Naughty Dog Could Have Avoided The Last of Us Part II's Biggest Controversy

The Last of Us Part II is one of the greatest video games ever made. Not only did it win the Game Awards' Game of the Year in 2020, it's one of the most award-decorated games ever. The feats Part II managed to pull off were pretty incredible considering sequels rarely do as well as the originals, at least not as far as critical acclaim is concerned. Both The Last of Us and The Last of Us Part II were such monumentally successful games that the franchise inspired the top-rated HBO series, The Last of Us. Season 1 tells the story of the original video game across nine episodes.

Season 2 will follow the events of the second game, but there are many aspects of the sequel that fans don't want to see adapted. Despite The Last of Us Part II's monumental success, it still faced a lot of backlash from fans when it came out. Most of the controversy revolved around Abby's character and role in the story. Abby, however, is an important part of the narrative. Without her, the story wouldn't work. Naughty Dog might have dropped the ball on how they introduced her, but they created a compelling story surrounding Abby and Ellie's struggle.

Abby's Character & Why Fans Hate Her

Abby's Father Was Searching For a Cure

• Laura Bailey voiced Abby Anderson and provided motion capture for the character
• Kaitlyn Dever will portray Abby in the second season of HBO's The Last of Us
• Abby and Ellie act as dual protagonists of the sequel game

Abby Anderson's father was Jerry Anderson, a doctor and a member of the Fireflies. Fans will remember the Fireflies as the mysterious organization that opposed the mainstream government and continued searching for a cure despite the odds. In The Last of Us, Joel (the main playable protagonist) sets out on a journey with a young girl named Ellie.

Ellie is immune to the Cordyceps. After being bitten by someone infected with the Cordyceps brain infection, Ellie never turned. The Fireflies wanted to use Ellie's immunity to create a vaccine for Cordyceps. Players believe this is their main goal throughout the entire game. Joel, however, grows close with Ellie during their long journey together. Eventually, Joel comes to see her as a daughter.

Joel delivers on his promise and gets Ellie to a Firefly-run hospital. When Joel finds out that the doctors plan to kill Ellie to extract the Cordyceps from her brain, he retaliates. To save Ellie, Joel slaughters his way through the entire building. He kills everyone, including Abby's father, Dr. Jerry Anderson.

When players are first introduced to Abby in The Last of Us Part II, she's hunting for an unnamed man with a small group of friends. Players first take control of Abby during her search for the man. Players get a little bit of understanding that whoever she's searching for, he's done something horrible to earn her ire. Eventually, her friends try to talk some sense into her. The man they're searching for is part of a well-protected community, which means killing him will put them in great danger.

Abby refuses to listen to reason and soon enough, she runs into the man she's hunting: Joel. Joel helps her narrowly avoid death, but even Joel's kindness can't curb Abby's thirst for vengeance. Abby betrays Joel and takes him back to her hideout, where her friends help her subdue him. Abby tortures Joel in a rage-filled act of revenge. The worst part is that Ellie shows up and intervenes. Abby's friends restrain Ellie, and she's forced to watch and Abby beats Joel to death.

Needless to say, fans weren't happy about Joel's death. After all, players played as Joel for the entire first game. He quickly became a fan-favorite that players fell in love with. Abby kills Joel early on in The Last of Us Part II's story. Joel barely lasts the first two hoursof the game's run time. His death is brutal and happens right in front of Ellie, who watches Abby kill Joel and she begs for his life.

Joel's murder sets Ellie on a revenge path to kill Abby and most players are emotionally invested enough to agree with her decision. The irony is, that Ellie sets out on a destructive journey to kill Abby for the same reason Abby killed Joel. Fans immediately hated Abby because of Joel's death, but they root for Ellie to get her revenge.

Abby is a Phenomenal Character

Abby & Ellie are Two Sides of the Same Coin

Despite the fans' negative reaction to Abby, she's a phenomenal and complicated character. Abby was relatively young when Joel murdered her father (she's not much older than Ellie). Abby didn't just lose her father that day, though, she lost all the Fireflies that made up the community she grew up in. Joel saving Ellie's life also destroys Abby's life at the same time.

The end of the original game is a hard thing to process because Joel wasn't wrong about saving Ellie. At the same time, he wasn't right, either. Joel saves the life of his child. He stopped a group of people who wanted to kill an innocent girl on the off-chance that they might be able to come up with a cure. The doctors weren't even sure they'd be able to use Ellie to create a vaccine, so killing her was a gamble.

