Meanwhile, in Jackson …

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Spoilers follow for The Last of Us season-two episode “Through the Valley.”

In a notable divergence from its source material, The Last of Us features “Jackson” instead of the video game locations. On the other hand, Game of Thrones presents “Hardhome,” while Lord of the Rings offers “Helm’s Deep.

In the second episode of season two, “The Last of Us” delves into a storyline long awaited by gamers and spoiler-savvy viewers: the demise of Joel. After killing numerous Fireflies five years earlier to prevent them from executing Ellie and extracting her blood for a cordyceps vaccine, his actions catch up with him in the form of Abby (played by Kaitlyn Dever), the daughter of the surgeon he had killed to protect Ellie. The killing of Joel by Abby was undoubtedly the most buzzworthy topic this season. However, “Through the Valley” is not solely about Joel’s pride or Ellie’s grief during his last moments. Instead, the episode is a stark reminder of the ongoing threats our human characters face from the Infected through an attack on Jackson that is reminiscent of a natural disaster. The infected have grown smarter and their numbers are swelling, making them more formidable adversaries.

Craig Mazin, one of the series’ co-showrunners who wrote “Through the Valley,” explains that they aimed to convey a shared feeling of injury and struggle among all characters, as Ellie herself is wounded in the game. They didn’t want it to seem like everyone else was okay. The intention behind bringing the fight to Jackson was to instill a sense of vulnerability for every character. This intense battle took approximately four weeks to film, included 200 more visual effects shots compared to last season’s main battle, and a flamethrower sequence that haunted star Gabriel Luna for weeks.

The Idea: ‘There is nowhere we can go to feel perfectly safe’

In the first season, Jackson underwent significant physical and narrative growth compared to the game; in the second season, the Wyoming outpost has expanded significantly, attracting refugees nearly every day. Now, Jackson is a picturesque, self-sufficient settlement, featuring a city council, livestock enclosures, and citizens who rotate through guard duty and patrol the surroundings. The creators wanted to convey the message that “there’s no place where we can feel completely secure,” as Mazin explains, so they began considering ways to disturb Jackson’s peace.

In the process of developing supporting characters and giving them a richer history and role, Mazin opted to switch the character accompanying Joel when Abby attacks him from his brother Tommy in the game, to Dina (Isabela Merced) in the series. This change transformed Dina from merely being Ellie’s love interest into a more significant figure, serving as a surrogate daughter for Joel. As a result, Tommy (Luna) was given room for a more expansive storyline that focused on his position of power in Jackson and underscored the depth of his relationship with wife Maria (Rutina Wesley). Luna expresses that witnessing his brother’s brutal attack without being able to intervene didn’t sit well with him emotionally, and Craig reassured him by saying, “Don’t worry. We’re considering some options.

In the lead-up to the WGA strike in May 2023, Mazin drafted an extensive message for Luna, explaining a fresh concept for season two: a unified assault by all of Jackson’s inhabitants against a massive horde, intertwining multiple narrative strands. Simultaneously, Abby, while seeking Joel outside Jackson, inadvertently awakens Infected who have been utilizing the deceased as insulation in the snowy mountains surrounding the town. These evolved Infected, capable of strategic thinking, had been using their dead to keep warm. Meanwhile, Jackson’s overconfident expansion efforts triggered a cordyceps network that had spread throughout the town’s plumbing system. This network, led by a colossal Bloater, then drew both groups together, heading towards Jackson.

In a scenario where Maria, Tommy, and their fellow townspeople are forced to fight hordes of Infected, Mazin points out that if the Fireflies had been successful in creating a vaccine from Ellie’s blood, this battle might have been preventable. Mazin reflects on the connections he drew between Joel’s final moments and the attack on Jackson, commenting that “One person making a choice has consequences not just for themselves, but for others who are deeply affected – not merely strangers or disliked individuals, but loved ones.” He adds that it was impactful to subvert expectations by revealing that everything had fallen apart at the end of the episode.

The Preparation: ‘Get their head around how massive this is’

In the making of “The Last of Us,” the creative team had initially planned a storyline involving a city under attack by Infected, including a large Bloater, titled “Endure and Survive.” However, the battle of Jackson surpassed the scale of that episode, according to production designer Don Macauley and visual-effects supervisor Alex Wang. The creation of Jackson necessitated an entirely new construction on a parking lot in Vancouver, British Columbia, along with more actors and stunt performers on set. Additionally, the battle took place during daytime, making the extensive visual effects more challenging to conceal. As Mazin puts it, “That episode essentially became a separate show within our show.

For Season 2, Macauley and his team had to build an entirely new version of Jackson, as none of the materials from the original set built in Canmore, Alberta were reused when production shifted to British Columbia. This fresh take on Jackson was constructed prior to filming in February 2024. The completed set spanned a massive area of 650 feet by 450 feet, equivalent to two city blocks complete with cross streets. It featured a wall, a gate, and a total of 45 buildings, each varying in the level of interior detailing. They opted against using any signage from Season 1, such as the Tipsy Bison bar’s sign, to emphasize the growth of Jackson and indicate that the characters are now in a different part of town, according to Macauley.

For the season-two premiere “Future Days,” the newly constructed Jackson set was utilized, but Macauley notes, “We were aware of the challenges as we were constructing it.” Director Mark Mylod and cinematographer Catherine Goldschmidt planned and marked out the action within the completed set. Afterward, Macauley’s team reinforced, fireproofed, and modified the gate for the Infected to break through following the wall breach; fortified buildings intended for burning with fire-resistant materials; finished rooftops and installed catwalks for cast and crew to access during action scenes; and added shatterable glass to windows that actors would need to smash. Moreover, Macauley personally designed detailed sketches of each battle scene, including lighting, as a reference for the entire production team. “These illustrations are essentially frames from the show without any footage being filmed,” he explains, “They help everyone visualize the scale of the battle ahead.

