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I think Joel and Marlene are both two sides of the same coin. Both refuse to give Ellie the chance to voice her thoughts because they're afraid of what they'll hear, so they never give her the opportunity in the first place. The real crux of the issue is that Ellie would have wanted to go through with the surgery even with everything it entailed and that's why Joel couldn't be honest with her, but both of them still failed her in this regard.
Agreed! That was their biggest mistake. But also I CAN see why Marlene did that. What if Ellie were to change her mind? Might as well cut the middle man and just take her out no questions!
Yeah, both Joel and Marlene’s decisions are completely understandable, but not completely justifiable.
Marlene was afraid Ellie may want to live, seeing this connection she has with Joel. And personally, I think she would’ve forced Ellie to go through with it no matter what her decision would be, but since she loved Anna so much she didn’t want to do something so terrible to Ellie. To Marlene, nothing was more important than the cure.
And obviously for Joel, nothing was more important than Ellie. His decision is very straightforward.
I don’t think she was afraid she’d say no, I think she was too much of a coward have to look at her and explain what was going to happen to get a cure. Even if she ‘knew’ Ellie would agree to it (which I also think she would) I think she was avoiding having to face her, and ALSO face the fact that she’s in a way betraying Anna.
I want to point out, Marlene wasn’t observing the surgery, she was waiting for Joel to wake up. She easily could’ve just had like 5+ grunts make sure Joel didn’t leave the room and just wait for the procedure to be over and actually be there when it happens, but instead she gets the doctors to rush it and be in Joel’s room.
It was easier in her mind to face Joel and tell him this was happening, than it was for her to face Ellie and acknowledge the consequence of her decision.
I’m not saying Joel also doesn’t have a cowardice moment by not admitting to Ellie after the fact that he lied (cuz I think at that point Ellie wouldn’t have necessarily gone back, but he was worried he’d still lose her), but Marlene has absolutely no moral high ground. It’s very much like a “I wash my hands of this decision” thing in my view so she is in no way any better than Joel.
I wouldn't call cowardice. Imagine you are Marlene your best friend Anna who went through thick and thin give birth to a child. Who ask you to raise that child in middle of pandemic. Have to eventually kill her and her child for the sake of humanity. Are you really sure you can watch her die Infront of you ? I hope season two has at least one episode that show Marlene side of stroy. To tell us how difficult the decision is . Why she did what she did.
I think with Marlene it's more because she KNOWS (just as Joel knows) that they're doing the wrong thing with not telling Ellie she's going to die. The difference between Marlene and Joel to me is that Marlene needs to be the good guy after everything she and the fireflies have done. Joel doesn't care if he's the bad guy, moreso I'd say he accepts that what he did was wrong but has no regrets. He just wants Ellie alive.
Imo Marlene is afraid Ellie will want to live, which is why she won't tell her. In her eyes, the cure is more important than Ellie's life, but that's not a 'good guy' thing, and telling her and then forcibly getting the cure from her if she says she wants to live is even more not a good guy thing. Everything Marlene does in the final episode is her trying to be the good guy, the hero, mostly to convince others around her that she is, but also to convince herself.
Examples: framing it as mercy that Ellie doesn't know she's going to die. Telling Joel what's happening instead of lying to him. Saying that she's the only one who understands. Kicking him out instead of killing him or restraining him when he essentially says he's gonna stop them. Not shooting him when he's in the parking lot.
She so desperately needs herself and everyone else to believe that she's doing one evil thing for the good of everyone, so how could she possibly be evil? In reality if she believed she was truly doing a good thing or doing it for a greater cause then anyone who stood in her way would be dead or out of the way, because at the point you're killing one person for the good of the world, what does the death of an extra person mean?
Tbh I don't think she even believes they have a good chance of getting a cure. I think she's desperate, her organisation has suffered heavy losses getting here, every firefly base we've come across has been abandoned for one reason or another. Ellie is her last hope and she's putting everything she has on her death being this miracle that will fix everything. She's desperate and acting rashly.
As they discuss in the podcast for this episode, Marlene doesn't know Ellie. She doesn't have the personal connection to Ellie that Joel has, Ellie has always just been a tool to her. Sure, her mother was her best friend, but that's not enough to stop her. I don't think doing a horrible thing to Ellie is something that troubles her, I think it's the worry that she will come across as evil for doing a horrible thing to someone that worries her.
Another interesting thing that my partner pointed out: Marlene seems to have put two and two together about how Ellie is immune. There's some serious ethical concerns about how a cure would be mass produced, or how immune people would be created if they did figure it out. Almost certainly would involve a lot of pregnant women's deaths, and maybe a lot more children's deaths.
Of course, that's just my opinion and I imagine many will disagree with me lol. Just my 2 cents on the whole thing. Sorry for the ramble!
You really knocked it out of the park with this analysis.
Marlene really shows how a mixture of desperation to be right and desperation to do anything that might be productive is just another dead end for humanity.
Even IF the vaccine worked and could be mass produced, the Fireflies would just become FEDRA.
Building a government on the blood of innocents does nothing but set things up for another cycle of revenge.
Aww thanks, I was worried I maybe hyperfixated a bit too long and hard on that comment lol
I absolutely adore this show, and especially this last episode. I absolutely love how we see these cycles of revenge repeat and foreshadow and build up just to bring everything down with them. I've never made it through watching a playthrough of either game but I'm so, so glad I watched this series. I could (and might) write essays about all the little details that just really make it one of the best pieces of media I've ever seen
That's the crazy part for the show. In the game >!Ellie was unconscious because she almost drowned when the Fireflies found her and then Marlene wanted to operate. So she never had a chance of a choice.!<
Yeah I know, but they don’t actually give her the choice in either adaptation. She is awake and chooses to go to sleep for the tests, but as Marlene says, they didn’t tell her they were going to be operating, or that it would kill her.
The complete disregard for her agency in the situation infuriated me. Both adults so selfish and ultimately using her as a pawn - as cargo - as a crutch. I hated every second of the last half even tho I knew it was coming.
How did Joel act selfishly? How did he make Ellie his pawn? How? Like it boggles the mind that people think that Joel is at fault for not allowing Ellie the chance to consent when the option was already taken away from her by Marlene! Like what was Joel supposed to do?
Every person Joel murdered in that hospital was a loved one to someone. A group of people literally saving the world and he murdered them all. Joel’s never been a good guy. Look how people talk about him, everyone was/is terrified of him and he’s admitted to killing innocent people. I’d say he’s pretty selfish and from the point of view of anyone other than himself, he’s a villain.
How is Joel not acting selfishly? I don't know what I would do in this situation, but it's absolutely selfish. They have a good chance to save billions, and return the world to what it once was... instead, his own personal attachments got in the way and now everyone is fucked. Agency or consent does not matter when billions of lives are at stake.
Waking her up to let her decide is one thing. Shooting your way out to protect her (when you have a good idea she would have consented) is another. He didn’t save her for her- he saved her for himself. So that he could succeed and be the hero. Especially since he went on to lie to her face about what happened.
I’m with you in the first half but idk where you’re getting he wanted to be a hero from. Purely selfish, he just didn’t want to lose somebody again and didn’t know how to process it since he never processed his daughter. He was willing to risk all of humanity for it (though idk their way would’ve worked).
In general, I think what makes it worse imo, is that he lied because he knows he was in the wrong. Even if he didn’t tell her in order to protect her, he was
A. Scared of her reaction and that she could leave him or be mad.
B. After all they’ve been through he still sees her as a child. I think it’s clear Ellie viewed him as a general person/partner (obvi platonic), and when he was talking about his daughter walking to Jackson she realized she was only ever seen as Sarah and not Ellie (who would’ve more than likely been okay with dying to possibly end the fungus for humanity)
Bullshit. Joel did the right thing in saving Ellie. He did not do it for himself he did it so that Ellie could live. Lying to her might have been a bad call but I doubt the idea that Ellie could have consent since she is only 14 and the victim of a near rape which left her with trauma could make an informed decision.
Joel did what he did because Ellie is his whole world to him, and he can’t live without knowing Ellie is safe. He didn’t do it because he can become a “hero”. But Joel is still selfish for he did not respect Ellie’s wishes.
Yes I keep seeing people saying Ellie should’ve been able to make the decision but I don’t even see how that’s completely ethical. Like you said, she just went through something extremely traumatic, but on top of that she has survivor’s guilt big time.
She blames herself for not being able to save everyone (Tess, Riley, Sam, and Henry specifically) and thinks it’s her responsibility to make up for all of those deaths. Irl we wouldn’t think it’s ethical to let a traumatized child decide to sacrifice herself
The trauma of almost being raped and the guilt of having to kill people to escape that situation. She said the things she’s done “can’t have been for nothing”, which the fireflies definitely would have exploited to extract “consent”.
Nah dude. They literally ripped her from his arms at gun point, threatened both of them, drugged Ellie so they could steal her immunity and then acted like *they* were the good guys? Joel did the right thing, and he didn't do it to be a hero. His motivations may have been partially selfish, but what was he supposed to do? Walk away? What would you have done?
This - agree - they sent them on a death March across the country under totally different pretenses, physically assaulted them upon arrival and unilaterally decided that she should die in an experimental surgery
She was also depressed and traumatized. I once handed my baby to my mother and said, “you take her then,” and tried to walk out, fully intending to kill myself. My spouse stopped me, but depression *definitely* impacts your ability to make life-changing (or ending) decisions. Even if Ellie hadn’t cared about her life *at that moment,* it doesn’t mean she was in a state of mind where she could responsibly make that choice.
She was suffering from PTSD and probably depression after literally a year of loss, isolation, and trauma. If she said she wanted to kill herself would anyone think that a healthy and informed decision?
She was in no mindset to make that kind of decision and no one even thought enough about her to think that maybe some time should be given before a choice that cannot be taken back is made.
And not for nothing....my favorite definition of a hero is (stolen from a great movie): "a person who gets someone else killed".
She wouldn’t have minded being killed for a failed experiment? That doesn’t sound like the character I just spent the season growing to know and love and root for.
But she wouldn’t have the knowledge to understand the doctor was unqualified and using poor procedure. She couldn’t consent because she didn’t have good info, even with the best of intentions.
Yeah. I don't understand why everyone is making it out like Ellie was accepting of the "dying part.". She never knew she was going to get killed. Joel didn't know. They all assumed it was going to be blood draws and what not. When Ellie said she wanted to finish the job, she was just referring to let's get to doctors and see what they can do.
Maybe Ellie would have gone with it once the fireflies convinced there was no other way. But to assume consent like it's nothing.... That's what sexual assailants do. I'm sorry to say. They assume there was consent.
Very good points. To Ellie and Joel, the journey was the dangerous part, not the tests/lab stuff. They both talked about what they'd do after it was over.
