. It just used the word partner. And Earl asked Neil, he says, when you say “partner”, um, what are you, what are you stating? And Neil says, in his famous phrase now, ‘what do you think?’ And Earl made the choice. And he's like, if it's alright with you, I think it's interesting that in this world, um, this man found partnership, he found connection, and he found love in this person. And that's what it was. Um, but that was a choice that, that Earl made purely as an actor, that Neil, uh, facilitated and supported that decision.
NEIL: At the time I didn't think about what representation could mean to other people, I don't know why I didn't think about and I, and maybe I should have. Um, but since the game has come out and there was like just a nuanced gay relationship that, uh, people connected with and identified with and they come in to express to me how much it meant to them to see it represented, so honestly are represented as well as as we did it. Um, it just kinda reinforced that feeling of, um, um, seeing yourself in something you love, seeing yourself in the movie and the game in a book. Uh, it's, it's, it's, it's such a unique feeling, um, that I can relate to on other levels. Um, that is just something that has become part of our process now to make sure that we're inclusive to tell better stories. It, ultimately it leads to better stories and it leads to more people being able to connect to different layers of your stories than just kind of telling the same stories with the same kind of characters in the same kind of relationships.
<<MUSIC>>
[JOEL: Hey look at that.
ELLIE: Lemme use that. I’m a pretty good shot with that thing.
JOEL: How about we just leave this kind of stuff to me.
ELLIE: Well, we could both be armed, cover each other.
JOEL: I don’t think so.... So we got shotguns and bombs, the hell are we doing with them?
BILL: Well every few weeks this military caravan rides through town I assume they’re out looking for supplies but you’d be amazed at the shit that they overlook. Anyway, few months back they’re rolling through and they get overrun by this horde of Infected, they were all over the truck it plows right on the side of the high school, it’s still sitting there with a battery in it.
JOEL: So we take that battery and we put it in another car?
BILL: BINGO! I wanted to get it but it seemed too dangerous with all the Infected in that part of town. But fuck it.
JOEL: That actually might work. Ellie come on.
BILL: Look, there’s the school.
JOEL: Alright.
BILL: Ready?
JOEL: Guess we’ll find out.]
<<MUSIC>>
ERICK: Uh, my name is Erick Pangilinan. Uh, and I'm the Art Director in Last of Us Part I.
CHRISTIAN: Before we dive into the game, I'd love to start broadly for people who may not know, um, what is your role as art director?
ERICK: Um so… It's almost like a mix between a Producer and an Art Director and an Art Manager where I manage the entire project from start to finish dealing with the Creative Director, Concept Art, Animation, the camera guys and the Environment team. Um, so I take care of the game from start to finish.
CHRISTIAN: So how does the art and the art direction contribute to that feeling of um, like loneliness and just isolation in this world that has moved on from when we started 20 years prior?
ERICK: I think one of the goals we tried to do it in the art was to contrast that because the feeling and the, and the situations we put the players in is very grim, very sad, very violent. And we want to contrast that with the environment being beautiful, open, bright.
CHRISTIAN: How do you balance the beauty of nature with the destruction of what it represents? That here's this beautiful flower per se, but it's not where a flower should be if society was, as it was, you know, 20 years prior. how do you balance that?
ERICK: I think for us, that was, we, we searched the internet, we look, we looked for references and you know, like in most, uh, images we saw it was just overwhelming. It was just nature will take back everything,
[SFX of nature in game]
and, and for us it is for the art director, it's more about balancing that so that it's, it's visually appealing. We use that to our advantage in, in separating the values, separating, uh, what is nature and what is the environment so that it creates a good balance aesthetically, uh, to the world. It gives us opportunities to create natural formations with what was once manmade.
[SFX of waterfalls]
Like using bridges as uh pathways for water to go by so you have all of these waterfalls cascading on top of each other, but instead of rocks, you have like the, uh, pancaked freeway. So it creates like this nice cascade down, um, an environment. But when you look at it closely, you'll see like, Hey, that's not rocks. That's not these, these, you know, terracing it's actually a destroyed structure, like the freeway that collapsed on top of each other and formed this nice waterfall in there.
