Category: Features

Fans of the award-winning video game franchise, The Last of Us, have been anticipating the arrival of the HBO Max streaming series since word of the project first circulated in late 2020. Led by Pedro Pascal, Anna Torv, and Bella Ramsey, the adaptation kicked off with an 80-minute first episode that covered a lot of ground (55 years to be exact), most of which was incredibly familiar to fans of the game and has fans of the game pretty fired up for more. But what about your average outsider? As a certified outsider, I have a lot of questions about just what the hell is happening at the end of the world in The Last of Us.

Science!

Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann came out swinging with some heavy science in the show’s opening scene. The science showdown between Quintus and The Swede was legit but it also really felt like HBO did a test screening of some portion of the series with a group of average IQ types and realized that without an explanation of what was going to happen 15 minutes later, they would have way too many questions. Then they went ahead and loaded it up with so much science that they may just have further confused the average IQ types. Fans of The Walking Dead spent several seasons trying to figure out how the end of the world began before getting over it, so at least there was some effort here.

D-Day

Pretty standard stuff for the day the music died, really. Pedro Pascal‘s Joel seems like a real dawg and the stuff with his daughter, Sarah, clearly exists to make you sad soon and open a spot in Joel’s heart later. Outside of that, Joel’s brother (that’s Gabriel Luna?!) is a rowdy Army dude–seems important. The Mycelium Mouths are just simply terrifying. Thankfully, Quintus’ pre-present-day exposition allowed for some understanding of how an otherwise decrepit old lady could become a WMD…oh my God he smashed her skull with a pipe wrench! Thankfully the failed escape attempt didn’t go on too long (I want to see what was going on in that plane; I feel like it was World War Z-level action with the Mycelium Mouths).

As the D-Day stuff comes to a close, it seems pretty clear that the only necessary piece was the death of Sarah. As the audience makes the jump 20 years into the future, there’s no understanding of how or why the Mycelium Mouths came to be, only that they did, leaving us to imagine that Sarah’s death will mark the beginning of Joel’s origin story as “The Governor” of some post-apocalyptic civilization.

What Are Fireflies? What a Mouthy Brat!

Joel is just…a grunt? He should be running this DMZ but instead, he’s willing to burn bodies and work in the sewers? All these FEDRA people are faceless goons and someone kicked the shit out of I-didn’t-recognize-her-but-that’s Anna Torv. Obviously, these Fireflys are a big deal; that brat they have chained up is mouthy as hell. If you’re already chaining her up, add a modified Hannibal Lecter mask to keep her from talking unless you need her to. Where’s a wight giant when you need one? I adored the abstract art on the wall in the subway tunnel; I could have stared at the blown-up Mycelium Mouth all day trying to figure out exactly what I was looking at.

Joel and Agent Dunham are sneaky! Joel’s brother is now estranged…hopefully Joel reminds him that he’d likely be dead if he hadn’t bailed him out of jail…and that Sarah would probably not have been shot and killed if Joel hadn’t spent the time bailing him out. At this point in the series, it’s tough to accept swapping out sweet Sarah, who fixed her Dad’s watch for his birthday, with the abrasive, vulgar Ellie but she’s apparently the Mycelium Messiah, so I guess she’s going to fill that hole in Joel’s heart with all sorts of cuss words.

The biggest outstanding question at the moment is why Joel is so terrifying. I assumed his 20 years of experience would have included murdering his way to the top of some group of survivors so he could lead a revolution against the government that took his daughter away from him. Murders, maybe some light torture, and developing some mild psychoses; instead, he’s just a dude who while resourceful, would seem to be no more or less threatening than any other dude. Surely his war vet brother would be scarier.

Next!

It seems like most of the people in this episode were faceless because we’ll never see them again now that Joel, Tess, and Ellie left the zone. Though it was nothing extraordinary, the closing shot of the episode worked as a really great tease for me. The thought of them heading into a completely ruined city full of loud, screechy noises might not be Rick riding into Atlanta on his high horse, but it definitely portends bad things man, I mean bad things…

PREVIOUS ENTRIES:

Rule #1, Cities Are Bad

Rules #13-17, When You Kill Them Make Sure They’re Dead

Rule #27, Only Carry What You Need (And Weapons!)