On the reverse side of that, Joel also butchered dozens of people to save Ellie. He also killed a group of skilled doctors who did have a chance to cure Cordyceps. Abby plotting her revenge makes sense, but killing Joel isn't the only defining trait of Abby's character. Abby is strong, smart, and cares about the people around her.

Players spend about half the game's playtime controlling Abby, so they see howinvaluable Abby is to the people around her. She always comes through for her friends and does everything she can to take care of her own. Abby isn't a bad person. As harsh as it sounds, killing Joel doesn't make her a bad person either.

To survive in a world like The Last of Us, sometimes people are forced to do horrible things. No one can survive without getting some blood on their hands. Joel and Ellie have taken so many lives for the sake of survival. There are multiple points in the story where Ellie authentically feels more villainous than Abby. While Ellie is consumed by her hatred for Abby, Abby learns that killing Joel will never bring her peace. She can't undo what she's done, but she can be better going forward.

One Small Change Could Have Made All the Difference

Letting Players Get to Know Abby Before Joel's Death Would Have Been Smarter

The Last of Us fans love Joel. That's a fact that has never changed, so naturally, they were going to respond poorly to Joel's death. The hate that Abby's character as a whole gets, though, is completely unwarranted. Abby and Ellie are so similar that it'shypocritical for people to say they love Ellie but hate Abby. Ellie literally hunts Abby down for the same reason Abby hunted Joel for so many years. Abby and Ellie are two sides of the same coin.

Abby is a cautionary tale for Ellie. She's supposed to be a look into Ellie's future if she continues down this destructive path of revenge. Revenge won't make her feel better, it'll only hurt the people around her. After Abby kills Joel, she loses so many people trying to fend off Ellie. Abby is where Ellie's heading. Abby could be standing in the mirror for Ellie because they're the same, Abby's only a few steps ahead.

It's almost comical how players rooted for Ellie to get her revenge on Abby, but they condemned Abby for the same action. The only difference is that fans had an emotional connection to Joel. Players kill Abby's father with their own hands at the end of the first game, so they feel the need to defend that decision. Abby was always destined to be controversial because she killed a character that fans not only loved but played for an entire game.

Naughty Dog could have avoided this controversy with a slight change in narrative, though. When first introduced to Abby, players can't help but sympathize with her. She's hunting down someone who harmed her and caused her great suffering. It's not until players realize that she's hunting Joel that they suddenly have an issue with it. If Naughty Dog gave players more time with Abby before killing Joel, it could have made all the difference. Instead of Joel's death happening at the beginning of the game, it could have happened later in the game.

With this setup, players would have several hours of playtime on Abby before she kills Joel. They would learn that she's hunting down a man who killed her father, a doctor who was trying to help people. The key to making this work is to elaborate on Abby's side of the story enough that players feel sympathy for her and even root for her to get her revenge. As they play her, they would slowly get hints that the man she's talking about is Joel, but it wouldn't be obvious right away.

By the time Abby finds and traps Joel, players wouldn't be blindsided too badly by the reveal. At the same time, they would have a far stronger connection to Abby. They would have several hours of getting to know her and her tragic story, allowing sympathy to grow. Players would want to root for her to get her revenge, just as they root for Ellie throughout the rest of the game. Getting the player attached to Abby before Joel's death was a key ingredient to avoiding the backlash.

Yes, some fans would still hate it no matter what, but many more players would be more conflicted. They'd be devastated that Joel died, but they would also have an easier time seeing Abby for the amazing and well-written character she is. It would also make theEllie vs Abby section of the game more emotionally charged because players have an emotional connection to both characters. This approach does take away from the shock value, but since players reacted so poorly to Joel's shocking and horrific death, that's not entirely a bad thing.

Despite the Backlash, The Last of Us Part II is Incredible

The Game's Story Made Risks That Paid Off

As mentioned, The Last of Us Part II is one of the most critically acclaimed and award-winning video games ever made. Even the hate that revolved around Abby's character wasn't enough to destroy the legacy of this game. It's just a shame that Naughty Dog could have avoided the worst of the backlash with one simple fix.

Sadly, The Last of Us Part II can't be changed now, but fans can hope that HBO's The Last of Us learns from the game's controversy. Hopefully, when Season 2 rolls around, the audience will spend much more time with Abby and have a chance to get to know her story before Joel's death.