CHRISTIAN: One of the moments I’d love to talk about - it’s arguably the first and only? Certainly one of the few boss fights in the game - like if “boss fights” even exist in this game - It's not like a health bar shows up and you know, “boss fight, FIGHT!” comes on screen; but it’s the encounter with the Bloater.
[SFX of Bloater]
It's such an important moment in the game and I’d love to hear how that moment and the gym were created.
[ELLIE: What the fuck is that?
BILL: It’s a goddamn Bloater.
JOEL: Ellie, take cover.]
ERICK: Yeah, I guess the Bloater’s an interesting, um, part in the game, but I think I remember, um, us being very against like making this feel like a game. We want you to be immersed in it as if you're in the world. So, so UI was a very, uh, careful balance in how much UI we're going to give the players so that it doesn't put them in like, Oh, now you're in a combat space, oh now you're fighting this boss or something. So we were very careful not to take you out of that, that experience. And one of the things that we do in the environment, especially like manmade environments like the school was to go very deep with the identity of the space. So, so we, we try to treat every space architecturally correct and we tried to study the interior designs of each of these structures so that we are designing it as if it's a real school. And, and then applying this environmental storytelling of like what happened to that place? Like did it, did it, uh, collapsed? Did it get flooded? Did it, um, how did the dirt, um, managed to get to this area? And what did it do to the materials like the floor or to the roof? Um, how do you apply the Infected into this area? Like how does, how, how do you show the pattern of the growth coming from the source? So the Bloater is really like the pinnacle of the most dangerous, uh, part of the infection. And I think, I think that's, that's why this thing was treated like it was the boss, you know, and, and it was presented in a way where you can see it's maximum strength like in this gym. And you were able to fight this with, with all your most powerful, um, weapons.
CHRISTIAN: And at least for me, I feel like it also represented because it felt like a real space, uh almost a micro version of a hero's journey coming complete where it's the realization of for so many people (projecting my own feelings, but) the, the school bully and, and that bullying happening in gym, right. Like be it the gym teacher yelling at you or the kid who pushes you into the locker. And here's Joel, this man's man, you know, Got-- survived everything so far taking on the bully, uh, in the school gym.
ERICK: Yeah, I never thought of it like that, and I guess that's why it's like the boss fight, right? Like you have to, you have to up that thing with, um, the, the danger of the situation with something bigger. And I think for us, that was the solution. And it's something that, you know, if you were stuck with it in an enclosed space, you'd, you'd be totally screwed and um, and so like getting introduced to the bloater in this big gym is actually great because it gets you, um, prepared for the other situations, which would be lot scarier than this.
[SFX of Bloater
ELLIE: What the fuck is it throwing at us?
JOEL: Ellie, just stay away from it.
SFX of Bloater and shots]
<<MUSIC>>
CHRISTIAN: And they destroy the Bloater and make they’re way out of the high school...and they find Frank’s body...
NEIL: But when they find Frank's body, like they see Frank's body when they're in the middle of a yelling match
[JOEL: Bill
BILL: Somebody had the same idea, they stole my shit
JOEL: Well then what the hell is plan b?
BILL: You oughta be thankful you’re still drawing breath. That was plan a, b, c, all the way to fuckin’ z. And furthermore you can tell Tess that she can take this job.
JOEL: Don’t you bring Tess into this!
BILL: She can shove right up her
JOEL: She had nothing to do with…]
And then they find this body.
[JOEL: Jesus… what you know this guy or some?
BILL: Frank
JOEL: Who the hell’s Frank?
BILL: He was my partner. He’s the only idiot that would wear a shirt like that.
BILL: He’s got bites here]
And then, Bill revealed that Frank was his partner and we see Joel do a moment of empathy and Joel pauses.
[JOEL: I reckoned he didn’t wanna turn so he--
BILL: Yeah I guess not.]
NEIL: He doesn't know what to say. Like that was one of the, one of my favorite descriptives of Joel when we sent out the casting description is he's inarticulate. He doesn't quite know how to express himself--because he's buried his feelings so much and he's just not like a well learned person. He's just, he doesn't quite know how to express his feeling, his thoughts, and he's just, he just kind of rambles in those moments. Like, I don't, that's a, that's a rough deal.
[JOEL: That’s a tough deal]
NEIL: And that's the best he could do to comfort someone he cares about. But we see this moment of like he gets it, he gets that sadness, he gets that loss. Um, and as much as he wants to bury those emotions, they bubble to the top.
