Summary
Pedro Pascal delivers his best work to date as “Please Hold on to My Hand” is the best episode of the season.
We recap the HBO series The Last of Us Season 1 Episode 4, “Please Hold on to My Hand,” which contains spoilers.
In The Last of Us Season 1 Episode 3, we had an emotionally charged episode that featured the relationship between Bill and Frank. It also was pivotal in understanding how Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) would get a ride to get on the road. So let’s dive into Episode 4 of the season.
The Last of Us Season 1 Episode 4 recap
The episode begins with Ellie looking at her reflection of herself in the mirror with a gun in her hand, pretending to pull the trigger. She also loads and unloads the weapon while aiming down the sight in the mirror. Then, back outside, we see Joel siphoning gas from one car into a gas can to get them back on the road. Finally, as he makes that happen, Ellie starts to read jokes from a “No Pun Intended” book that makes Joel go grey as he stands there.
Onward, the duo heads on the road again as a little Hank Williams plays in the backdrop from a cassette Ellie found in the backseat. Furthermore, we see Joel overly protective and reserved towards Ellie as they pull over for the night. However, when Ellie needs comfort, he provides reassurance she needs to go to sleep. I love the banter between these two.
Does anyone stand in Joel and Ellie’s way in making it to Wyoming?
As they travel down the road, they encounter massive wreckage blocking the interstate in Kansas City. Then, they have to get off a previous exit to which they see one of the checkpoints that no one is at. Moments later, they see a man that is hurt asking for help. But, of course, it was a plant pretending to be hurt, and it caused Joel and Ellie to crash. As they are firing at Joel, he gets Ellie to safety and picks apart the men one by one. However, another man busts through the door and takes down Joel. After he gets the best of Joel, Ellie gets out of hiding and shoots him.
I’ve been quite critical of the series, but this might have been my favorite scene. You see Ellie struggle after shooting this man, and while he is begging for his life, she doesn’t know what to do. Joel, who knows she saved his life, takes the gun from her and still proceeds to protect her by telling her to get behind the wall again because he knows he has to kill this man. Pedro Pascal delivered this entire thing with his eyes and facial expression, causing quite the emotions, especially for someone with a young daughter like me.
We move to Kathleen (Melanie Lynskey), who is grilling someone about the last time they saw someone. She gets down to the brass tacks of asking where Henry is with a gun to this man’s head. However, before pulling the trigger, a truck appears, and it’s one of the men Joel killed. The men inform her that the truck that was found was heavily supplied. Kathleen heads back inside, kills the man, and heads back outside to announce to her team that this is Henry’s fault. She orders them to find out who did this and kill them.
Who is Kathleen?
Kathleen is the leader of the revolutionary movement in Kansas City. Yellowjackets star Melanie Lynskey portrays her. The faction she is the leader of is inspired by the video game’s territorial Hunters.
Is Kathleen in The Last of Us video game?
No. Craig Mazin, the showrunner and writer of the series, created Kathleen. While he does pull aspects from the game from the Hunters to build this storyline, Kathleen was never part of that in the game. Mazin mentioned in several interviews that with the actual video game, you have to kill so many people, and they didn’t want viewers numb to that. So creating characters like Kathleen helps humanize the characters, and they can define why some of them are enemies or what they want from each other.
The Last of Us Season 1 Episode 4 Ending Explained
We return to Joel and Ellie, discussing their next course of action. Joel tries to explain that he should’ve never put her in the position to pull that trigger. He struggles mightily to find the right words to say to comfort her, but the effort alone gets Ellie quite emotional. However, she tells him it wasn’t her first time, leading to him pulling out the gun she used and handing it to her. Finally, he shows her the right way to hold it and a few more gun techniques. What a moment.
The episode ends with Ellie telling Joel a joke about diarrhea leading to Joel breaking a little bit and laughing. Once he falls asleep, he awakens to a scream from Ellie. He looks up, and a little kid has a gun to Ellie and tells him to be quiet.
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