Rule #49, Learn Not To Feel

Rule #58, People Aren’t Better Than Monsters

Rule #73, Look For The Light

????, 2033

-Iggy Bigby

I don’t know what day it is. I spent 20 years of the apocalypse keeping track. Funny I would die not knowing.

Let’s just get it out of the way – this is probably my final journal entry. I thought I could talk to people, help them understand what the world needed to heal. Make them see the light.

I was wrong.

We raided a Hunter settlement. Tried to bring them into our fold. We severely underestimated how many of them there were. They killed everyone in my mission, and now I’m in a cage on the way to sacrifice. Well, execution really. Being “thrown to the beasts“, an example for anyone else who might dare oppose them. Sacrifice just sounds better in my head. Doing it for the cause, and all.

I haven’t slept in… a while? So, I apologize if any of this sounds delusional. It’s hard to sleep when you know you only have a little time left. They took all of my things, but one of the guards left me my journal. Maybe he’s just curious what I’ll write. Like an insane social experiment. Obviously, he doesn’t know what I’ve got in here. The second half of my life. A series of events you clearly shouldn’t replicate.

If this is the last hurrah, though, I guess I’d better make it count.

I started this survival guide when I was only 22 years old. So much hadn’t happened yet. I didn’t know how humanity would change, or what might happen on a planet filled with monsters. I was just scared, and alone. I told myself I didn’t care if I died, that I wasn’t afraid of death. But that was bullshit. A lie to make myself feel better, while I listened to gunshots every night. Never sure if they were aimed at people or the infected. Never sure when they’d be aimed at me.

Now, they are. Metaphorically, of course. Literally, I’m being fed to a herd of Clickers. I’ll try to fight back – of course I will – but like I’ve said before, that fungus ain’t just for looks. It’ll hurt, I’m not looking forward to that, but maybe I’ll manage to get one last laugh in before I go. Of all the ways I thought this world might take me, gladiatorial combat against the undead was NOT on the list. It’s sorta hilarious if you’ve got a morbid sense of humor like mine. If you don’t, I suppose it may come across as tragic.

Either way, I’m trying to keep my spirits up. I think I had a pretty good run, all things considered. And, if you’ve somehow found even just a handful of my rules, I’d like to think I saved a life or two during the ride. Based on what I’ve heard, I should have just enough time to get one more lesson down on paper, and I’m not really doing anything else at the moment, so why not?

It’s an obvious one, keeping the circumstances in mind. However, now that I’m old (in apocalypse years), I’m gonna try to throw a little wisdom in there as well. Really flesh out the topic. It’s the antithesis of my current situation, the solution to the mistake that finally did me in. I believed in something, and for the first time, I wasn’t afraid of dying for it. I knew it could get me, but somehow I never really thought it would. So, please, if you’d like to avoid becoming plant bait, do the following –

Rule #88, Don’t Be A Martyr

What I’ve come to learn is that people aren’t designed to be satisfied. Survival is not based around ideals. Its foundation is simply the next thought, the next need that must be met. That’s where this country has landed, and that’s where it will likely stay. Honestly, there’s a good chance it was always headed towards this – whether a fungus took us there or not.

Humanity will always run towards perfection, just to throw it away. We get bored. Salvation is too easy. We make our own problems because deep down, we love the chaos. We love the sensation of hating something from the bottom of our stomachs. It makes us feel better to think everything else is terrible because then we don’t feel as bad about ourselves. It’s sickening, but it’s just how things are. I thought I could fight against that, change it even, and instead I learned the world has become exactly what it was meant to be.

Society was too complicated for us to handle. It was overstimulating. We were always supposed to live in tribes, hunting for basic needs. That’s what we have now. No borders, no government, no money. Just animals, roaming the land. Anyone who allows themselves to think higher thoughts, or commit to something bigger, has already written their future on the wall. People, as we know them, will never change.