TROY: When we get to that scene and he says, you know, he's so clinical about it. He's like, yeah, it looks like he got bit here, here, and here. Um, and he has this one moment of, contemplative grief and then it's back to Bill. He's like, you get rid of that girl as soon as you can. You know, you're, this is the last time I'm ever gonna see you ‘cause you're going to be a dead man.
[BILL: We square?
JOEL: We’re square.
BILL: Now get the fuck outta my town]
That's it. But it's a reminder, if nothing else for, I think for Joel, Bill, that whole arc serves as a... quasi-Faustian, um, just a, this, this neo-Jiminy Cricket going, remember, remember, you get attached and it'll fuck you. Don't care about people. Remember, don't care about people. This is about getting this one thing and getting to the other side. Don't get emotional about this, Joel. That's what I think the purpose of Bill serves to Joel. It's a reminder of the atrocities of this world that we're in.
<<MUSIC>>
[ELLIE: Oh, man!
JOEL: Hey, what happened to sleeping?
ELLIE: (sighs) Okay, I know it doesn’t look like it, but this here is not a bad read. Only one problem. Right there. “To be continued.” (sighs) I hate cliffhangers.
JOEL: Where did you get that?
ELLIE: Uh, back at Bill’s... I mean, all this stuff was just lying there.
JOEL: (sighs)]
NEIL: That scene I think was the first scene we ever wrote for that game. And it was used to cast Ellie and Joel. Um, and it was just--cause we knew like there's so much like violence and intensity and drama in the story that we need to balance it with lighthearted moments. And that's why it was so important to get the kind of levity that's in the scene and the kind of chemistry that these characters needed to have in this scene. Um, so in that instance it was like, well, we ha what would Ellie steal from Bill? And she steals all sorts of stuff. But I remember the comic book was just the first inkling we had that Oh Ellie would be into comics and there'll be such a rarity in the world that you would get excited every time she found a comic. And then that later turned into its own mechanic that as Joel, you can, as you're exploring, you can find these comics and then you gift Ellie. And it was another way systemically to build the relationship.
CHRISTIAN: Now Neil, you’re someone who’s written real comics. Did American Dreams exist at this point in your mind? Were you teasing the comic you would write about Ellie’s backstory? Was it already written?
NEIL: Yeah. No. When, when the scene was written, there was no thinking that, Oh, there'll be an opportunity here to make a comic book with uh Faith Aaron Hicks, someone I admire. I, I just love comics and I've loved comics my almost my entire life, that that's where like, I'm trying to think what a teenager would be into that, that I just immediately gravitate towards that which is comics. Again, I grew up in Israel when I was young and at the time we didn't have, when I lived there, there were no comic book stores. So like one day my dad came back from the U.S. and brought my older brother, a Batman comic and I was like seven or eight and I was just blown away by it. It just left such an impression on me. And then it was all about how do we get more of these things? And when we finally moved to the U.S. as a kid, I just collected like boxes and boxes of comics and I could just devour them.
[SFX of JOEL playing the country music ELLIE took from BILL
ELLIE: Well, better than nothing.
The music continues to play on the radio.
ELLIE: Oh. I’m sure your friend will be missing this tonight.
JOEL: Mhmm.
ELLIE: It’s light on the reading, but it’s got some interesting photos.
JOEL: N--Now Ellie, that ain’t for kids.
ELLIE: Whoa! How, how the hell would he even walk around with that thing!?
JOEL: Get rid of that! Just--
ELLIE: Now hold your horses, I wanna see what all the fuss is about… Oh. Why are these all stuck together?
JOEL: ...Umm…
ELLIE: (laughs) I’m just fucking with you.
Ellie tosses the porn mag out the window.
ELLIE: Bye bye, dude!]
