HBO's adaptation of the 2013 video game The Last of Us boasts intricate and engrossing world-building. It is a post-apocalyptic series that shows the United States fragmented into a tyrannical military government, FEDRA, common folks, Infected, the Fireflies, and so forth. While the show stays largely true to the source material, it cranks the story of the protagonist duo, Ellie and Joel Miller, up a notch by making a few changes well suited for the medium of television.
The Last of Us leads, Joel and Ellie, are more nuanced in the HBO series than in the game. While Pedro Pascal's Joel is softer and more sympathetic, Bella Ramsey's Ellie also differs slightly in the series.
7 Bickering With Bill
Bill and Frank's story is heartwarming and a creative departure from the game's canon. They are introduced in The Last of Us season 1, episode 3 "Long, Long Time" as a couple who live in the serene, but deserted Lincoln, Massachusetts. They are also Joel and Tess' trading partners and therefore on good terms with them. While Ellie is out of the picture in this equation, in that, she gets to visit Bill and Frank's place with Joel after the couple has died by a suicide pact, she does get to read out the heartfelt letter Bill left "To whomever, but probably Joel."
In the game though, Ellie and Joel knock on Bill's door and ask for his help in getting them a working car. Bill is foul-mouthed and fuels Ellie's fire. They constantly argue over trivial things, with Joel having to play the peacemaker at certain points.
6 Tess Asks Joel To Take Ellie To Bill And Frank
Tess' death in The Last of Us season 1, episode 2 "Infected," is a scary spectacle. The infected Tess is executed by FEDRA soldiers at the Capitol Building in the game. In the show however, she is given a kiss of death by an Infected, after which she blows herself up alongside the horde to buy Ellie and Joel more time to escape.
In both scenarios, Tess pleads with a reluctant Joel to keep Ellie safe. While in the game, she asks him to take the teenager to his brother, Tommy, because he was an ex-Firefly, and therefore in a better position to help the duo. In the TV series, however, Tess wants Ellie to be taken to Bill and Frank's. "They [Bill and Frank] will take her off your hands. They will handle it from here," says Tess. Joel keeps his promise as Ellie finds herself in Lincoln, Massachusetts in episode 3.
5 Ellie And The Pistol
In The Last of Us season 1, episode 4, "Please Hold to My Hand," the duo takes a quick detour through Kansas City and runs into an ambush. As a matter of fact, Kansas City replaces Pittsburgh as the place of action in the episode. Ellie is a gun nut in the HBO series and keeps asking Joel and Tess for a gun at various points prior to this episode. Unbeknownst to Joel, she steals a pistol from Bill and Frank's house at the end of The Last of Us episode 3 and quickly shoves it in her backpack. She uses the same pistol to save Joel's life during the gunfight that breaks in episode 4. While in the game, Ellie grabs a nearby gun and kills the man who tries to drown Joel in a puddle of water, the HBO series sees her shoot and paralyze the last attacker, Bryan.
In the HBO series, Joel and Ellie are ambushed by a small group of three attackers, one of whom fakes an injury and asks for help. While Joel does his best to flee the spot as fast as he can, the second man tosses a cinder block from above and shatters their windshield. Their tires are punctured by a spike strip, the third attacker shoots at them, and they crash into a laundromat. They abandon the truck, Joel tackles the attackers on his own, and Ellie is instructed to lie low. He manages to kill two of them, but the third has him pinned to the ground. Ellie sneaks up on the attacker and paralyzes him. Joel immediately takes away her pistol and finishes the attacker off.
4 Riley and Ellie's Night Out
Ellie and Riley's fateful story is told in a flashback sequence in The Last of Us season 1, episode 7 "Left Behind." Riley sneaks into Ellie's room after weeks of disappearance to tell her she's left FEDRA and joined the Fireflies. On her insistence, the duo heads out to a sealed-off mall.
Riley does show Ellie a wonderful time right up to the climatic moments. They dance on a lit-up display case and have their first kiss. Riley promises to stay and "figure it out" with Ellie, and shortly afterward, they see a group of Infected that pursues them through the mall. Just as they are about to escape, Ellie falls down and gets bitten in the process. Riley too ends up getting infected. In the HBO series, however, the duo is attacked by a single Infected in an American Girl Doll store. A melee breaks out at the end of which Ellie stabs the infected in the skull with her knife. Ellie rejoices only to discover that she and Riley are infected. Following this, Ellie smashes stuff while Riley sits quietly. Riley says they are left with two options, either to take an easy way out and shoot themselves or to just keep going and not quit. It's clear the immune Ellie doesn't turn while it's the end of the road for her first love/ best friend, Riley.
3 Ellie's Interaction With Marlon And Florence
The Last of Us season 1, episode 6 "Kin" opens with a couple, Marlon and Florence, living in a wood cabin in the Wyoming wilderness. They are among the characters created for the HBO series and they are a comical delight.
While Joel and Ellie are intruders into their home, they mean no harm. Joel just wants to know if Marlon has heard the name "Tommy" or seen him anywhere. He also asks Marlon to point out their location on the map, saying his answer better be the same as his wife's. Ellie meanwhile behaves like a brat, holding a pistol, prompting Marlon to ask, "Who is this little psycho?" Her sharp tongue surprises Marlon and amuses his wife.
2 Ellie Runs Away
In The Last of Us episode 6 "Kin," Joel reunited with his estranged younger brother, Tommy at the Jackson settlement. Joel asks him to deliver Ellie to the Fireflies in Colorado, but he declines, saying it's big a risk as he lives in a guarded community. In the HBO series, Ellie overhears Joel's plan to "ditch" her and confronts him later. She talks about her abandonment issues and conveys that she doesn't want to go with anyone but him.
In the game, Ellie overhears Tommy and Maria arguing about Joel's request to deliver her to the Fireflies lab. She takes one of the horses and rides off, and Joel and Tommy track her down to an abandoned ranch house. Joel chastises her for not realizing the value of her life and tells her that she put herself at risk.
1 Killing David
Ellie has grown fiercer by the time she encounters the cannibal cult leader, David, in The Last of Us season 1, episode 8 "When We Are in Need." She's learning to handle things on her own and takes care of Joel as he's recuperating from a stomach wound.
This episode, particularly, its climax, marks a turning point in Ellie and Joel's relationship. It also serves as a rite of passage for Ellie in many ways. For one, she violently hacks at the cult leader, David, with a butcher's knife in a burning steakhouse, and her anger serves the purpose of releasing her from years of distress. She stops once she's done venting and storms out of the burning structure. Joel embraces her outside, proving she's become his foster daughter. In the game, however, she keeps hacking at David with a machete and stops only when Joel pulls her away.