‘The Last Of Us’ surprises with a coming out, more heartbreak, and gay fans have a LOT of feelings
Spoilers ahead for The Last Of Us Episode 7, “Left Behind.“Seven episodes into HBO’s apocalyptic drama, The Last Of Us, we know by now: Don’t get too attached.Outside of our heroes Joel (number one daddy/ally Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (rising nonbinary star Bella Ramsey), pretty much every character we’ve grown any sort of attachment to has died—most of them by the end of the episode.So, we braced ourselves when we realized the show’s latest outing—”Left Behind”—would be another extended flashback, this one depicting Ellie’s fateful night out at the mall with her friend Riley (played by Storm Reid, who you’ll likely recognize from Euphoria and those inescapable “Stop scrolling!” ads for the movie Missing On TikTok.)Were our eyes deceiving us, or is ‘The Last of Us’ about to get even gayer?We’re taken to the not-too-distant past where Ellie is in FEDRA training, that famous attitude of hers on full display.
One night, her long-missing pal Riley climbs through her window, reveals she’s joined the rebel militia group the Fireflies, and coaxes Ellie to go on a surprise adventure with her.They end up at a dormant mall—a setting with a lot of history in the zombie and teen romance genres—where Riley has planned to show her friend its four “five wonders,” starting with a working escalator.For a while there, it’s pure teenaged bliss: Arcade games, stolen glances, silly photobooth pics, hand-holding, carousel rides to lullaby versions of The Cure’s “Just Like Heaven.” It’s beautiful, really, and most anybody who remembers harboring warm, fuzzy feelings for their friend when they were a baby gay can relate to the emotion the episode so perfectly captures.A post shared by The Last of Us (@thelastofus)But we know what to expect with.