ASHLEY: I think those moments are so important in the game because it is heavy and we need to have those moments to just sort of, all have sort of a collective sigh of relief to have a break for a moment. And you know, with the porn magazine for instance. It's, it's so funny because, you know, when we were talking about it, I don't think that I ever would have talked to my dad about a porn magazine, let alone talk about, you know, talk about a porn magazine in that way. But that just shows how interesting Joel and Ellie's relationship is. And you know, the whole joke where she asks why the pages are stuck together and he panics, but she's fucking with him. You know, she, she knows and it's, it's so good because you think it's going to be a moment where Joel is panicking and he's like, Oh man, I gotta have the birds and the bees conversation with her. Um, and she's like, ‘nah dude, I already know about all that shit. It's fine.’ It's just this beautiful sort of moment of him thinking, ‘Oh, I need to be a parent in this moment.’ And she's like, ‘no, it's okay. I've, I've raised myself to a certain degree. There's a lot of stuff that I already know, but we can joke about these things together because that's just what life is now, but I think, you know, in terms of, of that conversation and sort of the, the, the Joel and Ellie have about, about it, it's, you know, we have, for us, it takes us a long time when we start forming a friendship or a relationship to really put our sense of humor out there because it's, you don't know if your sense of humor is going to line up with somebody else's. If you say something, are they going to find that funny? Are they gonna find it offensive and sense of humor is such a big part of, of who we all are and the things that we find funny, which doesn't make any sense from one person to the next person. But I feel like being able to share that with someone is the biggest sign of comfortability and the fact that they get to that place and they start joking around and having a fun time. It shows their closeness and how this time that they've spent together in this journey that they've gone on. Um, they're getting closer and they care about each other and they're starting to enjoy each other's company. Um, and that needs to happen, that needed to be there.
CHRISTIAN: As we, we move through the game, the world becomes, um, or aspects of the world (there are still moments of levity) but aspects of the world become more brutal in terms of both the human enemies that we encounter and their ferocity and also, um, uh, enemies like, uh, Hunters--
[SFX of Truck
ELLIE: Easy!
HUNTER: Please, help!
ELLIE: Holy shit! Are we gonna help him?
JOEL: Put your seatbelt on, Ellie.
ELLIE: But what about the guy?
JOEL: He ain't even hurt.]
And the approach to what Joel and Ellie have to fight and, and, and physically combat. Is there an analogy there to Joel and Ellie's moral compass also sliding or is it just kind of the mechanics of gameplay that we need new enemies for our players to kind of deal with?
NEIL: It's almost all those things. So, uh, we wanted to show there are multiple threats in this world. One is the Infected--
[SFX of Infected]
Um, and it's almost like when you think of a natural disaster, there isn't someone strategizing how to use these Infected to kill people. It’s just nature is now killing us, um, in large numbers. Uh, but then knowing, um, when supplies get scarce and people get desperate, they can turn very primal and violent--
[SFX of gunshots
HUNTER: Thought you could get away from us, huh? We’re back, motherfuck-
SFX and montage of human violence]
And we wanted to explore that both in the story and in gameplay. Um, so you know, when, when Ellie and Joel get to Pittsburgh, it's the first time, I guess there's a little bit in the opening in um, in Boston, but we really don't really kind of really dive into it until you get to Pittsburgh. And we just see how violent and how desperate people have become and how much they're, how tribal they become. And anybody outside the tribe has seen almost no different as the Infected. It's just someone you kill for just for survival. And it was an opportunity to show through dialogue that this is something Joel has done. Um, so I remember like as we talked about these different parts, I remember in my head when they came online and you know, we started production of the game with Pittsburgh. That was like one of the first environments we've built and worked our way out from there. And one of the first in-game bits of in-game dialogue we recorded is Ellie asking Joel, “Like how did you know those people on the outset were trying to ambush us?” and him saying,
[JOEL: I've been on both sides
ELLIE: Oh. So, uh you kill a lot of innocent people?
SFX of JOEL grunting
ELLIE: I’ll take that as a yes.
JOEL: Take it however you want.]
And it was just like, you know, it took a lot of time to get to that dialogue. But what I love about dialogue like that is it just all of a sudden your brain is filled with all sorts of backstory of like what this guy must have done to get to this place. Um, and can he come back from that? Like it kinda fills your mind about who he is and then raises interesting questions about where this might go.
TROY: I think Joel looks at himself as a lone survivor without being, you know, he's like, I, whatever you need from me, I'll do whatever you need. I'll do whatever I have to. Um, I don't need a jacket. I don't need a badge. I don't need, um, any kind of affiliation or fraternity especially. And by the way, that's, that's one of my, people are like, what's your favorite line from the game? I was like, that's it. That, that to me is the most revealing line. Um, she was like, how did you know about that? And he goes, ‘cause I've been on both sides. Right? And it’s said so offhand. It's just like, because, like, ‘what do you want to know, girl? I'll tell you everything.’ Um, I think that to recognize that play, to be able to, like a quarterback, look down the line and go, they just changed and to throw that audible and be able-- that, that you have been in that situation before and you will not get caught looking again.
