It was already confirmed that Joel (Pedro Pascal) would return to The Final of Us, based mostly on his appearances within the trailer and, most not too long ago, that flashback scene in Episode 5 the place he opened Ellie’s (Bella Ramsey) bed room door to greet her within the morning. Nonetheless, everything of Season 2, Episode 6 is one lengthy flashback that gives context not just for how Joel and Ellie’s relationship grew but in addition what induced the fallout within the first place.
Like a healthful father-daughter story, the occasions play out yearly on Ellie’s birthday as she grows from a teenage woman to a younger girl. Joel will get to expertise all of the issues he didn’t together with his organic daughter, Sarah (Nico Parker). It was a devastatingly lovely episode that additionally reveals what went unsuitable between them, and the final phrases Ellie spoke to her father determine.
Joel Stepped Into the Fatherly Position, and All of the Challenges That Come With It
The episode takes viewers by each birthday Ellie had whereas the pair settled in Jackson after the occasions with the Fireflies. This begins along with her fifteenth birthday and progresses to the occasions depicted in Episode 1 of Season 2, when Ellie is now 19 years previous. She was a candy, harmless teen earlier than the moodiness and brooding of the pubescent years kicked in, and she or he began creating a extra mature sense of self.
Yr after 12 months, Joel goes out of his method to make Ellie really feel secure, appreciated, and, most significantly, cherished. He has a cake baked for her. He makes considerate items, like a do-it-yourself guitar full with an etching of one in all her drawings, lastly giving followers a backstory of the place that symbolic guitar got here from. She talked about she wished to learn to play, and Joel went out of his method to discover elements and restore an previous guitar for her. It’s harking back to when Sarah took Joel’s previous watch to get fastened as a birthday present within the present’s pilot episode. Past cake and items, Joel even finds methods to provide Ellie birthday experiences.
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The sweetest is when he takes her to a rundown museum he encountered on one in all his patrols. There’s a spaceship inside, and he urges her to go inside. Within the surrounding shows are uniforms and helmets, and he encourages her to stay out each child’s dream, break the glass, and seize a helmet. Then, he palms her a cassette tape, which he says took him “a mighty effort” to seek out. It’s audio from an actual flight to area. Ellie closes her eyes and totally immerses herself on this once-in-a-lifetime expertise. It doesn’t matter that she’s not really in area. She looks like she is. Joel appears to be like on as Ellie grins from ear to ear with delight. On this second, she is lastly only a child.
However because the years progress and Ellie begins coming of age, issues change, as they usually do with youngsters. At 17, Joel ventures into territory with which he’s not acquainted. He catches her in her room, partially unclothed, with one other younger girl. And he’s indignant. He doesn’t perceive what’s happening, nor Ellie’s sexuality or, as he implies, experimentation. He finds a tattoo on her arm masking up the Cordyceps scar, which she had earlier lined up by a purposeful burn so she may put on T-shirts once more. It’s the identical one she sports activities within the current day, and Joel is simply as furious as a pre-apocalypse mum or dad can be if they found their 17-year-old acquired a tattoo behind their again. “So, all of the teenage s**t all of sudden, huh?” he asks her, referencing the marijuana cigarette he additionally finds burning on the desk.
Ellie wants her area, and the cracks are already starting to indicate of their relationship. They struggle on a regular basis. Ellie needs him to go away and simply let her be. She tries to maneuver her mattress to the storage in a last-ditch effort to seek out her personal area. Joel relents, however says he’ll repair it up first so it’s an precise, habitable area. She’s now an official brooding teenager demanding to study to struggle, go on patrol, and be on her personal to do her personal factor. She doesn’t need to be “Joel’s daughter” anymore; she simply needs to be Ellie. And it’s breaking his coronary heart.
The Straw That Breaks the Camel’s Again in ‘The Final of Us’
Issues enhance between Joel and Ellie as soon as he units her up within the storage. She has some independence, and he begins respecting her as a younger grownup. The connection just isn’t the identical, although. It’s evident that Joel is lonely, lacking the little woman she as soon as was.
Two years later, he takes Ellie out on her first patrol as her nineteenth birthday current, and that is the place issues go horribly unsuitable. They discover Eugene (Joe Pantoliano), Gail’s (Catherine O’Hara) husband. He has been bitten and begs to be taken again earlier than the an infection takes over, so he can say goodbye to his spouse. Ellie thinks it’s the fitting factor to do, however Joel doesn’t. He guarantees Ellie he’ll oblige, however goes behind her again and kills Eugene. After they take the physique again to the group, Joel lies to Gail about what occurred, however Ellie jumps in and speaks the reality. That is the second the place she angrily tells Joel, “You swore.”
On this second, the connection between Joel and Ellie is fractured, seemingly past restore. Their interactions from then on are restricted. They don’t spend any social time collectively or speak about their days. She avoids happening patrol with him, and he tries to speak to her, however she offers one-word responses. It’s heartbreaking, and everybody notices, as Dina (Isabela Merced) factors out within the first episode of Season 2.
Whereas what occurred with Eugene initially angered Ellie past restore, it’s additionally one thing else. Simply earlier than they went out on that first patrol, Ellie had rehearsed asking Joel about Salt Lake Metropolis in her room. She is aware of one thing isn’t proper in regards to the story he instructed her 5 years in the past, and she or he wants to listen to the reality.
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It’s revealed on this episode that after the New Yr’s Eve celebration depicted in Episode 1, “Future Days,” Ellie didn’t, in truth, simply stroll to the storage and ignore Joel on the porch. She went again to speak to him. She reveals that she acknowledged the look on his face when he swore to her that he would carry Eugene again alive. It was the identical look he gave her when he promised what he instructed her in regards to the Fireflies was true. It was in that second that she knew her suspicions had been proper.
With Joel backed right into a nook, having to admit to his earlier lies or danger shedding Ellie ceaselessly, he has no alternative. Regardless that Ellie had suspected the reality for a while, solely now, after listening to it from Joel, did she really feel the load of guilt. She was the one hope to avoid wasting humanity, and Joel took that from her.
The ultimate phrases she speaks to Joel, with out understanding they’d be the very last thing she ever says to him, are heartbreaking. “I don’t assume I can forgive you,” she says, “however I’m going to strive.” The tears circulation as Joel accepts accountability however admits he would do it once more if given a second probability. Her reply reveals Ellie’s maturity. Ellie is rising up and coming into her personal. No less than Joel can take solace in the truth that her life might be significant in a roundabout way, and it was value saving.
This seemingly isn’t the final time followers will see Joel. There are loads extra flashback alternatives for the season finale, even doubtlessly within the confirmed Season 3. However the tender moments all through this brilliantly emotional episode solidify {that a} deep love between Joel and Ellie grew stronger, even when it didn’t look like it. Joel misplaced his daughter to start with, however many years later, he gained one, too. Ellie realizes she didn’t simply lose a buddy; she misplaced somebody who cherished her like a daughter. Stream The Final of Us on Max.