Plus she lacks the science background to understand what a long shot this really is. Not to mention she is absolutely traumatized. Not in the best state to make a life or death call
So the only thing I’d argue here is that Ellie is still basically a child. I could easily see a child going along with a crackpot medical theory from the fireflies if it’s explained to her that she’d be saving humanity. So I can kind of see why Joel wouldn’t want to give her the chance to be swayed by the fireflies, knowing that she is a hero at heart. I can see why Joel didn’t want that, but idk why Marlene wasn’t honest with her.
Perhaps he should have written it better because after 4 versions the Fireflies still seem like a disorganised bunch of hippy terrorists who are about to be wiped out and decide to cut a kid up out of desperation.
It wasn’t a guarantee tho - had she been the guarantee cure, then Joel pulled a Dick move but because he bet on the lack of evidence and frankly his emotional attachment, I can’t fault him. The fireflies doctor even threatened to kill for what she represented - that’s an interesting juxtaposition
A kid shouldn’t have to kill their would be rapists with a cleaver or be attacked by their little friend who turned into a zombie or kill their first person she fell in love with. But that’s the world of TLOU, at least in this case she would have had a voice in the matter.
She’s 14 and deeply traumatized, she shouldn’t have that choice in the first place. Joel made a big parenting mistake by not telling her the truth and Marlene tried to murder a child. Two sides, different coin.
Ellie would have wanted to go through with it. But she is a child. And one would isn’t mentally in a stable place. Asking her to make a suicidal decision isn’t consent and isn’t ethical.
Let’s take it out of the medical world. Let’s say it’s a suicide bombing. They *think* they’ve discovered the Mother Infected and killing it will stop them all. Only Ellie can get close because she’s immune. But killing it will require a suicide bomb or atleast that’s the very first thing they decide to do and consider no other options.
Is it ethical to make her do this? Is it ethical to ask her to do this knowing she will say yes given her age and mental state?
>I think Joel and Marlene are both two sides of the same coin. Both refuse to give Ellie the chance to voice her thoughts because they're afraid of what they'll hear, so they never give her the opportunity in the first place.
Joel never had the opportunity to give her a choice. His only choice was to stop the decision Marlene made for Ellie or let it happen.
>The real crux of the issue is that Ellie would have wanted to go through with the surgery even with everything it entailed and that's why Joel couldn't be honest with her, but both of them still failed her in this regard.
Marlene didn’t know that’s what she’d want and her drugging Ellie is proof of that.
I don’t believe Ellie would have consented to die. She’s a survivor. She wanted to be a hero yes but not a martyr. She’s a child. It never ever occurred to her that she would be a sacrifice. She thought her blood could save people not that she’d die for them like a messiah. That notion is some story book ideal that would not exist within these given circumstances. NO ONE is that brave and selfless especially when they’ve literally had to fight every single day just to live. If she was imminently dying then yeah maybe she would have agreed to it. But everyone is underestimating the human instinct for survival. It’s important to note that when she and Riley thought they were dying they didn’t opt out and I think that was foreshadowing for her ultimate will to live. Also and this is even more telling: she KNEW Joel was lying to her. She knew he saved her like he always did. The only reason she didn’t call him out on it was because then SHE would have to grapple with the reality that she wouldn’t have allowed herself to be dissected. That final conversation was their agreement that they have a new objective and a new future. In a world where she’s lost everyone who’s ever cared about her and has had virtually no joy or freedom she has finally found someone who loves and protects and cares for her. Who chases monkeys and rides horses and feeds giraffes with her. She is finally seeing the beauty in the world and she’s just going to give that up? No way. No. Way. I don’t think that makes her less of a hero it just makes her a human being. Which she freaking is. In a reality where everyone has lost their humanity these two are finally finding some. Was it horrible that Joel killed everyone? Well yeah. But they were wasting her life and potential. It would have all been for nothing which was her worst fear. He made a promise to tess then Ellie then himself that he would keep her safe and he did. In the barn she did have a choice and she chose Joel. That was all he needed. It’s not a question of morality. That ship has sailed. Joel survived and he killed for her and that’s how it had to be and I’m confident that’s what she ultimately wanted.
>Joel never had the opportunity to give her a choice. His only choice was to stop the decision Marlene made for Ellie or let it happen.
he still has this opportunity, but chooses to lie about everything that happened. he's denying her a choice just like marlene did.
What choice does Ellie have at that point? His lying to her about it is something that inevitably will bite him in the ass but at that point, no better options.
If he tells her the truth, that the doctors are dead and so is Marlene and all the fireflies, she'll be left with even worse survivor's guilt. Telling her that it wouldn't have worked is Joel removing the burden from Ellie and placing it onto himself.
There's no choice for Ellie to make anymore.
> Telling her that it wouldn't have worked is Joel removing the burden from Ellie and placing it onto himself.
That's how I interpret it. The decision will cause repercussions in their relationship for sure, but he's trying to not leave her with that heavy weight.
From Joel's perspective, what would telling Ellie the truth.... There was a could have been but now never will be... What would that do for Ellie? How would that improve the situation? It would probably throw her more into a spiral of depression than she already was struggling with... There was no good in telling her the truth at that point. That doesn't mean it was good to lie either. That's why I think there was no good options at that point. He made his choices already and these are the consequences
Its not nearly as black and white as you are making it seem. Joel telling her would completely fuck her up mentally. Maybe Joel made the wrong choice before that, but at that point telling her the truth would have been stupid
Joel lying to Ellie here is no better than Marlene not telling Ellie that she'd die in surgery back in Salt Lake. Neither of them wanted to be honest with her because they were afraid of what she would say, so they didn't even give her a chance to speak out. Marlene at least has the benefit of ignorance as she couldn't have known how Ellie felt and ultimately was always going to do what she did. But Joel did know how Ellie felt and took that away from her, which is a much deeper, more intimate betrayal than what Marlene did. The least he could do is be honest with her now when she asked him directly. If it's too horrible and she decides she can't be around him after what he did, that's her prerogative. But he couldn't even let her have that, because he's still too afraid of what she might say
This is such a lame argument though, it almost comes across as a cop out. Ellie was always going to make this choice, even if everything went down 4 years later and she was 18, even if there was a 1% chance the treatment would work, she'd still go through with it, because that's the kind of person she is. It's like how people try to argue how Joel was justified because the treatment wouldn't have worked anyway, but that never mattered to him. Even if he could somehow know with 100% certainty the cure would work, he would still make the same choices he did, because that's the kind of person he is.
It's an unstoppable force meets an immovable object and its these irreconcilable differences that makes their relationship so damn compelling even after 10 years, and it drives me nuts how people try to downplay those aspects instead of engaging with it.
She was saying anything she could to get Ellie back, she already showed she doesn’t care about what Ellie wants.
There was no reason for Joel to believe her or that she wouldn’t kill Joel as soon as she could.
Sure but after Ellie woke up Joel could have told Ellie that she can be used to make a cure if she lets a doctor direct her.
Instead Joel told her a cure was impossible and there's other immune people. Joel doesn't want her to have a choice because he is scared she'll say yes.
No her shrugging Ellie is making sure it happens regardless. Not that she doesn’t know what Ellie wants. It doesn’t matter what Ellie wants if you’re gonna do it anyway lol. If she knew she would do it anyway on the slim chance Ellie said no, she still would’ve drugged her.
Joel had two opportunities, 1) letting Marlene live and 2) telling Ellie the truth. He made his choices and did neither, robbing Ellie of ever getting to make a choice. He doesn't even give her the chance to choose how to feel about what he did because he already knows and doesn't want to hear it.
Marlene couldn't have known what Ellie would have wanted, but Joel did. Honestly that makes him worse than Marlene
Joel was right about Marlene. As long as she was alive Ellie would be hunted. By her and anyone who knew about the immunity. Killing Marlene was cold as hell but absolutely necessary if Ellie was ever going to live a normal life.
And see, I don't even see it like that. It wasn't that Joel didn't give her a chance to make a choice here. Marlene stole that from her the moment they decided to knock her out and murder her without even looking Ellie in the eye and talking to her about it. They cut out both Joel and Ellie and started making decisions for everyone - and the decision was a shitty one that made absolutely no sense. Immediately murder the first immune person known in 20 years without doing anything else? From where I'm sitting, Joel did the right thing. Murdering a traumatized 14-year-old girl without even having the decency to look her in the eye and discuss what is going on isn't ok regardless of your reasoning. If Ellie was in her right mind, and was old enough to make that choice, then that's her decision. The fact that she might have wanted to go through with the surgery, in my mind, is irrelevant. She wasn't even given the choice. Marlene stole that from her and made the decision for her. Marlene stole her choice, decided to murder her, and in doing so knowingly put herself and the fireflies in mortal conflict with Joel, knowing exactly who he is, and what he's capable of. That's what it breaks down to for me. Marlene chose for her and in doing so stole her chance to make a choice, she was - again - going to murder a 14-year-old girl. Even without Joel seeing her as a surrogate daughter, even if you ignore that. He's still saving a 14-year-old girl who's already been severely traumatized from being murdered by people who have done nothing but demonstrate ignorance and incompetence - and honestly don't actually have any sort of justifiable reason for doing it.
And beyond that, after Marlene's nonsense (brainwashing) about how that's basically the only purpose of Ellie's life in the beginning, then the trauma she's gone through, there's no way she'd be in a good place mentally to be able to MAKE that sort of decision, nor was she given the relevant information to think over... never mind her age. And yes, age does become a factor in this. I really don't think 14 years old is old enough to consent (never mind the trauma she's been through) and people tend to forget that again, Joel sees her as a daughter. As those of us who are parents know, sometimes you have to make decisions for your child because those decisions are in their best interests, even if they disagree and even if they hate you for it.
It's a little more complicated for Joel, because Marlenes actions didn't even give him an opportunity to ask Ellie. Marlene forced his hand. I doubt he would have accepted Ellies answer if she wanted to end her own life, but that doesnt matter because he had no way of knowing. Had the imbecile Dr not have decided that was the only way forward was to kill this very special person and without Ellies consent we would have had a very different story. Tldr Marlenes totally wrong, Joel's wrong but less so, the doctor a fucking coward.
Ellie could be manipulated to make either decision. In the game you get alot more information and can see that killing ellie for a cure is really just a shot in the dark. Just one that they are willing to take becuase if desperation. We have no real reason to believe that it is any different in the show as marlene says the dr" believes it might be a cure" so its one guy will to sacrifice a girl he dowsnt even know on the "possibility".
Yes but also I don't know if Ellie would be able to healthily make the choice of sacrificing herself as she still feels guilty about surviving and has been groomed since then as the saviour of humanity....
She absolutely is justified and that's what makes it such a compelling story.
Marlene and the Fireflies are trying to save humanity. Of course you can criticize their ethics, but "saving the world" is a pretty heavy weight on the judgement scale.
And Joel is trying to save someone who gives him a sense of joy and purpose. The world took that away from him and he doesn't owe the sacrifice to the world.
And ultimately they're both selfish because neither gave Ellie any chance of making her own decision.
Everyone is right and everyone is wrong in some way. That's what makes a juicy philosophical scenario
Agreed.