[The Hunters can suddenly be heard murmuring below and a bottle falls as JOEL ducks down.
JOEL (whispering): Oh shit
ELLIE drops down to the same platform JOEL is on.
JOEL: Come here. Keep your head down.
ELLIE crouches down and joins JOEL by the balcony.
JOEL: Alright now, I’m gonna jump down there and I’m gonna clear us a path
ELLIE: What about me?
JOEL: You stay here--
ELLIE (whispering): This is so stupid! We’d have more of a fuckin’ chance if you’d let me help.
JOEL (whispering): I am!
JOEL grabs the rifle sitting next to them.
JOEL: Now you seem to know your way around a gun. You reckon you can handle that?
ELLIE: ...Well, I sorta shot a rifle before… but it was at rats.
JOEL: ...Rats?
ELLIE: (sighs) With BBs.
JOEL: ...Well, it’s the same basic concept. Lift it up.
ELLIE raises the rifle
JOEL: You’re gonna wanna lean right into that stock ‘cause it is gonna kick a hell of a lot more than any BB rifle.
ELLIE: Okay...
JOEL: Go on and pull the bolt back.
ELLIE grabs the bolt
JOEL: Just tug it.
ELLIE pulls the bolt back and a bullet shell casing pops out of the rifle and falls to the ground
JOEL: There you go. Now as soon as you fire, you’re gonna want to get another round in there quick… Listen to me… If I get into trouble down there, you make every shot count. Yeah?
ELLIE: I got this.
JOEL: ...Alright.
JOEL crouches over to the opening in the platform.
JOEL: And just so we’re clear about back there… It was either him or me.
JOEL drops down to the street of the plaza.
ELLIE: ...You’re welcome.]
ASHLEY: I love that Joel doesn't let her shoot until that point because she is a kid. And that feels very real. And you know, oftentimes in video games it's just like, yeah, give every everybody a gun and let's just like go shoot up some stuff. But it's, it's, it's, it's so real. And you know, it's, if this happened today, there's no way that you would give your 14 year old kid a gun on day one of an apocalypse. And I mean, at least I wouldn't, but that is such a huge turning point in the game and their relationship because it shows a massive amount of trust between them. And I think Ellie at that point already trusted Joel in terms of how capable he was and how safe she sort of felt with him to a certain degree. But it feels like the first time that Joel puts his trust in her and his life in her hands and that lands with her. And their relationship is different after that. How can it not be?
CHRISTIAN: Yeah. And I think that is that, that that's the key moment because it's Ellie going from this, you know, we've seen it so many times in video games, this character that the protagonist needs to escort and protect everywhere to later, that role totally reverses.
ASHLEY: When we sort of first started shooting the game, there was a lot of conversation. You know, me, I am a gamer and as sort of a, your companion that you are carrying with you the whole time, sometimes it can feel like a burden. Sometimes, not every time. Of course you fall in love with your companion character and you want to take care of them. But there are moments when you're playing and you're like, ah, they keep like getting in the way and I keep having to go over here and save them. And obviously that's the, the, the game mechanics. But in sort of the discussions in when we first started shooting, um, there were a lot of conversations that we had and that I had with Neil where I was like, is there any way for her to be a little bit more capable or helpful? Like, cause I, I sometimes will get frustrated that like they don't have a weapon or they don't have anything to help and they're just standing there like, ah, help me. And I was like, I would love for Ellie to not be that. I know she's 14 and we have to keep that into consideration, but if there's some way where she could be more capable, I would love that.
[ELLIE: (exhales) ...How’d I do?
JOEL walks over to one of the dead Hunters and picks up his pistol.
JOEL: How ‘bout something a…
JOEL changes out the clip
JOEL: little more your size? ... It’s for emergencies only.
ELLIE: Okay.
ELLIE takes the pistol and the two continue on toward the bridge.]