I remember when we were still concerned about “Global Warming.” Someone told me it was narcissistic to think we would kill the Earth. That it was more likely the Earth would kill us, like the parasites we are. And, they said, that it was most likely a meteor would take us all out before any of that happened. The universe would hit the reset button, the only true method of bringing about peace.

Maybe a meteor is what we need. We’re too full of hate and greed to let anything else in the door. So many stories end with people being too stubborn to let their feelings go. To do what’s right in the name of the bigger picture. But you have to let go if you ever hope to move forward. Move forward, or you’ll die with the past. Don’t be a martyr. Just hold your loved ones close and keep yourselves alive.

I wasn’t able to do any of that. I let my emotions get in the way. I thought too much. Now the universe has cut my rope short. Thankfully, I have my writings. A legacy. Something for you to remember me by. In a weird way, my life has become devoted to you. The ones who can still make it. If I have to be a martyr, I’m hoping it’s worth something. That I can make you among the last of a drowning breed – those who decipher between good and evil, and know when to use both.

So, if you’ve found this journal, use it well. Enter this world knowing how it works, and learn to survive. I’ll see you sooner or later. Let me know how it goes.

August 17, 2030

PREVIOUS ENTRIES:

Rule #1, Cities Are Bad

Rules #13-17, When You Kill Them Make Sure They’re Dead

Rule #27, Only Carry What You Need (And Weapons!)

Rule #49, Learn Not To Feel

Rule #58, People Aren’t Better Than Monsters

-Iggy Bigby

“When you’re lost in the darkness… Look for the light. Believe in the Fireflies!“

Sounds pretty hokey, doesn’t it? I used to think so.

Back in Buffalo – almost 20 years ago now – we hated the Fireflies. That stupid slogan was everywhere. Inescapable. Alex and I would snicker about it in the Quarantine Zone, come up with some fairly solid riffs on our self-proclaimed saviors and their righteous mission. We couldn’t understand why they’d want to tear down what little we had left. We were so young and so selfish.

Sure, the QZ was far from perfect. A borderline fascist environment, honestly. But at the time, at least it kept us safe – or, as safe as we felt we could get in a world post-society. Democracy was gone, we thought. Accept it, and let us trudge through life. Stop trying to tear down our walls. FEDRA’s walls. I’ve been through a lot since then, though. I’m different now. Maybe you see it in my writing? I don’t joke like I used to. I’ve stopped trying to sugarcoat the reality of our situation. It’s bad, and yeah, someone should probably do something about it.

It’s not enough to live behind walls anymore. It’s not enough to spend decades cowering from existence, one mistake away from losing everything. That’s not the future I want. Not for me, and not for you. It’s certainly not what I wanted for Sweet Pea. It’s been a couple years since we left Jackson, and since then, I’ve started to see what I’d been missing this whole time.

Believe it or not, the Fireflies give us our best chance at a life worth living.

If you’ve been keeping up with all my entries, you’ll remember we were waiting for someone named Tommy to pick us up from Jackson and ferry us back to the Fireflies’ base in Salt Lake City. I almost didn’t go with him. The community in Wyoming was beautiful, and I couldn’t think of a real reason to leave it behind. Then, not long before Tommy made it to us, Jackson had to fend off a Bandit attack. Five men, all of whom I’d come to know, gave their lives to keep their families safe. To make sure their children would have enough supplies to make it through tomorrow.

I realized, at that moment, how important the Fireflies could be. Jackson was only allowed to be tranquil some of the time when the apocalypse wasn’t forcing death down its throat. The Fireflies had the potential to build a world where it could flourish. Where it would only be one of many thriving communities. I didn’t have anyone to protect anymore, nobody else to look out for but myself. So, I decided my best use was to leave Jackson and dedicate myself to crafting a world where its residents could sleep soundly at night.