Simultaneously, Wang and his group of 11 visual effects (VFX) providers used the script by Mazin as a guide to emphasize “the grandeur and magnitude.” As Wang explains, the assault takes place during a snowstorm with poor visibility, making it challenging for the horde to be seen. Many scenes needed VFX enhancements. Besides extending Jackson’s protective wall and intensifying the spreading fire throughout town, the team transformed the dozens of stunt performers and about 100 extras wearing prosthetics into a swarm of over a thousand Infected piling onto each other and attacking people as they move chaotically through Main Street. “Craig expected us to demonstrate the Infected in their full, aggressive form,” Wang said. “It was crucial to capture their wild and almost frantic movements.

The main antagonist in this episode was a particularly formidable Bloater, who breached the Jackson wall and engaged in a dramatic showdown with Tommy in a narrow alley. Just like in season one, the Bloater was entirely computer-generated, but Wang and Mazin opted to make this particular Bloater bigger and more intimidating. Craig explained that he wanted to avoid the impression of “Here’s just one Bloater, wandering across America, chasing them.” Wang chuckles at this point. In all, the episode featured over 600 visual effects shots, which is approximately 200 more than the season-one record for Kansas City.

The Performance: ‘Every round fired is a decision being made’

As it becomes clear that the Infected are hiding in the snow, Jackson takes measures to safeguard itself. Council members Tommy and Maria take charge, utilizing their warning system before organizing a defense. These events underscore how Tommy’s family has expanded to include Jackson’s entire community, as explained by Mazin. Now responsible for more than just his immediate kin, Tommy stations Maria on a rooftop as a sniper while he directs operations first from the town wall and later on Main Street. The battle is marked by scenes of them watching out for each other amidst the mayhem. “We rely on one another,” Wesley explains. “Even though I could barely make him out up there on the roof, I knew he was looking at me, and I was focused on him.” Luna adds, “The narrative unfolds through these significant action sequences. Everything you see on screen carries meaning, and each bullet fired is a choice made.

Luna and Wesley underwent both stunt rehearsals and weapon drills, using firearms crafted by the show’s armory team, such as replicas of guns featured in the “The Last of Us” video games, including Tommy’s M1 Garand rifle. Macauley focused on solving the physics challenges for specific scenes, like when Jackson’s defenders push gasoline barrels off a wall towards the horde. (He mentions they had safety measures in place with scaffolds and padded surfaces in parking lots weeks prior to filming these scenes.)

Filming for the intense action scenes spanned approximately four weeks, with each scene meticulously divided into parts. Throughout this timeframe, several constants were present: incessant Canadian rain, ammunition casings scattered on the wall’s edge, and a set covered in Dolomite, which Luna likened to “white, tasteless Cheeto dust.” Luna humorously admitted, “I didn’t realize how challenging it would be until I got there, and I was running around in cowboy boots.” During the episode, both Wesley and Luna had significant stunt sequences: Luna unleashed a dozen German Shepherds trained for attack that ultimately turned the battle against the Infected, while Wesley used a flamethrower to eliminate the Bloater. To prepare for these scenes, Luna learned to create both fireballs and long streams of flame. However, in the heat of the moment, he drew on a childhood memory: observing a demonstration of a napalm flamethrower at the National Museum of the Pacific War. “They set alight a bunker, and they had to be at least 15 to 20 meters away,” Luna recalled, “yet the instant the flamethrower ignited, you could feel the heat as if it was right next to you.

The initial scene involving the character Tommy on the set of “The Last of Us” was extremely hot and underwent significant changes post-principal filming. Director Mazin and Macauley devised a new concept: What if the Bloater chased Tommy into a narrow, blind-ending alleyway, forcing him to make a final stand? Four months later, Luna returned to a newly constructed section of the Jackson set to shoot another take of this confrontation, with the revised ending showing the Bloater falling at Tommy’s feet. Although the final Bloater is digitally created, stunt actor Glenn Ennis, wearing high-heeled boots and a “helmet with a Teletubby antenna and green tennis ball,” was used as a VFX reference as Luna set him ablaze with approximately 12 to 13 full body burns. The final scene is gruesome and violent, and had an emotional impact on Luna that he didn’t anticipate: recurring visions of the burning figures for weeks afterwards. “I always joke about it,” Luna says, “but my wife thinks I might be traumatized.

Title “Through the Valley” concludes by raising a larger query about recovery, as Tommy and Maria examine the remnants of Jackson. How will this town recover from the assault, and how will they react to the news about Joel? In his initial script, Mazin explains that the episode initially alternated between Jackson and Joel; however, he altered this approach during editing when he recognized that “the moment Abby shoots Joel, you cannot leave that room.” Instead, “Through the Valley” focuses on the battle in Jackson, featuring a heroic German Shepherd attack, followed by a shift to the chalet where Abby captures and torments Joel, revealing her identity to him. During this emotional ride, Ellie is compelled to witness Joel’s death. The scene concludes with a panoramic shot of Ellie and her partner Jesse hauling Joel’s body towards a distant Jackson engulfed in flames. This image symbolizes the series’ pattern where “there’s a victory … there is something else that falls apart,” Mazin says. “This is the frontier, and they have found ways to survive; thus, Jackson has a chance to recover. However, at what cost?

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2025-04-21 06:59