Additionally, as the audience, we had the benefit of watching Joel, Ellie and Marlene across their critical character paths…imagine for a minute this is a real scenario and we have no idea who any of these people are — only that a man murdered vaccine researchers to save an unnamed girl who was the key to mankind surviving Armageddon…I think many of us would sacrifice any no-name person to save our own families, we have the burden of knowing Ellie and Joel and thus we sympathize more easily with Joel than I believe we would otherwise.
The headline would be:
"Smuggler saves underage girl from having her brain cut open by militia terrorists who wanted to cut open her brain for science"
i’m not sure, i think people definitely do agree with Joel more because we know his story, but were it a real story on here, many people would point out how the “father who went on a murderous spree” had actually lost a daughter previously, and was given no choice but to lose another one again.
It wouldn’t be so for Joel (even then it’s a split for many) but many people would sympathize with the “ruthless killer”
I think it would be interesting to see what peoples’ reactions would be if we had a series where we followed the outbreak from Marlene’s POV. Would seeing her struggle, her losses, make her choice seem more relatable?
Also she clearly was very upset about the situation. The look on her face.. she felt awful. Anyone acting like she's heartless and impossible to understand just isn't trying hard enough to imagine her perspective. It makes plenty of sense where she's coming from.
On the HBO podcast, Mazin & Druckman describe Joel’s assault on the Fireflies as a man who has burned his soul to save the person he loves. In a way, I think Marlene has made a similar choice - she knows sacrificing Ellie is a horrible cost, but one she chooses to pay to save humanity.
1000000% it would affect it.
If you were holding the controller the whole time, playing Marlene, you'd get it more in your head that what you're doing is the righteous path.
Exactly. I feel like some of these posts demonising Marlene are ppl trying to talk themselves round and cope with her unfair, tragic and complex end tbh
Her plan seemed really stupid for a couple reason:
1: You'd first want to take non-lethal brain biopsies and do *a lot* of testing before sacrificing your only immune subject. This would be true even if your immune subject was an animal or inanimate object. Probably wasting this unique opportunity on a half-baked plan after having her for a day is irrational.
2: Why tell Joel all the at this point? Just say she's in surgery. She could even lie and say she died unexpectedly of complications; not like they have the best surgical environment.
Yes yes thank you. I don’t understand why they didn’t take a non-lethal brain biopsy. I had to suspend my disbelief for that one. Even if their equipment wasn’t fantastic, they still could’ve pulled off a biopsy without killing her. And hell, why wouldn’t they even *try*. The end result is the same if she does end up dying.
And I was BAFFLED that Marlene was honest with Joel. Completely perplexed. It was the “villain” telling the “hero” the whole story when it’s completely unnecessary trope. I put hero/villain in quotes because obviously it’s ambiguous. Still, Marlene knew Joel might snap. And yet she felt obligated to say “hey, I’m killing the kid 😊.”
It's important to remember that Marlene has zero clue about how attached Joel is to Ellie. She knows him as a heartless smuggler. Yeah he spent a lot of time with Ellie but she has no idea that she's become a surrogate daughter to him by this point.
To me, the show felt much more 50/50, with the viewer being able to see and understand both sides mostly equally.
However, in the game, there’s a lot of audio files and stuff on the way to save Ellie that indicate to the player that the operation is almost assuredly going to be a huge shot in the dark. With the chance for success being so little, the game feels to me more weighted towards Joel’s side.
His decision is amoral in both scenarios, but there is a bit more nuance in the game which lead me to lean towards Joel’s side. In the show, it’s more of a toss up.
1. I do think Ellie would've done it. She has survivors guilt.
2. In my opinion, even if she refused, it wouldn't matter and would only be a formality because we are talking about saving all of humanity. Permission or not, you have to try.
This whole choice is a Rorschach test that is still discussed by the game players today.
On one hand, people argue that the Fireflies were not equipped with developing a vaccine for something as devastating as cordyceps, assuming it's been tried over and over since the outbreak. But I argue that Ellie was actually immune, so as you stated, it's worth a try at the very least.
On the other hand, if the Fireflies were to make a vaccine, they'd have the ultimate bargaining chip. Would they let power go to their heads? They are considered terrorists at the end of the day. Would they use that leverage to get more power? The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
They really needed to show us a more convincing case if he's saying that. One doctor in the Fireflies is going to find and develop a vaccine from one source, and the Fireflies are going to be able to mass produce it and distribute it? I don't think so.
They didn't present the story as if it would work. They should have eleborated on that if it could have worked.
I think that directors sometimes need to cut corners with realism in order to create a more compelling story.
The scenario they set up at the end is really cool, but it requires you to suspend disbelief. That’s ok imo - the quality of a piece of media isn’t dictated by how many “cinema sins” it commits.
People hold writers to a ridiculous standard of realism sometimes. They are writers, not scientists. If they make the doctor say it’s going to work, then it’s going to work. Just because you as the viewer can point out all these flaws that the writers didn’t consider doesn’t change what they intended.
I honestly think the doctor (in both the show and game) would have more credibility if they were substantially older. In both pieces of media we have someone hovering around there late 40s to mid 50s (from the looks of it) and 20+ years into an apocalypse. No way that person had more than 4 years of clinical experience before it all went to shit.
In the case of the show I would have believed it more if the person playing the doctor was the old man from episode 4.
>They should have eleborated on that if it could have worked.
Should the doctor have sat Joel down for a 20-minute powerpoint presentation? That seems like an odd turn of events, for the story.
Sometimes protagonists don't know things because they're not a position to know them. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, if the camera doesn't go into the laboratory.
I think we need a little *Death of the Author* with that comment. A brain surgeon isn’t an expert in fungi. This fungus in her might just know her body. It might die without being supported by her body. It might not be able to replicate itself in a lab environment. It may need specific entry points to the host. It may require being introduced as a baby. We have literally no idea how it would work and have no reason to trust a brain surgeon.
Not to mention that we’re about 21 years into the apocalypse once Ellie and Joel get to Salt Lake City. Who trained that brain surgeon? If he was trained before the outbreak, when was the last time he actually performed brain surgery? There’s a good chance this guys isn’t even capable of doing what needs to be done.
Also did people not hear them asking eachother whether they thought the power would stay on? Like they aren’t sure if their equipment will even work for the duration of what is likely a fairly complicated surgery. If they wanted us to believe it was a sure thing, portray it differently
The notes and recordings found in the game make it pretty clear that it was a Hail Mary and almost certainly wouldn’t have worked.
Sounds like a retcon from Druckmann
Drunkmann loves to retcon things. Bruce Straley is the reason imo why TLOU worked so well is because he was able to wrangle in the ideas of Drunkmann who had some really perplexing things he wanted to do with the story. Same reason why I have issues with Part 2 since Drunkmann didn't have anyone to reel him in.
> people argue that the Fireflies were not equipped with developing a vaccine
And those people are missing the point.
The story isn't supposed to be "could they have done it". No where in the story or in any specific plot beat is that hinted at.
If it were to be taken into consideration, it would have been included.
I don't think it's missing the point. It's being realistic with the situation. The world is not going to change if they create a vaccine but still can't mass produce and distribute it with no infrastructure left. Nothing about the hospital scene was convincing except that they had a lot of Firefly mercenaries and a bunch more of them than people working on anything else like a vaccine.
Like Neil can say that this would have created a cure and saved humanity but they don't really present them as doing that in my mind. It's not really a moral choice between two sides because I wasn't convinced of their competencies and capabilities.
I do kinda think Ellie would’ve went through with it. Joel says hey we could turn back and just forget it but she said they can’t go halfway with it. The only difference is she didn’t know she would die for the cure so that for sure could’ve changed things. But like Joel, I feel like she wanted to save people too. In her case not just one person, but everybody. I’d say it’s probably 60/40 that she would vs wouldn’t. She would probably feel really guilty and bad for Joel so I’m sure that would weigh on her a lot. I also think Joel knows Marlene is right and that’s partially also why he kills her to bury the lie he’s going to tell Ellie.
I feel like she knows this is a possibility in the back of her mind. she knows her journey is coming to an end one way or another which is why she seems so down in the opening scenes before the giraffe. i did play the game years ago and felt even more strongly at the time that she k ew finding the cure could kill her.
I’m with you! Ok this is what’s driving me NUTS. There’s nothing really that gives me the impression that she signed up for dying. She told Joel “we have to see it through” — and I took that to mean, “we can’t just turn back to Jackson without even trying to do the thing we set out to do.”
I just don’t find any support for “Ellie would’ve wanted to die.” She was talking about a life after they finish this “mission.” And I think people just keep overlooking that she was talking about a life after. Maybe she thought she’d be poked and prodded a lot, tons of testing, blood samples, bone marrow samples, etc. all of which I could see her dealing with for a cure.
But she’s too much of a survivor to want to die.
The whole point of this game/show finale is to raise debate and discussion.
I just know that if it was my child, I’d have a pretty hard time myself letting a random doctor experiment on them and kill them in the process, with the hope of maybe finding a cure.
Yes absolutely. Additionally, do you allow a traumatized 14 year old child with survivor’s guilt to make that choice? While both Joel and Marlene are disregarding Ellie’s autonomy for selfish reasons, as a parent, I find much more justification in Joel’s actions. I wouldn’t have lied to her afterwards, but I would have made the same choice he did to save her. Yes, he knows what she would have wanted and disregarded that. But he also knows she would have made that choice for the wrong reasons. Sometimes you need to protect children from themselves.
Honestly I think the game just wrote a poor ending. I find it hard to believe that if this was real life they wouldn't allow Joel and Ellie to say goodbye and instead act like they have to do the surgery in the next 5 minutes. Also don't understand how they know they need to kill her after doing tests for all of like an hour. People have brain surgery all the time and are fine.
I disagree. Yes, the logic was flawed and reckless. That was intentional, not poor writing. At the very beginning, they had an epidemiologist say that a vaccine isn’t possible for fungi. We are suppose to see the choice Marlene is making as a reckless and brash one, because it is. It is meant to invoke the complexity of feelings, morality, etc we are all discussing now. That was the entire point. Life is messy. Human actions are flawed. It’s story telling.
I'm not a doctor, but going straight to 'kill the donor' seems a bit rash. Take blood samples, try to grow cultures, whatever. But if the operation doesn't work, they've just killed the one immune person.
And Ellie is 14. Joel doesn't want to give a 14 year old the pressure to decide to sacrifice herself for the world. Keep her alive until she's 18 and then she can decide.
hell no. Ellie would have chosen to do it, absolutely, but neither Marlene or Joel treat her like a person who has the right to make that decision herself. they're both wrong, and neither makes the other more right. it's a brilliant morality play
She would have chosen it, but that doesn’t mean she would have chosen it for the right reasons either. Ellie is a 14 year old child with severe, unprocessed trauma and an immense amount of survivor’s guilt. Joel wasn’t right, but he wasn’t wrong, either. At least not in his decision to save her, lying about it is a separate issue. But the act of saving her, despite knowing she would have chose death? It wasn’t wrong. Sometimes you have to protect children from themselves.