I joined the Fireflies, and I haven’t looked back. Ironically, Tommy went back to Jackson after dropping us off. He wanted to stick to his word; get us there safely. But he found something special in that county, running that dam. He found love, so he left the Fireflies. I suppose you could say I took his place. I don’t regret it. First decision I’ve made in a while I can say that for.

You might think it’s some culty bullshit, but I’ve never felt more secure. I have a purpose again, and I feel good doing it. It’s been a really long journey, but if I had to enter another rule in this journal – in ‘Apocalypse 101’ – it would be to find whatever it is that makes you feel this way too. You might be thinking it’s a weird thing to put in a survival guide. That joining a militia feels like a surefire way to get yourself killed. But there are other jobs here, aside from being a grunt. There are doctors and caretakers and cafeteria workers. All of them LIVING. Being truly ALIVE.

So, literally or metaphorically, I encourage you to abide by the following rule.

Rule #73, Look For the Light

Before you join the Fireflies, however, let me give you a brief history lesson. It’s not like school, where you sign up for classes and they teach you everything you need to know. It’s more of a “pick it up as you go along” situation. Lucky for whoever has found this journal, though, I have sorta been treating it like school. ‘101’, and all. So I’ll give you the rundown and hopefully, you’ll be good to go by the time you join up. Hell, maybe by when you find this we’ll have already done it and nothing I’ve ever written will matter anymore. That would be something.

Anyway, best I can tell, the Fireflies came about sometime in the early 2010s, not long after the apocalypse started. As I’ve covered a couple times, their goal was to restore a democratic government and remove FEDRA and the QZ’s from power. In their early days, they didn’t have much support. They’d try to start riots or coups from inside QZ’s, but it didn’t work. Eventually, they went further than FEDRA was comfortable with, and six Firefly members were publicly executed. That was a mistake on FEDRA’s part. Really stirred the people up.

After that, things started to take off. Their numbers grew, people started to see the light. They were able to organize. You could identify members from their clothing – always yellow and green, like the glow of a real firefly (Get it? True fashion). That’s what I wear now, too, which is great because I’ve always looked good in Earth colors. We also wear cool, fancy pendants as an identifier. A way to weed out the spies from actual believers.

The Fireflies’ base of operations has moved around a few times, before they landed in Utah. I’ve heard the last spot they called home was at the University of Eastern Colorado. They were there for a while, but I’m glad I missed that era. It ended poorly. Bless their hearts, the militia was searching for a Cordyceps cure in the University’s science labs. Trying to bring the world back by ridding it of monsters altogether. Testing all sorts of wacky vaccines on monkeys, until one got loose. It bit a doctor, and everything fell to shit from there*. The labs were no longer viable. They had to move elsewhere.

The last decade has been spent trying to get as many people and communities on the Fireflies’ side as possible. A lot of the QZ’s have now fallen to Firefly insurgency, a nice change of pace after so many years of failure on the militia’s part. Unfortunately, as soon as people get a little taste of freedom, they get spooked. They think the Fireflies will turn out to be just another dictatorship. So, after the QZ’s topple, the folks there reject us and make the cities their own. I can respect the idea, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired. Apparently, this is how the Hunters got their start. QZ’s that fell to the Fireflies just became hotbeds for “survival of the fittest.” A shame. So much wasted potential.

Now that I’m here, I’m hoping I can put an end to the mistrust. Alex always said I had a way with words. A way with people. So maybe, after I help end FEDRA, I can be a peace broker. Make up for all that time of simple killing. Stand up and convince the citizens of this country to play along. To unify. To build better lives for themselves. Maybe I can at least do that.

When you’re lost in the darkness, look for the light. And look for me. Don’t be afraid to say hi.

*(That was in 2028, just before I made myself known. I still hear whispers there’s a lead on a cure, but as far as I know, nothing all that miraculous in terms of actual progress has been made. We’re led by a woman named Marlene. She’s a fighter, and she knows how to rally the troops. She’ll do whatever it takes to get the job done. Marlene is convinced her and the surgeon here, Dr. Jerry Anderson (real nice guy), can change the world. I hope she’s right, because if she’s not, it could be the end for all of us…)