Episode 4: Please Hold My Hand

Episode four follows Joel and Ellie across the mainland United States in the car they received from Bill and Frank. They camp and drive all the way until they hit Kansas City, where the road they were taking is blocked off. They have the choice to take a slower path or risk going around the blockade to get back on the highway, and they take the riskier path. 

Ellie points out that the Kansas City QZ seems abandoned, which causes Joel to become increasingly more stressed, along with the fact that it is taking longer than it should to find the route back to the highway. Suddenly, they are ambushed and are forced to fight back against a group of thugs. They end up crashing their vehicle and retreating into a nearby store. 

In the next scene, Joel tells Ellie to hide while he deals with the thugs from the highway, and she does so. However, when it becomes clear to Ellie that one of the thugs has got one up on Joel, she saves the day by stepping out with the gun she secretly grabbed from Episode 3, and uses it to save Joel. Joel is initially displeased, but eventually trusts Ellie to use a gun later in the episode. 

The episode then cuts back into the past, and the audience discovers what happened to Kansas City. 

It is revealed that a group of resistance fighters took over the Kansas City QZ after military personnel known as FEDRA engaged in extreme corruption and tyranny. The renegades spent their time in power finding and killing all of the “informants” that assisted in helping FEDRA, as well as taking control of all of Kansas City’s military capabilities.  

The show then cuts back to the present and the leader of Kansas City, Kathleen Coghlan, is hyper-fixated on finding two informants named Sam and Henry Burell. She insists that finding them is the number one concern for Kansas City, even if it is irrational. 

During a search, Coghlan disregards a mysterious, bubbling concrete hole in the basement of the building she is in, and shrugs it off as a problem for later, even though it appears infinitely more serious than finding Sam Burell.  

The episode ends with Joel and Ellie sneaking around to reach a tall building in order to see the layout of the city from the windows and rest before formulating a plan to escape Kansas City. They eventually make it up to the top of a building, where Joel sets up a glass trap in order to be able to hear anyone trying to sneak up on them. 

After they both fall asleep, Joel wakes up to the sight of a kid pointing a gun at him with an older adult telling Joel and Ellie not to move. The episode ends on this cliff hanger. 

The audience can infer that the older adult and the kid are Sam and Henry Burell on the run from the resistance fighters. My guess for the next episode will be that Sam and Henry will try and force Joel and Ellie into helping them escape Kansas City. 

This episode of the “Last of Us” follows the game much more closely than the previous episode, only changing some locations and adding additional information to the background of the villains of the episode. 

These changes add to the overall story, and respect the game material enough to make up for the side story that made up the majority of Episode 3.