The Last of Us video game creator Neil Druckman directs the show’s second episode, “Infected,” which ratchets up the tension to 11 as we see more of what the fungus does to people as Joel and Tess must take Ellie past the infected zone.
Nothing We Can Do | In 2003, in Jakarta, Indonesia, a mycology professor named Ratna is taken by police from a restaurant to a classified location. She looks through a microscope and identifies Cordyceps on the slide, but is told that it came from a human. Ratna enters a HAZMAT suit to look at a corpse and finds bite marks on the victim’s leg and fungus growing from the mouth. After being told that the fungus spread from other factory workers, fourteen of which are missing, Ratna tells the police that there is no treatment for the fungus- and orders him to bomb the entire city!
In present day, Ellie (Bella Ramsey) wakes up in an abandoned building with Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Tess (Anna Torv) pointing a rifle at her, demanding to know if she’s infected, which Ellie insists that she’s not. While Ellie goes to pee, Joel recommends leaving her on her own and finding another way to get the battery for their truck, but Tess insists on sticking to the mission. Ellie tells Tess and Joel that doctors are working on a cure for the fungus, but Joel isn’t convinced. Regardless, they agree to take Ellie on her way.
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The Long Way | As they make their way across what’s left of the Boston freeway, Tess asks Ellie how she got infected. Ellie says that she snuck into a mall and got bit, but tenses when Tess asks if she was alone in the mall. They get into the lobby of an old hotel, which is flooded, and Ellie gets startled by a skeleton in the water. As Tess sneaks over a wall to find a way through the hotel, Ellie asks lots of questions about Joel, none of which he answers. As Tess clears the way through the hotel, they overlook the path in front of the hotel, which is lined with hundreds of infected, writhing around on the ground.
With their path blocked, their only way is through a dark museum in Independence Hall. They find a fresh corpse inside the gift shop with deep slices through his face, which makes Joel and Tess immediately worried. Joel orders Ellie to stay completely silent as they continue through the museum, ascending up the stairs. Once they get to the second floor, the ceiling caves in behind them and they start hearing a very unsettling sound as two fungus overgrown “Clicker” zombies enter. As long as they stay quiet, they can’t see the three of them, though, but of course, that doesn’t last long.
The Last Stand | The Clickers are freaky as hell and nearly tear their heads off, but they last long enough to kill them, although Tess twists her ankle and Ellie gets bitten on her arm, but seems fine. They make it across the rooftop of the museum and through the city and find an empty truck parked in front of a building with a blood trail leading inside. There, they find the camp they were supposed to meet all dead, leaving them with no options. And to make matters worse, Tess got infected back at the museum.
She orders Joel to take Ellie to Bill and Frank as infected begin to come barreling towards them. She knocks over some gasoline barrels and buys enough time for Joel and Ellie to clear the building as hordes of infected break in and one infected man kisses Tess, spreading fungus into her mouth. She manages to light the gasoline and blow up the building, herself and the infected in a blaze of glory as Joel and Ellie can only watch.
The Last of Us airs Sundays on HBO.