NEIL: We wanted to apply all this pressure on Joel and Ellie when they're in Pittsburgh and they're stuck in this city. It seems like everywhere you turn there is this antagonistic force of the Hunters or the Infected trying to kill you, that you could easily turn into the same mindset as the Hunters and not trust anybody. And anyone you come across, you kill them first. Ask questions later. And we see the difference between, um, Joel and Ellie when they come across these two people with Henry and Sam. And Joel's instinct is to just kill them. Um, cause Joel has seen too much go wrong. Um, it's actually the kids in this scenario of Ellie and Sam that bring pause to everything.
[SFX of punching
ELLIE: Joel, stop! Look.
SAM: Leave him alone!
JOEL: Just take it easy
HENRY: It’s alright, they’re not the bad guys. Lower the gun. She’s right. I thought you we one of them. Then I saw you. If you haven’t noticed they don’t keep kids around. I’m Henry. This is Sam. I think I caught your name was Joel?
ELLIE: Ellie.
JOEL: How many are with you?
SAM: They’re all dead.
HENRY: Hey. We don’t know that.
ELLIE: We could help each other!
JOEL: Ellie.
ELLIE: Safety in numbers and all that!
HENRY: She’s right. We could help each other.]
NEIL: So it was, it was, it became interesting from a dramatic standpoint to say, ok ay, now you're gonna have to trust someone--a stranger--can you do that? Is it okay to do that? Um, in this world and they take a chance on them. And now that we have these two kids where again you've been and just nothing but survival mode, Ellie has just shot a person for the first time. She's been kind of, she's lost some of her innocence. Um, so she's in a different mindset. But now when we bring Sam in and someone her age, we get to see them kind of joking. And Henry even comments on that,
[HENRY: Wow.
SFX of SAM and ELLIE laughing and joking
HENRY: It’s been a while since that boy even cracked a smile. She doesn’t seem affected by all this.]
Um, so it was an opportunity that we jumped on to explore the innocence of kids even in horrific settings. And you read about this quite a lot, um, where people have to find levity no matter what the situation is you... And it happens in the Holocaust has happened in like, like even in some horrible situations in our world, you find stories of how people have found ways to keep themselves human.
<<MUSIC>>
CHRISTIAN: So, Joel and Ellie accompany Henry and Sam, who are on their way to the radio tower outside of town, to find the rest of their group. At the gates they are attacked by the Humvee, and Henry and Sam flee without waiting for Joel and Ellie, who then must run to the bridge where Ellie jumps into the water, though she can’t swim. Joel jumps in after her but the current is strong. Thankfully, both are rescued by...
SAM: Henry! He’s awake
ELLIE: Hey you, we’re alive
HENRY: (Laughing) See? What’d I tell ya huh? He’s good, everything’s fine. You know Sam’s the one who spotted you, you guys have taken quite a bit of water
(JOEL punches HENRY)
HENRY: Fuck’s wrong with you?! Whoa
SAM: Henry!
JOEL: Get back son!
HENRY: Hey, hey, hey, He’s pissed but he’s not gonna do anything.
JOEL: You sure about that?
SAM: Stop!
ELLIE: Joel?
JOEL: He left us to die out there.
HENRY: No, you had a good chance of making it, and you did but coming back for you meant putting him at risk. If it was the other way around would you have come back for us? I saved you.
ELLIE: He saved me too. We would’ve drowned.
HENRY: You know for what it’s worth I’m really glad we spotted you. Now, that radio tower is on the other side of this cliff, ok? Place is gonna be full of supplies. You’re gonna be really happy you didn’t kill me.
CHRISTIAN: When you were making this moment, Neil were you a father yet? Cause this is a brother relationship, but it hit me as one of the strongest parent-child relationships in the game.
NEIL: I'm trying to recollect the timeline. My daughter would have already been born, so I'm sure subconsciously there was a lot happening there. But you're right in that it is a brother relationship, but it's more of a paternal relationship. Um, and again, it's, it's, it's as we talking about this, I'm, I'm just seeing this through line of the, this theme of like protecting your kid versus giving them freedom to express themselves, to find who they are to make mistakes. And we see that in the toy shop--
HENRY: Sam, what are you doing?
SAM: Nothing
HENRY: Get rid of it!
SAM: My backpack is practically empty.
HENRY: What’s the rule about taking stuff?