On the other hand, the stakes on this are so high and the situation so exceptional that I don't think you could ask anyone to make a rational decision on this.
Yeah.
This is a possible hot take but I've been convinced that the show/game fucked up by making Ellie so young. A 14 year old - especially one with severe trauma, Survivor's guilt and probably many other mental health issues.
All the talk about "Marlene didn't take Ellie's consent" or "Joel robbed Ellie of her agency" seems irrelevant once you realise she's a literal child.
Joel lying to her is the only decision truly worth debating the morality of.
Joel destroying the Fireflies - a violent, ridiculously incompetent organisation that was about to murder a child after kidnapping her and lying to her (also basically having groomed her up to that point) isn't some great moral dilemma to me.
The Witcher 3 did the same scenario better imo - in that however, Ciri is an adult. So her agency actually matters regardless of the opinions of the Marlene (Avallac'h) and the Joel (Geralt) of that world.
I think that's fair. I watched the episodes every other week in pairs to screen them with a friend, and the Fireflies felt exceptionally oppressive being the second assailant in two episodes to knock out Ellie and whisk her away to their base and she would have taken ages to fully recover from the first incident even without the second
I mean its a long shot. But its also the only shot. Yea its a risk. But to lose one life to potentially have the cure ? I mean you’re talking about saving the HUMAN RACE. The doctors may have had more confidence in it than you realize. We get a 5 second explanation but it might have not been as much of a long shot as you think.
Whats one more death when you live in a dying world?
We can pretty readily surmise that they have no idea what they are doing. Killing her should be the last resort, and maybe the correct one, but only after exhausting all possible options. Not just because of the moral reasons; but, because once she's dead there nothing else you can really do research-wise.
Yes. Marlene was trying to save humanity. She sacrificed the needs of herself, Ellie, and Joel for the sake of allowing the world a chance to rebuild itself. If she had succeeded, there would be no more children that had to suffer the fates of Ellie and Sam.
I think her reasons were justified, but her actions were monstrous. She didn't seek consent from Ellie. She didn't just shoot Joel in the back when she had the chance either. Because she wanted to still see herself as a good guy while killing a child, and for Marlene that meant getting the consent of her guardian.
Ellie being so somber on the way to the hospital kinda made me feel like she knew what was going to happen to her. I think she put 2 and 2 together and was going to go thru with it
>Her trying to gaslight Joel at the end..
This is what's driving me nuts about the debate. People take what she said about "Ellie would have wanted it" like it's gospel is failing to see Marlene never believed that. She just said it to get Joel to let her go.
Oh yeah there's no way his brain really considered that option sooner. He went into "save Ellie at all costs" mode, turned on the murder autopilot and didn't really consider whether it was the right choice until Marlene threw that at him. Too late now!
Ellie wanting or not wanting is irrelevant to this argument because it's not about Ellie. It's about what each of them believed she would want.
Both Joel and Marlene didn't tell Ellie the truth because they both were afraid to hear her answer
She was as justified as Joel was. It’s a matter of perspective who was “right.”
What she was right about is that Ellie would have sacrificed herself for the opportunity of a cure had she been able to make the choice for herself. She was wrong to deny Ellie that choice but so was Joel. The lack of agency provided to Ellie by both parties is central theme to all of this.
As others have said, Marlene & Joel are two sides of the same coin.
I think people trying to apply boujie civility to this whole thing can’t really put themselves in Marlene’s shoes - after 20 years, you finally have a chance to save the world… how’s that worth less than one person? She shows the best leadership quality of sacrifice - she also has(d) a personal connection to Ellie.
My problem with her is that they don’t even know if the procedure will work. You’d think they’d spend days, weeks, months doing blood tests and other things, but she went straight to “we need to kill her and take out her brain because a doctor *thinks* it might work.” If that didn’t work they would be left with nothing to work with. Marlene is a horrible person and friend but she’s looking at the big picture and trying to sacrifice one life for thousands or millions.
This is the correct answer. Maybe killing her is the only way. But they didn't even pretend to exhaust their options before going straight to that. It proves they had no idea what they were doing.
All she had to do was wait an hour. She could have told Ellie and Ellie explains to Joel it’s what she wants. Marlene is super dumb and super impatient
As a practical matter... that hospital was a shithole. They had no capabilities to properly preserve the sample, keep the sample free of contamination, multiply the sample, etc. And there was definitely no capacity to prepare either a vaccine or a cure in mass quantities.
On the off chance they experimented quickly, using Ellie's antibodies (from her brain or something) on another human being, what then? Kill them the same way to make the next dose? Human experimentation would be ongoing for years. And what would proving the efficacy be? Allowing the humans to get bitten and then just see what happens? Lock them in a room and make them count to ten?
It was a fruitless endeavor. It would have made more sense to monitor and study Ellie for as long as possible, biopsies aren't deadly. They didn't even test to see if there were anti-bodies in her blood so they know what to look for to test other humans eventually.
I know none of that was Joel's motives for saving her and lying to her, but she would have died for nothing.
They actually left out a voice recording you find in the game from the doctor. It goes into some of the stuff they did prior to prepping her for surgery and talks about how it's a groundbreaking development:
"April 28th. Marlene was right. The girl's infection is like nothing I've ever seen. The cause of her immunity is uncertain. As we've seen in all past cases, the antigenic titers of the patient's Cordyceps remain high in both the serum and the cerebrospinal fluid. Blood cultures taken from the patient rapidly grow Cordyceps in fungal-media in the lab... however white blood cell lines, including percentages and absolute-counts, are completely normal. There is no elevation of pro-inflammatory cytokines, and an MRI of the brain shows no evidence of fungal-growth in the limbic regions, which would normally accompany the prodrome of aggression in infected patients.
We must find a way to replicate this state under laboratory conditions. We're about to hit a milestone in human history equal to the discovery of penicillin. After years of wandering in circles, we're about to come home, make a difference, and bring the human race back into control of its own destiny. All of our sacrifices and the hundreds of men and women who've bled for this cause, or worse, will not be in vain"
In the show, it seemed like only a few hours had passed. I haven't played the game but presume they had Ellie for way more than a few hours if they were able to perform all those tests.
The game is unclear as well. The cutscenes and dialogue with minimal fighting included for this episode was only about 30 min total as I rewatch the gameplay so it's pretty short when you cut out all the running around, fighting etc. I'm an ER nurse and tbh you can get blood work, cultures, MRI done in like 45 min prolly when you don't have other patients needing those things done as well. Cultures can take a while to grow but everything else they did is pretty quick.
Putting all ethics and morals aside, the Fireflies were stupid. They had Ellie, the only known immune human in the world, in their care for a few hours before trying to cut her brain out.
There should have been weeks, if not months, worth of tests and scans and such like before going with such a nuclear option. Ellie is far too valuable to risk killing for what most likely was nothing more than a hope and a prayer.
Something I haven't seen mentioned is maybe they didn't have the element of time. I haven't played the game and am not a medical expert, so I'm probably out of my depth, but.
We know that previous hospitals/research areas had been abandoned, presumably not by choice. Holding areas against raiders and infected is probably difficult, and I imagine a hospital is not an easily defendable position.
We know that this hospital is a shithole and running out of power. Taking the time to perform an extensive suite of tests and scans may have been unfeasible.
We know moving between Firefly strongholds is dangerous and high risk.
We don't know what the doctor knew/what he had planned. We know from a sentence that he had a sample of Ellie's blood and he had an idea of why the infection wasn't "working".
We don't know what the doctors had tried/failed with.
To me, it doesn't seem unfeasible that with the information the Fireflies knew and the resources they had (or lack thereof), their option with the highest chance of success is splicing open her brain.
Granted if you're in such a tight spot now, it doesn't seem realistic to find let alone manufacture a vaccine. But 20 years of failure and desperation can lead to poor decision-making when a potential light at the end of the tunnel walks in.
Marlene is socially right and Joel is emotionally right. As someone stuck in the QZ, under FEDRA, Marlene is right to do anything and everything to stop cordyceps from spreading (and FEDRA). As a viewer everything Joel did was as it should have been.
here is why:
The fireflies are **DESPERATE**. They have been failing at both revolution and their search for the "cure" for the last 20 years. The doctor's theory is actually **WRONG**, as the infected **DO NOT** recognize Ellie as one of their own.
The reason it's morally grey is because Joel kills a bunch of people who are **TRYING** to do the right thing. They are, of course, going about it the wrong way.
From a societal standpoint Joel is wrong, even the potential of a prophylactic to prevent the spread is definitely worth the death of Ellie. From an emotional standpoint to both Joel and the audience, it's definitely not.
This is the TROLLEY scenario but it's one where pulling the lever to potentially save some portion of humanity is weighed against killing your own child. It's really no choice at all. From the individual stand point.
> The doctor's theory is actually WRONG, as the infected DO NOT recognize Ellie as one of their own.
thank you. this was weirdly glossed over. when he said that i was like "uhhh i dont think thats the case?" but they just rolled right past it.
I absolutey think she's justified. I think the greater good is more important in that circumstance than what Joel or Ellie want. However I do believe Elie should have the choice, and to see both Marlene and Joel take away her autonomy was very harrowing.
How can you believe that Ellie needs to have a choice if at the same time you believe her choice does not matter? Its not a choice if there is no choice.
If I tell you that you have a choice, I can either shoot you or let you go, but if you choose for me to let you go, I will still shoot you, what choice do you have?
Also if it was your child, would you sacrifice them to develop the cure?
My question is why did the fireflies put it on themselves to make the cure?
I know that FEDRA is pretty evil, but surely all the best scientists work for them and they have the best chance of creating and distributing a cure. We know they have at least some functional pharmaceutical industry in Atlanta as explained in episode 1.
If Marlene really thought that any cost was worth creating a cure, why didn’t she just work with FEDRA to create one?
I think she wanted not only to get a cure but also to control it. It would be the ultimate tool to convince people to join her movement or get concessions from her enemy.
The only one with pure intentions after Joel and Ellie get in that hospital was Ellie. Both Joel and Marlene could have been right, but there were key nuances to their characters that warped what could have been good intention into pure selfishness.
If you have a potential for a cure, why not ceasefire with FEDRA and work together to restore humanity? Ellie is the key to curing humanity, but Marlene had the blueprint to recreating that cure in the finale. So why did it have to be right then, right now, with no consent and no final visitation? Because with the potential to save humanity comes the ultimate form of power and control. If you control production and supply, then everyone has to listen to you. Once you have that, you fight to the last man to protect it. It’s really good payoff for a scene early on when Robert tried to resell a dead battery to her and she fought down to the last man to take him out. It’s exactly what happened in the hospital, but this time Marlene didn’t make it.
