The Last Of Us - Season 2 - Episode 03 - The Path Review
*It’s rare that we at Player 2 cover anything that isn’t in the video game realm, but with its roots firmly in gaming, and the prestigious talent involved in it, HBO’s adaptation of The Last Of Us is an incredibly fascinating project. So join us, each week as we dissect the newly released episode, from the series’ first to its last. Now it’s time for Season 2.*
For many watching Episode 3 of The Last Of Us’ second season, your ears may still be ringing from the events of the previous episode. While the stakes couldn’t be any higher through the second episode, the third, The Path, dials things back significantly, setting the stage once again for the action to come. As the cleanup continues following the battle in Jackson, countless infected are being burned, and the the bodies of friends are prepared for their final goodbyes. Joel is among those, and Tommy walks in to take over his cleaning specifically, getting to spend some final, quiet moments with his fallen brother, perhaps the final words he ever speaks to his brother echo through the brain – “Give Sarah my love”, the doting father finally able to rest and be with his daughter once more. Meanwhile, Ellie wakes in the hospital and instantly begins screaming, gripped by the trauma of Joel’s murder.
Following the show’s opening credits we then see Jackson three months removed from the events, as a gradual rebuild it underway. Ellie is being discharged from the hospital, but not without having a final appointment with Gail first. Gail pokes at the seams of Ellie, asking about the dance and the hostility between her and Joel. She also asks about Joel’s prior comments about saving Ellie, but this prompts Ellie’s walls to go up, as she lies her way out of the situation, claiming not to know what Joel was referring to, and then departs the hospital. It’s not a time for Ellie to reflect as she heads to Joel’s home to find rows of flowers left by his fence as a tribute. Ellie enters the homestead to find her room preserved in a way Joel would have left it, and a shoebox on his bed. The shoebox contains both Joel’s watch, the gift from Sarah seen in the show’s first episode, and his gun. Ellie takes the gun and as she explores Joel’s wardrobe and touches his clothes the emotions begin to take hold – only for Dina’s arrival to pull her out of the distraught headspace that she was in.
The pair get to chat at this point where Dina reveals that she hadn’t been truthful about what she remembered at the lodge, out of fear of Ellie recklessly self-sabotaging herself to go after Abby. She reveals the identities of everyone, and that they’re from a group called the WLF in Seattle. Ellie takes this knowledge to Tommy, pitching a group effort to exact revenge upon Abby, but Tommy won’t allow her without going through proper Jackson community processes – a council meeting.
We’re next introduced to a cloaked, less resourced group, carrying basic melee weapons and bows and arrows. The group is discreetly walking the streets and have a whistling communication method in place to inform each other of threats. There’s a nice community feel between the group of Seraphites, before a warning whistle is heard and the group flee due to the presence of the WLF.
Back in Jackson, ahead of the council meeting Ellie is working out, trying to regain her lost fitness and strength due to the three month bed-ridden period. Jesse is assisting and Ellie begins to pitch him to try and win the upcoming vote, since he is now on the council. We next see the town hall meeting where several community voices on both sides of the argument speak, including Seth, the bigoted local who antagonised Ellie at the dance. He actually takes her side and makes a compelling argument to go find Abby because they’re exposing their communities weaknesses by doing nothing. Ellie then has her turn making a passionate, considered plee for help. This pitch ultimately fails though with the council voting 8-3 against sending a group to Seattle to chase the WLF. A conversation following the council decision between Gail and Tommy gives the viewer some time to see where Tommy is at, having now assumed a near-paternal role over Ellie in lieu of Joel’s passing. He’s fearful that Joel has turned Ellie down a path of revenge and hatred, but Gail suggests that the two actually connected so well because they were both already walking the same road prior to meeting.
We next cut to Ellie’s house where she is preparing weapons, and to ignore the coucil decision. Dina arrives, knowing full well what Ellie will do and has a more considered and rational plan to escape, prepared. The pair meet late at night, and with the help of Seth, they escape Jackson, armed with weapons, food and medical resources. The first stop is via Joel’s grave where Ellie wishes him one final goodbye, leaving some coffee beans on his grave before departign for Seattle.
Several days and nights pass as the girls trek to the city, and they pass the time playing games, sharing stories including stories of their first kills, where Ellie successfully avoids talking about how her first gun victim was in-fact her best friend Riley. One night before they go to sleep, Dina brings up the kiss at the dance, and while Ellie suggests it was a mere 6/10 quality kiss, Dina also points out that she wasn’t as under the influence as Ellie had once thought. Dina also expresses concert that the sad energy that she feels from Jesse is sadness that she creates. They roll over and go to sleep following this conversation.
The following morning they arrive on Seattles outskirts and quickly find a fallen body, but as Dina explores off the road, she finds many more, and as Ellie explores the scene we see that they were the group of Seraphites we met earlier in the episode, shot down by what Ellie suspects is Abby’s group. Eventually they get quite close to the city and begin their descent into Seattle’s outer city, narrowly avoiding the eyes of a WLF scout who was placed atop the Seattle Space Needle. The episode ends as the audience gets to see a snapshot of the scale of the WLF threat before Ellie and Dina as tanks roll through the streets with dozens of armed militia members accompanying them.
The Path does an exceptional job of giving the audience some closure from the prior episode, while also picking into the emotional state of many of the show’s key players, and setting up the next big threat. Unlike the previous episode, the balance and pacing of this is superb and while the episode isn’t nearly as action packed as its predecessor, it does much more to keep the viewer emotionally engaged in what comes next. The threats are obvious, the motivations from all parties unwavering, setting up a dangerous series of upcoming encounters, the perfect place to leave the viewer ahead of the seasons middle chapter in Episode 4.
The Last of Us is available to stream now on Max, with new episodes every Monday. This episode was reviewed with early access kindly provided by Max.
