The Last of Us' Joel was right in the choice he made

If I say the sentence, “Joel was right,” it’s certain to fluster many fans of The Last of Us as the audience has debated a key decision that transforms and enhances Joel’s character for years now.

I’ve kept this opinion to myself for the longest time, though recent news and the approaching second season of the HBO show suggests it’s time to step forward and make my feelings known. Before I get into the weeds here, it’s worth me saying that I’m about to spoil the ending of The Last of Us, both the Part I video game, and the first season of the HBO show. If you’re behind on either, you’ve been warned.

In both the game and the show, Joel chooses to save Ellie’s life over the creation of a cure that would supposedly wipe out the cordyceps virus that decimated the planet. In the final moments, Ellie is taken to an operating theatre where she will not survive, as doctors and scientists aim to create a cure from her immunity to the virus. Before the surgery can begin, Joel storms in to save Ellie and in the process, kills the team working on her.

Over on IGN, an interview was recently published with The Last of Us’ creator Neil Druckmann and HBO series co-showrunner Craig Mazin. In the chat, the topic of Joel’s decision arose, where Druckmann said, “I believe Joel was right.” Mazin and Druckmann have slightly differing opinions on Joel’s choice, however, as Mazin goes on to note that, “I think that if I were in Joel's position, I probably would have done what he did,” Mazin adds. “But I'd like to think that I wouldn't.”

HBO

The choice Joel makes has split fans ever since the game revealed the decision in a shocking moment that had been building over the many hours of the campaign. As Mazin goes on to say, “That's the interesting push and pull of the morality of it. And that's why the ending of the first game is so provocative and so wonderful.” I also believe that Joel was right to make the choice he did, but that doesn’t mean it was the right thing to do.

If the world was crumbling due to a virus killing off billions, the possibility of a cure should be enough to push anyone to rally behind science, but in that situation, nobody is in their right mind, least of all a bereaved parent. It’s easy to say you would choose the fate of the world, but emotion does heavy things to the brain.

The key to why Joel makes this choice comes in the opening hour of the story. During the chaos of the virus emerging, while all hell is breaking loose, Joel is carrying his daughter Sarah to safety. In the frenetic melee, Sarah is killed by a soldier as she is thought to be infected, dying in Joel’s arms. In both the game and show, we get a glimpse of the horrors of traumatic death, and how the death of a child can impact a parent, once through the impeccable acting work of Troy Baker, and again with the stellar performance of Pedro Pascal.

Both of these portrayals of Joel get to the end of the first story and make the decision to rush in and save Ellie. Ellie, who, over many hours, has become what Joel lost. She stumbles into his life in constant danger. A young girl, desperately in need of a father figure in a time of chaos, and a father who lost his little girl and would do anything to save her, even if it’s through a facsimile. Ellie isn’t a replacement for Sarah, but she has become what Sarah could not; the fulfilment of an unspoken parental promise.

SIE

I believe Joel was right, and were I in his position, I would choose Ellie 10 times out of 10, because I know his pain all too well. I know what it’s like to lose a child, a daughter. I know how that pain eats at every part of a person, right down into the bones.

My daughter died after a car crash. She lived for five days on life support, before she slipped away. No matter the pleas I made to the universe, the time I spent by her side in the hospital, I couldn’t save her. If I was given the chance, I would, of course, give up anything to see her again. Anything.

Joel, not in his right mind, saw that chance. He was given an opportunity to give up literally everything - the happiness and recovery of the world - in order to save a girl who represented the biggest loss he’d ever experienced, and the shreds of happiness he has felt since Sarah died.

Humans are incredibly complex, and our emotions drive us. This is why his choice has so frequently and constantly divided the audience, but we play the game, or watch the show, fully removed from the core emotions that drive that thought in Joel’s mind. In that instant, nothing exists beyond his one chance to save, his one chance to give up something important in order to fulfil what every parent strives to do - to protect their child.

SIE

When the rest of the cast of The Last of Us were asked the same question, one word came up: “complicated”. Bella Ramsey, Isabela Merced, and Kaitlyn Dever all danced around that word, because it is complicated. Gabriel Luna noted of his on-screen brother, “I understand, and you can't see the scope of the whole world. You can only see your world, and Ellie is his world.”

Joel wasn’t right in what he did, he robbed the planet of recovery, but for him, for any bereaved parent, his choice was beyond complicated, yet it is resolute.

I’ve often reflected on this choice as one of the strongest pieces of writing in all of video games, because it got to the root of grief and loss beyond anything I’ve seen previously. Playing the opening hour of The Last of Us, as the screen fades after Sarah’s death, I sobbed, wracked with grief for a long time. I knew that feeling of holding my dying child in my arms. Joel then goes out into the world, carrying that grief, and, if I can be bold, he would feel anger, shame, and regret that he could do nothing to save Sarah. Because that’s how I felt, still often feel, 17 years later. The universe had taken control.

So, when Joel rushes in, saving Ellie from certain death - a death fated by the universe - a part of me reflects on the danger he places on society, but a bigger part of me knows it’s exactly what I would do. It’s what, I’m sure, 99% of bereaved parents would do. It’s not the correct choice, but it’s right for them, for him. All sense of what should be done ceases to exist, and at that moment, all that matters, is attempting to heal your own fractured heart.