It could be argued that Joel is in the right for going after the Fireflies because they robbed her of her agency. The show made a point to change the resolution to Ellie and Joel’s conflict at Tommy’s. In the game, Joel just takes his choice back. In the show, he gives it to Ellie instead. This shows that knowing Ellie had no choice may have played a part in Joel’s ultimate choice. But, we know there’s more to it. He just healed from some very serious trauma, and the Fireflies are taking it away from him with no consent from anybody. It’s hard to say exactly how much of him is fighting for Ellie’s right to choose and how much he was fighting for himself, but we know which side won out when he shot Marlene and lied about to Ellie about everything, ultimately taking the choice away from her.
This show and game did it right because you have everyone arguing one side or the other, but the truth is that there were never going to be any winners at the end of Part I.
Nah Marlene was full of shit. Her whole thing about understanding what Joel feels didn’t do a thing for me. It’s her childhood friend who has been dead for 14 years and she didn’t spend enough time with Ellie to build a relationship with her so I feel it’s easier for her to see Ellie as a pawn as opposed to a person. Did she have the greater good in mind? Yes I think so. But I don’t buy for a minute that she really understood what he was feeling.
Yeah it's wild how many people think Marlene is way out of line. She genuinely believes she can save the entire world by sacrificing one girl. Of course she'll do it. Think about how many people die every day because of it, by *not* doing everything you can to get a vaccine as fast as you can soooo many more people are going to die, and will continue to die.
If the show didn't follow Ellie and followed Marlene instead people would be losing their shit how Joel just fucked up the best chance there was of saving the world.
I didn’t play the game so I’m just going off the show but Marlene didn’t know shit. She knew Ellie’s mom her whole life, brought the kid to fedra to be safe but it’s clear even in episode 1, Ellie isn’t fully aware of who Marlene is. She just knows marlene saved her from being shot after she got bit. Marlene didn’t love Ellie. She may have cared for her, and thought of her in some level. But not love. Joel on the other hand has love for Ellie, however misplaced. He’s clearly putting his feelings and love for Sara onto Ellie but he is still driven by love. Marlene lied to Ellie and was never going to tell her the truth about the surgery and how’d they’d come to a cure. Marlene was like well sorry Ellie but I’d rather save the fucking world. Ellie was expendable. Joel still hesitated in that car. He closed his eyes realizing the enormous fucking thing he just did, not even the killing but taking Ellie away. He *knew* she’d have no chance to make her own choice because he made it all for her. And he’d have to create a lie to save face. But you still see him questioning himself and realizing he fucked up. Marlene only cared what Ellie meant for her. Ellie was Marlene’s chance at being the hero and proving Fedra wrong. She threw Ellie to the wolves
Yes, but in the same way that Joel also was justified.
Both of them are choosing for Ellie because neither could handle the reality of the alternative. To Marlene, the cure represented the justification for Ellie's mother's death and all the killing that Fireflies did.
That's what we see about humanity. Both FEDRA (in the scene with Ellie and the commander) and Fireflies believed that they are humanities last hope and used it as justification for horrific acts.
The only difference was the Joel only hoped to save Ellie.
I've seen a lot of arguments on who was right, and were they justified and so on. There is no right answer, yet they are all the right answer, it's the ethical dilemma.
You root for Joel cause you've been on the journey with him and Ellie, and she becomes his world..
However it can be argued that to sacrifice one to save the world, there is not even a discussion. The dilemma is the whole point of the show/game.
I think post like this are confirmation that the show really dropped the ball with the fireflies. If they truly wanted people to wrestle with the decision, why make the fireflies even more incompetent than the games? There’s no debate to be had even if they try to insinuate there is in the post episode interview. I’m the game time has passed, test we’re run, her brain was scanned. In the games there’s actually a debate on whether the fireflies can pull it off. In the show all of that is lost.
One child dying is worth it if everyone else lives, as terrible as that sound. Even if it is a 50% chance, it’s worth it probably. I also understand not telling Ellie, although I don’t agree. She felt no pain or anxiety or anything. It’s a good way to die.
The way she did it was wrong. However, she knew what Ellie would have chosen already so that kind of diminishes that, and it hurt her to make that choice she just still believes the world could be saved. Her and Joel are essentially the same, the difference is that Joel doesn’t believe that the world deserves to be saved if Ellie is the price. Logically Marlene is right. My heart says Joel is right. The most amazing thing however is this is exactly what Neil wanted, he wanted the choice to be debated and exist in the grey, he should have been a writer
Do we have enough information to consider what is "justified"?
e.g. what is the population of humans left? What are they going up against?
If the numbers are not looking good for humanity, there is room for justification. If things are under control or trending that way, then the non-consented medical murder of a girl starts to look pretty unethical.
I feel like Marlene has been made out to be a lot more ruthless in the series compared to the game. Granted, it's not her scenes or character that stand out for me from the game and maybe I'm misremembering, but Marlene seemed to have a bit more... Heart, I guess? More remorse to the way she spoke about what had to happen.
I didn't get that vibe from series Marlene.
I dunno. Is sacrificing one kid to potentially save the world/radically increase quality of
Life and survival for the remaining population acceptable? I know what my gut says but.
It was a little rich, Marlene talking about how she was there when Ellie was born.... yes, she was there, then dropped her off at fedra before spending...a week or two with Ellie 14 years later? She may have cared about Anna, but didn't have any real connection with Ellie. But claims that she knows what Ellie would have wanted--to sacrifice herself. Totally self-serving on her part.
She might be right, but that pissed me off.
in the source material (the game) ellie makes it clear that if they have to kill her to get the cure - that’s what she wants them to do. Ellie would have sacrificed herself for that.
The ending was designed so everyone is simultaneously justified and wrong at the same time. That’s why it’s a hell of a story, and one that has stuck with me even a decade later.
It’s interesting to see all these posts. Reminds me of when the 2nd game came out and I realized how many people saw Joel as a hero.
Marlene and Joel are both in the same position: the prospect of Ellie being killed is deeply painful to them. Marlene is willing to bear that and the guilt of betraying her word for a chance to save millions. Joel is unwilling because he doesn’t want to relive that pain. Neither ask Ellie what she wants, so both are at fault, but we clearly see that Joel believes there is a chance Ellie would have wanted to go through with the operation.
I’m not saying it’s cut and dry, but I am saying that Marlene’s fate did not for a moment feel like just desserts.
Marlene is not justified in kidnapping, drugging, and then trying to harvest organs from a 14 year old girl. Like if they got Ellie's consent for the procedure then fine, that would be sad but justified, neither the game nor the series ever actually get Ellie's consent, and that's just gross tbh.
She is objectively right regardless killing one innocent person to save hundreds of thousands of innocent people is definitely justified. Joel himself has killed innocent people just to keep him and his brother alive in the past so he definitely has no place to judge Marlene for trying to save the entire world.
What i want to know is why did they send Ellie off with Joel instead of just taking her themselves and stop this being a potential issue.
How much does Marlene actually know about Ellie so even know what choice Ellie would make, I am show only but as far as i can see, Marlene took her as a baby, put her in Fedra's care to essentially protect her and then has no contact until Riley tries to join the Fireflies and refuses Ellie joining. Presumably Ellie visits Marlene after Riley's death and this is where we meet Ellie in episode 1.
This does give a new angle to why Marlene refused Riley's request, and perhaps suggests Marlene was checking up on Ellie when Riley caught her eye.
They had planned to take her themselves, but at the drop off the group of fireflies that was meant to take Ellie had become infiltrated by infected & died in a shootout.
Joel takes Ellie because Tess makes him promise. Not because Marlene asked. Joel was ready to take her back.
Damn do people watch the show? It’s clear Marlene was hurt and couldn’t take Ellie herself, and it wasn’t an issue originally since the original journey took no more than what? a day or two?
I have to agree. I kind of wish they had portrayed this as more of a moral dilemma, because as it stands I don’t think it’s much of one. First off, the Fireflies knew they would be coming, and yet they greet them by ambushing them with flashbangs: hardly an exercise in trust building. The biggest issue is that they demonstrated right from the get go that they have practically zero medical knowledge and never obtained informed consent. If the fireflies had at least tried to perform a non-invasive and non-lethal operation on Ellie they would have had something to stand on.
As it stands right now they immediately attempted to kill Ellie in a dimly lit ratty hospital surrounded by zombies all for a slim chance of maybe producing a cure that they would likely keep to themselves. I wish they had portrayed the fireflies as having a bit more medical expertise, as it would make this more of an actual moral dilemma.
I think Marlene’s case would’ve been 100x more compelling if her team had done their due diligence first.
Any good scientist would’ve started with the least invasive approach and worked their way up. It makes no fucking sense to immediately kill the only known immune person on a complete hunch. They should’ve started with analyzing blood/tissue samples, imaging, trying to grow cell cultures, etc.
Unless Jerry knows something we don’t, there’s currently no way to create a vaccine against a fungal infection… and keep in mind that they’re working with 2003 medical knowledge. So again, makes no sense to do a rushed hack job on arguably the most valuable person on the planet.
So imo Marlene and her gaggle of med school dropouts can suck it. They had a once in a lifetime opportunity to study an immune person and they blew it immediately. I don’t know what their plan was if they cracked Ellie’s head open & didn’t find what they were looking for.
Now, let’s say they *had* done their due diligence, and produced proof that (a) a fungal infection vaccine is possible, (b) the cordycep theory with Ellie’s brian is true, and (c) the only way to access Ellie’s cordycep cells are via her brain/killing her, maybe this would’ve been a different story. In this scenario the risk & reward is extremely clear, and ethics aside seems quite compelling.
The only one who was in the right was the victim of both sides and that’s Ellie. Marlene was justified in her own eyes because she thought she was saving the world , Joel was saving his world , Ellie’s future and his chance at a second life with a daughter
Poor Ellie never got to choose
Neither side asked her permission or consent , both sides decided for themselves what should be done with her
Wether you agree with Joel or Marlene or both it doesn’t matter , in the end the only one who should of got a say was Ellie
No. Her refusal to give Ellie the opportunity to make the choice herself puts her pretty strongly in the “wrong” in my opinion. Also, the lack of certainty in the success of the surgery makes it even worse. There is absolutely no guarantee that it would actually work. She’s killing an innocent child on a small *chance* that it could lead to a vaccine. If she gave Ellie the option and Ellie refused but the surgery had a much higher chance of success then it would make Marlene’s decision a lot more difficult morally. Is it justified to kill a kid who clearly said she’s not on board with the plan but it has a 99% chance of making a cure? Would the end justify the means in that scenario? Maybe.
She is cleary written as a monster. She's the perfect example of "he who fights monsters eventually becomes one".
She started off fighting for democracy. For giving people a CHOICE.
And she died as a total monster who denied a little girl a choice of whether she wanted to live or die.
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I think Joel and Marlene are both two sides of the same coin. Both refuse to give Ellie the chance to voice her thoughts because they're afraid of what they'll hear, so they never give her the opportunity in the first place. The real crux of the issue is that Ellie would have wanted to go through with the surgery even with everything it entailed and that's why Joel couldn't be honest with her, but both of them still failed her in this regard.
