The Last of Us Episode 6 Review: The Things That We Fear

After the shock that Episode 5 left us with, this latest episode was a much-needed change of pace. It appears the makers realized that too, hence they gave us this episode named “Kin”.

When it comes down to the basics, there’s not much that humans dwell on. They care for very few fellow beings; with others, they have some mutual understanding and sometimes affection. And that affection makes us weak, and it makes us vigilant. Episode 6 of The Last of Us represents this in a very effective manner.

New friends, old complications, and a sense of responsibility!

The episode opens with two new characters whom we never saw before. They were not in the games either; never been seen in the series before this point. They were just a native American couple whom Joel was asking for directions from.

The couple was sure that Joel and Ellie would perish soon enough. There we see the first signs of weakness in Joel. But they eventually find what they were looking for; “The Jackson County”.

Joel’s brother and his wife head a communal that mostly runs on favors. People trade and do favors for each other and they survive this way. Joel is surprised to find his brother married and a lot of things become clearer in light of this revelation.

Joel asks his brother for that “Favor”. Joel’s shady past comes into question, and Ellie shows signs of what she learned from Joel, her distrust for strangers.

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Everything mostly plays out as it did in the game. Only, we got a glimpse of the future too. A bunch of characters, locations, and even a very beautiful shimmer of hope for season 2 was given.

Joel finally tells Tommy his little secret, and he also tells Tommy that he does not trust his body anymore. He talks of weakness and of caring for Ellie. And once all this is done, we see Tommy seeing off Joel and Ellie to their next stop.

As we said before, for the most part, this episode goes the way it all played out in the game. Also, we are given a glimpse of the oncoming winter, both ways. The rabbits and that shocking scene, yep, the one that made all of us gasp while playing the game!

And then this episode ends on a cliffhanger. It was not a very surprising episode, but it served its purpose perfectly. We can even argue that it was somewhat rushed to a conclusion in too much hurry. The climax was not very satisfying, but served its purpose.

The performances that hurt us

Everything remains consistent, every actor is just perfect. But this time around, Pedro Pascal just swiped us away. He finally showed his vulnerability and his prowess at doing so.

Bella Ramsey was once again perfect at being Ellie. She fails to whistle, tries her hand out on those silly puns, and is as foul mouth as Ellie ever was in the games.

Finally, Gabriel Luna and Rutina Wesley gave very convincing performances as Tommy and Maria. Only Rutina did an awesome job of presenting us with a more layered Maria than we have ever seen before. She now brings Ellie an eggplant jacket while looking at Joel suspiciously.

A Glimpse at the future

We saw a bunch of things that gave us a hint at what was to come. Not in the coming episodes, but in the coming season. We saw Dina; we were shown that beautiful eating area that we once saw in teasers for The Last of Us 2.

And we finally saw Shimmer. Yes, the girl has been born and is getting ready for her future adventures. It’s a very good thing that the makers decided to put all these details in this episode like this. It would play out well in season 2, at least for the sake of continuity. For now, these are just a bunch of clever references.

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For the next episode though, we might finally meet David and his gang, and even see who Troy Baker plays in the series.