SAM: It weighs like nothing!
HENRY: The rule! What is it?
SAM: We only take what we have to.
HENRY: Right. Now, come on.
NEIL: so there's some truth to that, but it's also missing this other point of like, kids need that escape. They need that, this other thing. So it's like, and that's why Ellie steals it and then gives it to Sam, which is this very kind of sweet gesture. Um, but that's one of those things that just felt very true to me and felt like it had to get in the game.
So all these, um, in some ways Tess, in a lot of ways Bill, and the most ways, uh, Henry and Sam when we go forward, these are all cautionary tales for Joel. So, with Tess it’s like, okay, here's what's happens when you get idealist, um, idealistic and she believes she's going to save mankind, you're going to end up dead. Um, with Bill it’s like okay, well here's what happens when you're just about survival and about like limiting your freedom and it's not about having fun or living. He drove his partner away and later when you find this suicide note, like it's all laid out there and it was like Frank was not happy with Bill and he wanted to escape and bill just wanted is like, will we survive in this town? That's all we need. And it's like, that wasn't enough of Frank. So that's a cautionary tale for Joel. It’s like if you're just about survival, if you're just about keeping your emotions at bay, you're going to drive everyone else away. You're going to end up alone and miserable and then later with Henry and is like kind of the ultimate thing that Joel is afraid of, which is losing the person you love.
TROY: Um, there's a piece of concept art that was one of the first, and if anybody has the collector’s, um, art book of The Last of Us, uh, it's the kind of sepia toned, um, sketch. Um, but it's a picture of Joel and Ellie at a campsite, at a fire, and they're laughing. And I carried that picture with me everyday to set, because to me that was always the moment that we were trying to get to. Uh, just the moment of levity, the moment of light. And the closest that we got was the scene with the beans--
[HENRY: (laughs) Shut the hell up.
JOEL: Dead serious. It was Tommy’s birthday and that’s all he wanted to do is just…(sighs)...rent two Harleys and drive cross country.
HENRY: Aw man. I could die happy if I could just ride one...around the block. (laughs) ...What was it like?
TROY: And we get to see for the first time Joel kind of… being a bit nostalgic and, and wistful and having this moment of, of, um, recollection of a, of a fond memory.
JOEL: ...It was good. It was real good.
HENRY: Good? C--Can you believe this guy? C’mon man, give me details! Describe it! (laughs)
ELLIE: You know what, you two deserve a little privacy.
HENRY: N--No, Ellie Ellie. This isn’t just any regular motorcycle, okay? You get on that bad boy, you feel that engine? Nothing like it!
ELLIE: Oh yeah? How would you know?
HENRY: I’ve seen it in my dreams.
JOEL chuckles
HENRY makes motorcycle revving “vroom” sounds.
ELLIE: Okay… (sighs)]
ASHLEY: That’s what we want. That’s what we need, at the end of the day, just need a basic human connection. And I think that's something that is very important to Ellie because you don't have all of this external stuff, you know, she doesn't have going to the movies or staying at home playing video games or, you know, going out to the park and playing a game of soccer. It's all you have. And all she has is connections with people. And I think if you're someone who has dealt with loss, um, you realize how important that is. You know? And I think that's one of the main reasons why she gets connected with the fireflies because the fireflies are simply trying to save humanity and save that connection. And I think it's, it still goes back to her still trying to find meaning to all of that.
ELLIE opens the door to SAM’s room.
ELLIE: Well…
ELLIE closes the door.
ELLIE: It’s safe to say those two have officially bonded.
SAM: Did Henry send you?
ELLIE: No. (scoffs) Why would Henry send me?
SAM: To make sure I’m not fucking up somehow.
ELLIE: Psst. I’d say we all did pretty good back there. Especially you… Is everything alright?
SAM: Everything’s fine.
ELLIE: Okay… well, have a good night.
ELLIE starts to walk away
SAM: How is it that you’re never scared?
ELLIE: Who says that I’m not?
SAM: What are you scared of?
ELLIE: Well, let’s see. (sighs) Scorpions are pretty creepy. Um, being by myself. I’m scared of ending up alone. What about you?
SAM: Those things out there… What if the people are still inside? What if they’re trapped in there without any control of their body? I’m scared of that happening to me.