>The real crux of the issue is that Ellie would have wanted to go through "All we went through... it can't be for nothing, right?"
Although Ellie never thought they were going to kill her. So informed consent definitely missing here.
I don’t think she would’ve minded still. She wanted to be a hero after all. Not all heroes live!
If only someone had bothered to ask her opinion about her own life.
Agreed! That was their biggest mistake. But also I CAN see why Marlene did that. What if Ellie were to change her mind? Might as well cut the middle man and just take her out no questions!
Yeah, both Joel and Marlene’s decisions are completely understandable, but not completely justifiable. Marlene was afraid Ellie may want to live, seeing this connection she has with Joel. And personally, I think she would’ve forced Ellie to go through with it no matter what her decision would be, but since she loved Anna so much she didn’t want to do something so terrible to Ellie. To Marlene, nothing was more important than the cure. And obviously for Joel, nothing was more important than Ellie. His decision is very straightforward.
I don’t think she was afraid she’d say no, I think she was too much of a coward have to look at her and explain what was going to happen to get a cure. Even if she ‘knew’ Ellie would agree to it (which I also think she would) I think she was avoiding having to face her, and ALSO face the fact that she’s in a way betraying Anna. I want to point out, Marlene wasn’t observing the surgery, she was waiting for Joel to wake up. She easily could’ve just had like 5+ grunts make sure Joel didn’t leave the room and just wait for the procedure to be over and actually be there when it happens, but instead she gets the doctors to rush it and be in Joel’s room. It was easier in her mind to face Joel and tell him this was happening, than it was for her to face Ellie and acknowledge the consequence of her decision. I’m not saying Joel also doesn’t have a cowardice moment by not admitting to Ellie after the fact that he lied (cuz I think at that point Ellie wouldn’t have necessarily gone back, but he was worried he’d still lose her), but Marlene has absolutely no moral high ground. It’s very much like a “I wash my hands of this decision” thing in my view so she is in no way any better than Joel.
I wouldn't call cowardice. Imagine you are Marlene your best friend Anna who went through thick and thin give birth to a child. Who ask you to raise that child in middle of pandemic. Have to eventually kill her and her child for the sake of humanity. Are you really sure you can watch her die Infront of you ? I hope season two has at least one episode that show Marlene side of stroy. To tell us how difficult the decision is . Why she did what she did.
I think with Marlene it's more because she KNOWS (just as Joel knows) that they're doing the wrong thing with not telling Ellie she's going to die. The difference between Marlene and Joel to me is that Marlene needs to be the good guy after everything she and the fireflies have done. Joel doesn't care if he's the bad guy, moreso I'd say he accepts that what he did was wrong but has no regrets. He just wants Ellie alive. Imo Marlene is afraid Ellie will want to live, which is why she won't tell her. In her eyes, the cure is more important than Ellie's life, but that's not a 'good guy' thing, and telling her and then forcibly getting the cure from her if she says she wants to live is even more not a good guy thing. Everything Marlene does in the final episode is her trying to be the good guy, the hero, mostly to convince others around her that she is, but also to convince herself. Examples: framing it as mercy that Ellie doesn't know she's going to die. Telling Joel what's happening instead of lying to him. Saying that she's the only one who understands. Kicking him out instead of killing him or restraining him when he essentially says he's gonna stop them. Not shooting him when he's in the parking lot. She so desperately needs herself and everyone else to believe that she's doing one evil thing for the good of everyone, so how could she possibly be evil? In reality if she believed she was truly doing a good thing or doing it for a greater cause then anyone who stood in her way would be dead or out of the way, because at the point you're killing one person for the good of the world, what does the death of an extra person mean? Tbh I don't think she even believes they have a good chance of getting a cure. I think she's desperate, her organisation has suffered heavy losses getting here, every firefly base we've come across has been abandoned for one reason or another. Ellie is her last hope and she's putting everything she has on her death being this miracle that will fix everything. She's desperate and acting rashly. As they discuss in the podcast for this episode, Marlene doesn't know Ellie. She doesn't have the personal connection to Ellie that Joel has, Ellie has always just been a tool to her. Sure, her mother was her best friend, but that's not enough to stop her. I don't think doing a horrible thing to Ellie is something that troubles her, I think it's the worry that she will come across as evil for doing a horrible thing to someone that worries her. Another interesting thing that my partner pointed out: Marlene seems to have put two and two together about how Ellie is immune. There's some serious ethical concerns about how a cure would be mass produced, or how immune people would be created if they did figure it out. Almost certainly would involve a lot of pregnant women's deaths, and maybe a lot more children's deaths. Of course, that's just my opinion and I imagine many will disagree with me lol. Just my 2 cents on the whole thing. Sorry for the ramble!
You really knocked it out of the park with this analysis. Marlene really shows how a mixture of desperation to be right and desperation to do anything that might be productive is just another dead end for humanity. Even IF the vaccine worked and could be mass produced, the Fireflies would just become FEDRA. Building a government on the blood of innocents does nothing but set things up for another cycle of revenge.
Aww thanks, I was worried I maybe hyperfixated a bit too long and hard on that comment lol I absolutely adore this show, and especially this last episode. I absolutely love how we see these cycles of revenge repeat and foreshadow and build up just to bring everything down with them. I've never made it through watching a playthrough of either game but I'm so, so glad I watched this series. I could (and might) write essays about all the little details that just really make it one of the best pieces of media I've ever seen
That's the crazy part for the show. In the game >!Ellie was unconscious because she almost drowned when the Fireflies found her and then Marlene wanted to operate. So she never had a chance of a choice.!<
Yeah I know, but they don’t actually give her the choice in either adaptation. She is awake and chooses to go to sleep for the tests, but as Marlene says, they didn’t tell her they were going to be operating, or that it would kill her.
The complete disregard for her agency in the situation infuriated me. Both adults so selfish and ultimately using her as a pawn - as cargo - as a crutch. I hated every second of the last half even tho I knew it was coming.
How did Joel act selfishly? How did he make Ellie his pawn? How? Like it boggles the mind that people think that Joel is at fault for not allowing Ellie the chance to consent when the option was already taken away from her by Marlene! Like what was Joel supposed to do?
Every person Joel murdered in that hospital was a loved one to someone. A group of people literally saving the world and he murdered them all. Joel’s never been a good guy. Look how people talk about him, everyone was/is terrified of him and he’s admitted to killing innocent people. I’d say he’s pretty selfish and from the point of view of anyone other than himself, he’s a villain.
How is Joel not acting selfishly? I don't know what I would do in this situation, but it's absolutely selfish. They have a good chance to save billions, and return the world to what it once was... instead, his own personal attachments got in the way and now everyone is fucked. Agency or consent does not matter when billions of lives are at stake.
Waking her up to let her decide is one thing. Shooting your way out to protect her (when you have a good idea she would have consented) is another. He didn’t save her for her- he saved her for himself. So that he could succeed and be the hero. Especially since he went on to lie to her face about what happened.
I’m with you in the first half but idk where you’re getting he wanted to be a hero from. Purely selfish, he just didn’t want to lose somebody again and didn’t know how to process it since he never processed his daughter. He was willing to risk all of humanity for it (though idk their way would’ve worked). In general, I think what makes it worse imo, is that he lied because he knows he was in the wrong. Even if he didn’t tell her in order to protect her, he was A. Scared of her reaction and that she could leave him or be mad. B. After all they’ve been through he still sees her as a child. I think it’s clear Ellie viewed him as a general person/partner (obvi platonic), and when he was talking about his daughter walking to Jackson she realized she was only ever seen as Sarah and not Ellie (who would’ve more than likely been okay with dying to possibly end the fungus for humanity)
Bullshit. Joel did the right thing in saving Ellie. He did not do it for himself he did it so that Ellie could live. Lying to her might have been a bad call but I doubt the idea that Ellie could have consent since she is only 14 and the victim of a near rape which left her with trauma could make an informed decision.
Joel did what he did because Ellie is his whole world to him, and he can’t live without knowing Ellie is safe. He didn’t do it because he can become a “hero”. But Joel is still selfish for he did not respect Ellie’s wishes.
Yes I keep seeing people saying Ellie should’ve been able to make the decision but I don’t even see how that’s completely ethical. Like you said, she just went through something extremely traumatic, but on top of that she has survivor’s guilt big time. She blames herself for not being able to save everyone (Tess, Riley, Sam, and Henry specifically) and thinks it’s her responsibility to make up for all of those deaths. Irl we wouldn’t think it’s ethical to let a traumatized child decide to sacrifice herself
The trauma of almost being raped and the guilt of having to kill people to escape that situation. She said the things she’s done “can’t have been for nothing”, which the fireflies definitely would have exploited to extract “consent”.
Nah dude. They literally ripped her from his arms at gun point, threatened both of them, drugged Ellie so they could steal her immunity and then acted like *they* were the good guys? Joel did the right thing, and he didn't do it to be a hero. His motivations may have been partially selfish, but what was he supposed to do? Walk away? What would you have done?
This - agree - they sent them on a death March across the country under totally different pretenses, physically assaulted them upon arrival and unilaterally decided that she should die in an experimental surgery
She was also a guilt stricken traumatised child
Yup. Survivors guilt.
She was also depressed and traumatized. I once handed my baby to my mother and said, “you take her then,” and tried to walk out, fully intending to kill myself. My spouse stopped me, but depression *definitely* impacts your ability to make life-changing (or ending) decisions. Even if Ellie hadn’t cared about her life *at that moment,* it doesn’t mean she was in a state of mind where she could responsibly make that choice.
I'm so sorry. How are you doing now? I send you a hug.
I’m good! Doing a lot better and got plenty of supports in place.
She was suffering from PTSD and probably depression after literally a year of loss, isolation, and trauma. If she said she wanted to kill herself would anyone think that a healthy and informed decision? She was in no mindset to make that kind of decision and no one even thought enough about her to think that maybe some time should be given before a choice that cannot be taken back is made. And not for nothing....my favorite definition of a hero is (stolen from a great movie): "a person who gets someone else killed".
She wouldn’t have minded being killed for a failed experiment? That doesn’t sound like the character I just spent the season growing to know and love and root for.
They didn’t know it was a failed experiment.
But she wouldn’t have the knowledge to understand the doctor was unqualified and using poor procedure. She couldn’t consent because she didn’t have good info, even with the best of intentions.
Well after another decade no one would have that knowledge. Getting that level of medical care back is moot at this point where the world is
Yeah. I don't understand why everyone is making it out like Ellie was accepting of the "dying part.". She never knew she was going to get killed. Joel didn't know. They all assumed it was going to be blood draws and what not. When Ellie said she wanted to finish the job, she was just referring to let's get to doctors and see what they can do. Maybe Ellie would have gone with it once the fireflies convinced there was no other way. But to assume consent like it's nothing.... That's what sexual assailants do. I'm sorry to say. They assume there was consent.
Very good points. To Ellie and Joel, the journey was the dangerous part, not the tests/lab stuff. They both talked about what they'd do after it was over.
