The Last of Us Review - Episode 2 "Infected" Recap: Save who you can save
Having escaped the Boston QZ military zone, Joel, Tess & Ellie make the trek to the State House through the "Live Free and die [quickly]" zone.
Flashback to 2003
2003 Real Life Highlights: U.S. forces seized control of Baghdad, effectively ending the rule of Saddam Hussein AND the Human Genome Project was completed, with 99% of the human genome sequenced to 99.99% accuracy.
Oh and this:
And now back to the fantasy bubble of The Last of Us…
In episode 1 of The Last of Us, HBO’s new hit show, as supported by its 4.5 million viewers on premiere night, in the opening scene, we witness a flashback from 2003, where Sarah, Joel and Tommy are having breakfast. On the radio, between “Tomorrow” (Avril Lavigne) blaring in the background and the news, we learn that there have been “disturbances” in Jakarta. Joel thinks Jakarta is in the Middle East and Tommy thinks it’s a country. Only Sarah knows it’s the capital of Indonesia, in Asia and that it’s a capital and not a country.
Artifacts from 2003: Tomorrow by Avril Lavigne (2002 album)
#2: A map of Indonesia: Geography lesson
Jakarta, September 2003
When episode 2 picks up, we’re in 2003, same as where episode one started. In the first few minutes of the episode, the Indonesian policemen escort Professor Ibu Ratna, who is the preeminent expert on mycology (study of mushrooms), from a restaurant and take her to a facility cleanroom where she is asked to inspect a dead body that had been infected with Cordyceps.
After cutting into a limb of the deceased woman and seeing the fungus sprout under the surface of the skin, the professor can’t believe what she is seeing, as all her prior knowledge tells her that this fungi can’t exist in human host temperatures, but alas as that other mycology professor from Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994) fame, predicated in the 1960s, with global warming and climate change, the Cordyceps have had to learn how to survive in warmer temperatures or risk going extinct.
The policeman gives Professor Ratna some tea and explains the situation - that the infected woman has been bitten and went on to bite a few more people in a factory where she worked. These people that she bit were captured and executed. Unfortunately it’s unknown how this woman that Ratna inspected got infected in the first place and thus, who is the real Patient Zero, which means pretty much all hope is destroyed as containing the spread seems futile at this point.
What is very clear from Ratna’s explanation is that no medicine or vaccine will be effective in killing the spread of Cordyceps. The only solution is to bomb the city and obliterate the masses. The professor solemnly asks the policeman to be taken home to spend her remaining time with her family, a foreboding of bad juju floating in the pungent, fungal air.
Somewhere outside Boston QZ, 2023
Tess and Joel debate keeping Ellie alive, knowing full well she’s been infected per her arm bite and yet, she was quarantined after the bite and has been healthy and sane ever since then and that was many days ago. Typically, after someone is bit, the onset of the clicking and cracking and body snapping with rabid behavior in the mix is within a few hours. More on validating this fact later on.
Ellie and Tess bond as they journey through old hotels and Boston museums together. Whereas Joel is detached and distrustful, Tess exhibits warmth and kindness towards Ellie and more to the point, she wants to keep Ellie alive, as she believes Ellie’s immunity to Cordyceps could be the key to a vaccine that cures people (Thankfully, not in a “save the cheerleader, save the world” type way, but more understated) which is why she will stop at nothing to get her to the State House. The end goal being Ellie will be taken to a Firefly camp out West where they are supposedly working on a cure, but first they need to get her to the people who will take her out West without getting her killed.
Joel is cynical about the Firefly cure (“This isn’t going to work, Tess. We need to go back.”) and he doesn’t believe in giving chances to strangers he doesn’t think can be trusted. He wants Ellie dead and keeps his rifle close by at all times. Ellie is also cautious around Joel, buttoned up around her. This dynamic is staunchly intact with Joel only once answering one of Ellie’s many questions during a moment where Tess is absent and they are forced to talk to one another, “Where are you from?” she asks. “Texas,” he says. “And Tess?” she prods. “She’s from Detroit Michigan.”
These quiet, tense moments are interlaced with very stressful zombie flash mobs because as Tess explains to Ellie outside the Boston museum these fungus are “more connected than [you] know.” They are growing underground a superhighway system so stepping on the fungi in one place alerts all of the other infected fungi hosts to come.
Once in the museum, Joel implores Ellie to be quiet, when they start to hear sounds. Critical Knowledge about Zombies alert: The zombies can’t see but they can hear really well. Of course, after a few minutes, a museum zombie (clicking and clacking and cracking its body and vocally letting out a demonic loud baying) approaches the three of them and Ellie freaks out (emitting sound) and chaos ensues. When the zombie hears them, he goes after them and then another zombie comes. In the mix, Tess gets bitten as does Ellie. Ellie experiences no symptoms beyond the site of the bite being gross looking. Tess, is another story.
Someone say “Zombie Flash Mob”? This video is the best. Even though it gave me nightmares for 30 years after watching it for the first time. I’m over it now.
After the horrifically terrifying events inside the museum, which is a total nail biter, Ellie shows her bite and Tess says she only hurt her ankle so has to spend a little time setting it and stabilizing it outside with using Joel’s tape. In what’s probably the most tender and prophetic moment between Joel and Tess where he is trying to bandage her, Tess tells him, “I got it. I got it.” Joel starts to anxiety spiral a bit (it’s his nature and tbh has likely contributed to keeping him alive) about Ellie’s new bite and what to do to with her to which Tess says with zero patience and f*cks left to give turns to him and says, “Why can’t you accept the good? Like to think, for once, maybe we could actually win.” He looks at her confused and also appears to be trying to demystify the statement, but has no time for she sends him onto Ellie and away from her. Hopefully Joel will cling to these words and do his best to honor them as he moves onward in this journey with Ellie (and without Tess).
The State House with the Golden Dome
Tess, Joel and Ellie make it to the State House before it gets dark and something is wrong. There are no people there to meet them and the trunk is empty with only bloody steps leading a trail into the building where all 3 see the massacre inside. I mean c’mon we ALL predicted this end scenario! One of the Fireflies was likely infected and it became a blood bath. Big shocker: There is no battery, no ammo, no radio and no way of going West. No hope. Tess is frantically looking for a map and a solution and Joel tells her it’s over, “We are going home.” “This is not my f*cking home,” Tess says. Tess announces she’s staying and Ellie intuits from Tess’ reaction that she’s infected. Random observational aside: Joel, her longtime partner is clueless about Tess’ state and what might be prompting her her erratic behavior till Ellie, a 14-year-old stranger forms this conclusion based on spending 1 day with her? Yup.
The Zombie French Kiss we all wish we hadn’t been forced to see
Tess sacrifices herself for Joel and Ellie, as the zombie invasion makes its way to the State House. Joel and Ellie flee the building and to buy them some time for them, Tess makes a plan to light the building on fire and to kill all the zombies there but before she can get the lighter to work, a creepy zombie dude assaults her and these disgusting fungi shoot from his mouth into hers. In the end, she manages to get the lighter to work effectively blowing the building up and to have her final moment as a human be stolen from her and tarnished by this loathsome zombie. Thank you Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann for this. Next time, ask me for my opinion, or any woman for that matter, and we’d happily supply some notes about this very unpoetic and unjust ending to a formidable character.
Inside the Episode - 2
I wish I could post a photo in the comments, because I captured how my husband’s and son’s body language changes when they know something terrible is about to happen (they played the games). 😂 Such a great episode. And I will never under the zombie french kiss.