Fifth episode of The Last of Us series by HBO, and inevitably new debriefing and complete analysis, because once again, there is a lot to say. This week, the wait will have been shorter because Super Bowl obliges, HBO has decided to bring forward the broadcast of the episode by 2 days, just to avoid being cannibalized by what is the most followed sporting event in the world. United States every year. A very good choice from HBO.
What should we remember from this episode 5 suddenly? First thing to know, its duration of 59 min, a full hour, let’s not quibble for a minute, and which was once again directed by Jeremy Webb, one of the rare directors to be entitled to make 2 episodes . There is another, moreover, Ali Abbasi who made episodes 8 and 9, by far the best of the series, but we will come back to this in due time. As we could see at the end of episode 4, it is the characters of Henry and Sam who make their entry into the series, two major protagonists of video games and who obviously had to appear in the treatment of the series, for several things. The first is that their presence allows Joel and Ellie to have some good company in this ravaged world where humans are more dangerous than the infected. Besides, that’s the purpose of the series as of the video game, how would the survivors behave in such a fucked up world? Bah it is not pretty to see, whatever the camp in which one is.
The other advantage of having introduced Henry and Sam is also to allow Joel and Ellie to consolidate their bonds of affection between them, but that we will come back to at the end of this video. Compared to the video game, there have been quite a few changes. Already in the way they meet, it is no longer the same. In the series, Ellie and Joel are woken up by Henry and Sam who rob them in their sleep, while in the video game, it is through a window in the middle of the day that Joel is attacked by Henry who has him. taken for a soldier. I also find that Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann have found a good angle to make the link between the events of the 4th episode with the arrival of Henry and Sam. The two protagonists are intimately linked to Kathleen who seeks at all costs to find them, even if it means deploying considerable forces. We indeed learn that it was Henry who had Kathleen’s brother killed, out of betrayal and necessity, in order to save his brother’s life. This is the reason why Kathleen is beside herself and doesn’t hesitate to use violence to achieve her ends. Suddenly, we are sent back to this theme that Neil Druckmann denounces in The Last of Us video games, and especially in Part 2, hatred and violence begets hatred and violence, an endless cycle from which it is difficult to escape. to go out. Until the final outcome of The Last of Us 2 where Ellie manages to break the cycle.
Otherwise, there is also a different treatment in the personality of Henry and Sam between the series and the video game. In the video game, our two characters are survivalists, especially Henry who never deviates from the golden rule he has imposed on himself: never take unnecessary things with them. We remember for example this scene where Henry, who is a young boy we remember, has fun with a robot and gets yelled at behind by his big brother who reminds him of the rule of survival. In the series, this very hard spirit, bordering on the military, has been greatly toned down, with a gentler Henry with his brother who does not hesitate to give him pencils so that he can pass the time when they have to. to hide. Another very important element is the character of Sam, who is younger in the series, since he must be something like 6/7 years old, whereas he is 9/10 in the video game. And above all, the big difference is that Sam is deaf in the series, which is not the case in the title of Naughty Dog. This choice to opt for a deaf character has two interests: the first is to be more inclusive, especially since the actor who plays Sam, whose real name is Keivonn Woodard, is actually deaf in the real life. And the other interest is also to bring an even more touching dimension with a character who exudes tenderness and innocence. Suddenly, what happens to him at the end becomes even more tragic and dramatic, especially with these scenes of complicity he has with Ellie throughout the episode. Moreover, the fact that Sam is younger allows Ellie to take care of him as if he were her little brother, and there again, it reinforces these bonds of affection that will hit us when Henry sacrifices his brother to the END.
And this is where I find that the series surpasses the video game, in its tragic dimension, but also thanks to the recasting of the actors who play Henry and Sam. We all remember the emotional shock of the video game, the tragic fate of these two characters, but I find that with hindsight, it lacked emotional impact. Not that we weren’t touched by Henry’s desperate act of slaughtering his brother like an animal, but once we saw the sequence in the series, we realize that Lamar Johnson manages to inspire more of tragedy, despair and humanity in his acting. The scene in the series is more impactful, more emotionally touching, with this shot which goes off a bit instinctively and almost uncontrollably, then the gaze of Lamar Johnson who realizes that he just did something stupid, and then this moment when he decides to put a bullet in his head, I found this sequence absolutely incredible on an emotional level. Likewise, the scene between Ellie and Sam just before they go to bed, Ellie who reassures Sam by showing him her bite again, deciding to lie to him so that he has a good night, despite knowing what will be going on with him. happen, Bella Ramsey’s acting is truly impeccable. This is where the series manages to do better than the video game.
Impossible to talk about this episode 5 without mentioning the sequence of the infected that everyone was waiting for, and for good reason, there is also the presence of the colossus or Bloater to use the exact term. As I had pointed out in my recap video of the 9 episodes, this series is singularly lacking in passage with these infected, even if I want to remind you that The Last of Us is not a series of zombies, but the story between two characters, Joel and Ellie in a post-apo world infected with “zombies”, it’s not the same. I remember the film that inspired the video game and its author Neil Druckmann, it’s The Road by Jon Hillcoat, with a similar treatment. In any case, you will be served because this is the episode where you will have a maximum of infected, runners, stalkers, clickers, all of which come to throw themselves on Kathleen’s armed forces. If the Bloater does not disappoint by ripping the head off the character played by Jeffrey Pierce, I find it a shame that there is no confrontation with Ellie and Joel. The appointment had been missed in episode 3, because I remind you that in the game, it is with Bill that we meet the colossus with a fierce fight and frankly it would not have been a refusal to have a showdown in the series. Besides, be aware that you will no longer see infected in the rest of the series, except for a passage at the beginning of episode 9, but we won’t say more.