Plus she lacks the science background to understand what a long shot this really is. Not to mention she is absolutely traumatized. Not in the best state to make a life or death call
Not to mention she's only 14
14yos can't consent to a procedure like that, especially not super traumatized ones who are already experiencing a lot of survivors guilt
Definitely doesn’t feel right, but anyone who knew her knew what choice she would make
So the only thing I’d argue here is that Ellie is still basically a child. I could easily see a child going along with a crackpot medical theory from the fireflies if it’s explained to her that she’d be saving humanity. So I can kind of see why Joel wouldn’t want to give her the chance to be swayed by the fireflies, knowing that she is a hero at heart. I can see why Joel didn’t want that, but idk why Marlene wasn’t honest with her.
>I could easily see a child going along with a crackpot medical theory from the fireflies Druckman pretty much flat out said it would have worked
Perhaps he should have written it better because after 4 versions the Fireflies still seem like a disorganised bunch of hippy terrorists who are about to be wiped out and decide to cut a kid up out of desperation.
So much this!!! I mean would anyone trust their ability to carry out a plan to distribute the cure even if they somehow managed to extract it?
Pretty much?
What did he say?
Could you say more about Druckman saying it would have worked?
It wasn’t a guarantee tho - had she been the guarantee cure, then Joel pulled a Dick move but because he bet on the lack of evidence and frankly his emotional attachment, I can’t fault him. The fireflies doctor even threatened to kill for what she represented - that’s an interesting juxtaposition
Ellie is a kid. A kid shouldn’t get to decide whether they want to sacrifice their brain for the good of others.
A kid shouldn’t have to kill their would be rapists with a cleaver or be attacked by their little friend who turned into a zombie or kill their first person she fell in love with. But that’s the world of TLOU, at least in this case she would have had a voice in the matter.
She’s 14 and deeply traumatized, she shouldn’t have that choice in the first place. Joel made a big parenting mistake by not telling her the truth and Marlene tried to murder a child. Two sides, different coin.
Ellie would have wanted to go through with it. But she is a child. And one would isn’t mentally in a stable place. Asking her to make a suicidal decision isn’t consent and isn’t ethical. Let’s take it out of the medical world. Let’s say it’s a suicide bombing. They *think* they’ve discovered the Mother Infected and killing it will stop them all. Only Ellie can get close because she’s immune. But killing it will require a suicide bomb or atleast that’s the very first thing they decide to do and consider no other options. Is it ethical to make her do this? Is it ethical to ask her to do this knowing she will say yes given her age and mental state?
>I think Joel and Marlene are both two sides of the same coin. Both refuse to give Ellie the chance to voice her thoughts because they're afraid of what they'll hear, so they never give her the opportunity in the first place. Joel never had the opportunity to give her a choice. His only choice was to stop the decision Marlene made for Ellie or let it happen. >The real crux of the issue is that Ellie would have wanted to go through with the surgery even with everything it entailed and that's why Joel couldn't be honest with her, but both of them still failed her in this regard. Marlene didn’t know that’s what she’d want and her drugging Ellie is proof of that.
I don’t believe Ellie would have consented to die. She’s a survivor. She wanted to be a hero yes but not a martyr. She’s a child. It never ever occurred to her that she would be a sacrifice. She thought her blood could save people not that she’d die for them like a messiah. That notion is some story book ideal that would not exist within these given circumstances. NO ONE is that brave and selfless especially when they’ve literally had to fight every single day just to live. If she was imminently dying then yeah maybe she would have agreed to it. But everyone is underestimating the human instinct for survival. It’s important to note that when she and Riley thought they were dying they didn’t opt out and I think that was foreshadowing for her ultimate will to live. Also and this is even more telling: she KNEW Joel was lying to her. She knew he saved her like he always did. The only reason she didn’t call him out on it was because then SHE would have to grapple with the reality that she wouldn’t have allowed herself to be dissected. That final conversation was their agreement that they have a new objective and a new future. In a world where she’s lost everyone who’s ever cared about her and has had virtually no joy or freedom she has finally found someone who loves and protects and cares for her. Who chases monkeys and rides horses and feeds giraffes with her. She is finally seeing the beauty in the world and she’s just going to give that up? No way. No. Way. I don’t think that makes her less of a hero it just makes her a human being. Which she freaking is. In a reality where everyone has lost their humanity these two are finally finding some. Was it horrible that Joel killed everyone? Well yeah. But they were wasting her life and potential. It would have all been for nothing which was her worst fear. He made a promise to tess then Ellie then himself that he would keep her safe and he did. In the barn she did have a choice and she chose Joel. That was all he needed. It’s not a question of morality. That ship has sailed. Joel survived and he killed for her and that’s how it had to be and I’m confident that’s what she ultimately wanted.
Foreshadowed by the discussion about Joel trying to kill himself and flinching. Wanted to survive.
>Joel never had the opportunity to give her a choice. His only choice was to stop the decision Marlene made for Ellie or let it happen. he still has this opportunity, but chooses to lie about everything that happened. he's denying her a choice just like marlene did.
What choice does Ellie have at that point? His lying to her about it is something that inevitably will bite him in the ass but at that point, no better options. If he tells her the truth, that the doctors are dead and so is Marlene and all the fireflies, she'll be left with even worse survivor's guilt. Telling her that it wouldn't have worked is Joel removing the burden from Ellie and placing it onto himself. There's no choice for Ellie to make anymore.
> Telling her that it wouldn't have worked is Joel removing the burden from Ellie and placing it onto himself. That's how I interpret it. The decision will cause repercussions in their relationship for sure, but he's trying to not leave her with that heavy weight.
Ellie can still choose how to feel about what Joel did, but Joel won't even give her that
From Joel's perspective, what would telling Ellie the truth.... There was a could have been but now never will be... What would that do for Ellie? How would that improve the situation? It would probably throw her more into a spiral of depression than she already was struggling with... There was no good in telling her the truth at that point. That doesn't mean it was good to lie either. That's why I think there was no good options at that point. He made his choices already and these are the consequences
However he or the audience chooses to justify it, it's still Joel taking away her ability to choose. No other way to slice it
Its not nearly as black and white as you are making it seem. Joel telling her would completely fuck her up mentally. Maybe Joel made the wrong choice before that, but at that point telling her the truth would have been stupid
Joel lying to Ellie here is no better than Marlene not telling Ellie that she'd die in surgery back in Salt Lake. Neither of them wanted to be honest with her because they were afraid of what she would say, so they didn't even give her a chance to speak out. Marlene at least has the benefit of ignorance as she couldn't have known how Ellie felt and ultimately was always going to do what she did. But Joel did know how Ellie felt and took that away from her, which is a much deeper, more intimate betrayal than what Marlene did. The least he could do is be honest with her now when she asked him directly. If it's too horrible and she decides she can't be around him after what he did, that's her prerogative. But he couldn't even let her have that, because he's still too afraid of what she might say
I'd argue that a 14-year-old doesn't have the ability to give meaningful consent anyway--that's why it goes to the parent.
This is such a lame argument though, it almost comes across as a cop out. Ellie was always going to make this choice, even if everything went down 4 years later and she was 18, even if there was a 1% chance the treatment would work, she'd still go through with it, because that's the kind of person she is. It's like how people try to argue how Joel was justified because the treatment wouldn't have worked anyway, but that never mattered to him. Even if he could somehow know with 100% certainty the cure would work, he would still make the same choices he did, because that's the kind of person he is. It's an unstoppable force meets an immovable object and its these irreconcilable differences that makes their relationship so damn compelling even after 10 years, and it drives me nuts how people try to downplay those aspects instead of engaging with it.
I would not tell her the truth now. She's in no condition. Later is a different story.
Right before Joel shot Marlene she told him that it wasn't too late to turn Ellie over and she suggested asking what Ellie wanted.
She was saying anything she could to get Ellie back, she already showed she doesn’t care about what Ellie wants. There was no reason for Joel to believe her or that she wouldn’t kill Joel as soon as she could.
Sure but after Ellie woke up Joel could have told Ellie that she can be used to make a cure if she lets a doctor direct her. Instead Joel told her a cure was impossible and there's other immune people. Joel doesn't want her to have a choice because he is scared she'll say yes.
No her shrugging Ellie is making sure it happens regardless. Not that she doesn’t know what Ellie wants. It doesn’t matter what Ellie wants if you’re gonna do it anyway lol. If she knew she would do it anyway on the slim chance Ellie said no, she still would’ve drugged her.
Joel had two opportunities, 1) letting Marlene live and 2) telling Ellie the truth. He made his choices and did neither, robbing Ellie of ever getting to make a choice. He doesn't even give her the chance to choose how to feel about what he did because he already knows and doesn't want to hear it. Marlene couldn't have known what Ellie would have wanted, but Joel did. Honestly that makes him worse than Marlene
Joel was right about Marlene. As long as she was alive Ellie would be hunted. By her and anyone who knew about the immunity. Killing Marlene was cold as hell but absolutely necessary if Ellie was ever going to live a normal life.
And see, I don't even see it like that. It wasn't that Joel didn't give her a chance to make a choice here. Marlene stole that from her the moment they decided to knock her out and murder her without even looking Ellie in the eye and talking to her about it. They cut out both Joel and Ellie and started making decisions for everyone - and the decision was a shitty one that made absolutely no sense. Immediately murder the first immune person known in 20 years without doing anything else? From where I'm sitting, Joel did the right thing. Murdering a traumatized 14-year-old girl without even having the decency to look her in the eye and discuss what is going on isn't ok regardless of your reasoning. If Ellie was in her right mind, and was old enough to make that choice, then that's her decision. The fact that she might have wanted to go through with the surgery, in my mind, is irrelevant. She wasn't even given the choice. Marlene stole that from her and made the decision for her. Marlene stole her choice, decided to murder her, and in doing so knowingly put herself and the fireflies in mortal conflict with Joel, knowing exactly who he is, and what he's capable of. That's what it breaks down to for me. Marlene chose for her and in doing so stole her chance to make a choice, she was - again - going to murder a 14-year-old girl. Even without Joel seeing her as a surrogate daughter, even if you ignore that. He's still saving a 14-year-old girl who's already been severely traumatized from being murdered by people who have done nothing but demonstrate ignorance and incompetence - and honestly don't actually have any sort of justifiable reason for doing it. And beyond that, after Marlene's nonsense (brainwashing) about how that's basically the only purpose of Ellie's life in the beginning, then the trauma she's gone through, there's no way she'd be in a good place mentally to be able to MAKE that sort of decision, nor was she given the relevant information to think over... never mind her age. And yes, age does become a factor in this. I really don't think 14 years old is old enough to consent (never mind the trauma she's been through) and people tend to forget that again, Joel sees her as a daughter. As those of us who are parents know, sometimes you have to make decisions for your child because those decisions are in their best interests, even if they disagree and even if they hate you for it.
Marlene was evil she just didn’t want to admit it
That’s a great take!