ELLIE: Okay. First of all, we’re a team now, kay? We’re gonna help each other out. And second, they might still look like people but there’s not a person in there anymore.
SAM: Henry says that they’ve “moved on”, that they’re with their families. Like in Heaven. Do you think that’s true?
ELLIE: I go back and forth. I mean, I’d like to believe it…
SAM: But you don’t.
ELLIE: I guess not.
SAM: Yeah, me neither.
ELLIE: (sighs) Alright, I’m pooped. I’ll see you tomorrow.
ELLIE leaves SAM’s room and closes the door behind her. SAM throws the toy robot ELLIE brought him down to the ground. He sits down and can be heard pulling up his pant leg to reveal his infected scratch.
<<MUSIC>>
A MEMORY/FLASHBACK
HENRY: You alright, Sam?
SAM: Yeah, I’m okay!
ELLIE: Thanks, Joel!
HENRY: (Exhales) Alright, we did it
ELLIE: We should move.
HENRY: Alright. No no no.
HENRY: Sam!
ELLIE, HENRY, and SAM start firing as Infected begin swarming the neighborhood. JOEL covers them with sniper fire.
SAM: Henry!
An Infected attacks SAM, knocking him to the ground. JOEL managed to take it out with a shot from the rifle before it kills him.
HENRY: Sam, are you okay?
SAM: Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.
HENRY: You sure?
SAM: I said I’m fine.
The shrieks of more Infected ring out in the near distance.
ELLIE: Come on! Come on!
HENRY: Let’s move!
The sound of crickets fades into HENRY making breakfast the next morning. ELLIE sniffs the food, then lets out a yawn.
ELLIE: Damn, that smells good.
JOEL: Good morning.
ELLIE: Where’s Sam?
ELLIE creaks open the door to SAM’s room.
ELLIE: Sam?
SAM only grunts in return.
ELLIE: Sam!?
SAM lunges at ELLIE, tackling her down through the door.
JOEL: What the hell? Oh shit, he’s turning!
JOEL goes to grab his gun, but HENRY fires a shot to stop him.
HENRY: That’s my fucking brother!
ELLIE: Sam!
JOEL: Screw it!
JOEL goes for his gun, but HENRY shoots SAM first.
ELLIE: Shit!
JOEL: Ellie. Ellie, are you alright?
ELLIE: Uh huh. Oh my God.
HENRY: ...Sam?
ELLIE: Oh no…
HENRY: (crying) Sam?
JOEL: Henry… Ellie, stay there… Henry...
HENRY: (crying) Oh, what have you done?
JOEL: I’m gonna get that gun from you, okay?
HENRY: (crying) S--S--Sam…
JOEL: Whoa, okay okay. Easy.
HENRY: (crying) This is your fault…
JOEL: This is nobody’s fault, Henry.
HENRY: It’s all your fault!
JOEL: Henry! Henry, no!
HENRY takes his own life with the pistol.
ELLIE: Oh my God…
<<CLOSING MUSIC>>
CHRISTIAN: Next week on The Official The Last of Us Podcast:
[ELLIE: “Jackson County”. Means we’re close to Jackson City, right?
JOEL: Shouldn’t be more than a few miles.
ELLIE: You ready to see dear old brother?
JOEL: I’m just ready to get there.
ELLIE: You nervous?
JOEL: I don’t know what I’m feeling.
ASHLEY: I believe that it’s its one of the most important moments in their relationship because they both to some degree are opening up about some heavy stuff and granted its a bit of a heated exchange but they are getting stuff out, they are both trying to figure out how much they actually do care about each other.]
The Official The Last of Us Podcast is produced by PlayStation and Spoke Media. It’s hosted by me, Christian Spicer and written by Brigham Mosley.
Our Sony PlayStation Team includes, Charlie Yedor, Cristian Cardona, and Carrie Surtees.
Our Naughty Dog Team includes Arne Meyer and Scott Lowe.
Our production team is Carson McCain, Kelly Kolff, Tre Jones, Reyes Mendoza and Aleisha Force.
This episode was mixed by Evan Arnett, who contributed additional sound design and music.
Today’s episode included interviews with Neil Druckmann, Troy Baker, Ashley Johnson and Erick Pangilinan.
Executive producers are Alia Tavakolian and Keith Reynolds.
Thanks for listening.
<END>