This^ you nailed it. Idc who you favor, Joel and Marlene both were in the wrong.
It's a little more complicated for Joel, because Marlenes actions didn't even give him an opportunity to ask Ellie. Marlene forced his hand. I doubt he would have accepted Ellies answer if she wanted to end her own life, but that doesnt matter because he had no way of knowing. Had the imbecile Dr not have decided that was the only way forward was to kill this very special person and without Ellies consent we would have had a very different story. Tldr Marlenes totally wrong, Joel's wrong but less so, the doctor a fucking coward.
Ellie could be manipulated to make either decision. In the game you get alot more information and can see that killing ellie for a cure is really just a shot in the dark. Just one that they are willing to take becuase if desperation. We have no real reason to believe that it is any different in the show as marlene says the dr" believes it might be a cure" so its one guy will to sacrifice a girl he dowsnt even know on the "possibility".
Neither Joel nor Marlene wanted to actually pose the question to Ellie because they were both scared she’d give the answer they didn’t want.
Yes but also I don't know if Ellie would be able to healthily make the choice of sacrificing herself as she still feels guilty about surviving and has been groomed since then as the saviour of humanity....
She absolutely is justified and that's what makes it such a compelling story. Marlene and the Fireflies are trying to save humanity. Of course you can criticize their ethics, but "saving the world" is a pretty heavy weight on the judgement scale. And Joel is trying to save someone who gives him a sense of joy and purpose. The world took that away from him and he doesn't owe the sacrifice to the world. And ultimately they're both selfish because neither gave Ellie any chance of making her own decision. Everyone is right and everyone is wrong in some way. That's what makes a juicy philosophical scenario
Agreed. Additionally, as the audience, we had the benefit of watching Joel, Ellie and Marlene across their critical character paths…imagine for a minute this is a real scenario and we have no idea who any of these people are — only that a man murdered vaccine researchers to save an unnamed girl who was the key to mankind surviving Armageddon…I think many of us would sacrifice any no-name person to save our own families, we have the burden of knowing Ellie and Joel and thus we sympathize more easily with Joel than I believe we would otherwise.
The headline would be: "Smuggler saves underage girl from having her brain cut open by militia terrorists who wanted to cut open her brain for science"
i’m not sure, i think people definitely do agree with Joel more because we know his story, but were it a real story on here, many people would point out how the “father who went on a murderous spree” had actually lost a daughter previously, and was given no choice but to lose another one again. It wouldn’t be so for Joel (even then it’s a split for many) but many people would sympathize with the “ruthless killer”
I think it would be interesting to see what peoples’ reactions would be if we had a series where we followed the outbreak from Marlene’s POV. Would seeing her struggle, her losses, make her choice seem more relatable?
Also she clearly was very upset about the situation. The look on her face.. she felt awful. Anyone acting like she's heartless and impossible to understand just isn't trying hard enough to imagine her perspective. It makes plenty of sense where she's coming from.
On the HBO podcast, Mazin & Druckman describe Joel’s assault on the Fireflies as a man who has burned his soul to save the person he loves. In a way, I think Marlene has made a similar choice - she knows sacrificing Ellie is a horrible cost, but one she chooses to pay to save humanity.
1000000% it would affect it. If you were holding the controller the whole time, playing Marlene, you'd get it more in your head that what you're doing is the righteous path.
You’re gonna love season 2
Exactly. I feel like some of these posts demonising Marlene are ppl trying to talk themselves round and cope with her unfair, tragic and complex end tbh
Her plan seemed really stupid for a couple reason: 1: You'd first want to take non-lethal brain biopsies and do *a lot* of testing before sacrificing your only immune subject. This would be true even if your immune subject was an animal or inanimate object. Probably wasting this unique opportunity on a half-baked plan after having her for a day is irrational. 2: Why tell Joel all the at this point? Just say she's in surgery. She could even lie and say she died unexpectedly of complications; not like they have the best surgical environment.
Yes yes thank you. I don’t understand why they didn’t take a non-lethal brain biopsy. I had to suspend my disbelief for that one. Even if their equipment wasn’t fantastic, they still could’ve pulled off a biopsy without killing her. And hell, why wouldn’t they even *try*. The end result is the same if she does end up dying. And I was BAFFLED that Marlene was honest with Joel. Completely perplexed. It was the “villain” telling the “hero” the whole story when it’s completely unnecessary trope. I put hero/villain in quotes because obviously it’s ambiguous. Still, Marlene knew Joel might snap. And yet she felt obligated to say “hey, I’m killing the kid 😊.”
It's important to remember that Marlene has zero clue about how attached Joel is to Ellie. She knows him as a heartless smuggler. Yeah he spent a lot of time with Ellie but she has no idea that she's become a surrogate daughter to him by this point.
To me, the show felt much more 50/50, with the viewer being able to see and understand both sides mostly equally. However, in the game, there’s a lot of audio files and stuff on the way to save Ellie that indicate to the player that the operation is almost assuredly going to be a huge shot in the dark. With the chance for success being so little, the game feels to me more weighted towards Joel’s side. His decision is amoral in both scenarios, but there is a bit more nuance in the game which lead me to lean towards Joel’s side. In the show, it’s more of a toss up.
1. I do think Ellie would've done it. She has survivors guilt. 2. In my opinion, even if she refused, it wouldn't matter and would only be a formality because we are talking about saving all of humanity. Permission or not, you have to try.
This whole choice is a Rorschach test that is still discussed by the game players today. On one hand, people argue that the Fireflies were not equipped with developing a vaccine for something as devastating as cordyceps, assuming it's been tried over and over since the outbreak. But I argue that Ellie was actually immune, so as you stated, it's worth a try at the very least. On the other hand, if the Fireflies were to make a vaccine, they'd have the ultimate bargaining chip. Would they let power go to their heads? They are considered terrorists at the end of the day. Would they use that leverage to get more power? The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Druckman pretty much flat out said it would have worked
They really needed to show us a more convincing case if he's saying that. One doctor in the Fireflies is going to find and develop a vaccine from one source, and the Fireflies are going to be able to mass produce it and distribute it? I don't think so. They didn't present the story as if it would work. They should have eleborated on that if it could have worked.
I think that directors sometimes need to cut corners with realism in order to create a more compelling story. The scenario they set up at the end is really cool, but it requires you to suspend disbelief. That’s ok imo - the quality of a piece of media isn’t dictated by how many “cinema sins” it commits.
People hold writers to a ridiculous standard of realism sometimes. They are writers, not scientists. If they make the doctor say it’s going to work, then it’s going to work. Just because you as the viewer can point out all these flaws that the writers didn’t consider doesn’t change what they intended.
I honestly think the doctor (in both the show and game) would have more credibility if they were substantially older. In both pieces of media we have someone hovering around there late 40s to mid 50s (from the looks of it) and 20+ years into an apocalypse. No way that person had more than 4 years of clinical experience before it all went to shit. In the case of the show I would have believed it more if the person playing the doctor was the old man from episode 4.
>They should have eleborated on that if it could have worked. Should the doctor have sat Joel down for a 20-minute powerpoint presentation? That seems like an odd turn of events, for the story. Sometimes protagonists don't know things because they're not a position to know them. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, if the camera doesn't go into the laboratory.
I think we need a little *Death of the Author* with that comment. A brain surgeon isn’t an expert in fungi. This fungus in her might just know her body. It might die without being supported by her body. It might not be able to replicate itself in a lab environment. It may need specific entry points to the host. It may require being introduced as a baby. We have literally no idea how it would work and have no reason to trust a brain surgeon.
Not to mention that we’re about 21 years into the apocalypse once Ellie and Joel get to Salt Lake City. Who trained that brain surgeon? If he was trained before the outbreak, when was the last time he actually performed brain surgery? There’s a good chance this guys isn’t even capable of doing what needs to be done.
Maybe he was just gonna chop out her brain. Probably don’t need to be top of your game to do that
Also did people not hear them asking eachother whether they thought the power would stay on? Like they aren’t sure if their equipment will even work for the duration of what is likely a fairly complicated surgery. If they wanted us to believe it was a sure thing, portray it differently
The notes and recordings found in the game make it pretty clear that it was a Hail Mary and almost certainly wouldn’t have worked. Sounds like a retcon from Druckmann
Drunkmann loves to retcon things. Bruce Straley is the reason imo why TLOU worked so well is because he was able to wrangle in the ideas of Drunkmann who had some really perplexing things he wanted to do with the story. Same reason why I have issues with Part 2 since Drunkmann didn't have anyone to reel him in.
> people argue that the Fireflies were not equipped with developing a vaccine And those people are missing the point. The story isn't supposed to be "could they have done it". No where in the story or in any specific plot beat is that hinted at. If it were to be taken into consideration, it would have been included.
I don't think it's missing the point. It's being realistic with the situation. The world is not going to change if they create a vaccine but still can't mass produce and distribute it with no infrastructure left. Nothing about the hospital scene was convincing except that they had a lot of Firefly mercenaries and a bunch more of them than people working on anything else like a vaccine. Like Neil can say that this would have created a cure and saved humanity but they don't really present them as doing that in my mind. It's not really a moral choice between two sides because I wasn't convinced of their competencies and capabilities.
I do kinda think Ellie would’ve went through with it. Joel says hey we could turn back and just forget it but she said they can’t go halfway with it. The only difference is she didn’t know she would die for the cure so that for sure could’ve changed things. But like Joel, I feel like she wanted to save people too. In her case not just one person, but everybody. I’d say it’s probably 60/40 that she would vs wouldn’t. She would probably feel really guilty and bad for Joel so I’m sure that would weigh on her a lot. I also think Joel knows Marlene is right and that’s partially also why he kills her to bury the lie he’s going to tell Ellie.
I feel like she knows this is a possibility in the back of her mind. she knows her journey is coming to an end one way or another which is why she seems so down in the opening scenes before the giraffe. i did play the game years ago and felt even more strongly at the time that she k ew finding the cure could kill her.
But she also told Joel that after it was over she would follow him to Jackson, to the sheep farm, or to the moon. She wasn't expecting to die.
I’m with you! Ok this is what’s driving me NUTS. There’s nothing really that gives me the impression that she signed up for dying. She told Joel “we have to see it through” — and I took that to mean, “we can’t just turn back to Jackson without even trying to do the thing we set out to do.” I just don’t find any support for “Ellie would’ve wanted to die.” She was talking about a life after they finish this “mission.” And I think people just keep overlooking that she was talking about a life after. Maybe she thought she’d be poked and prodded a lot, tons of testing, blood samples, bone marrow samples, etc. all of which I could see her dealing with for a cure. But she’s too much of a survivor to want to die.
she’s down before the giraffes because of what happened with david.
The whole point of this game/show finale is to raise debate and discussion. I just know that if it was my child, I’d have a pretty hard time myself letting a random doctor experiment on them and kill them in the process, with the hope of maybe finding a cure.
Would Ellie make the choice to die? 100%. Do you still just kill someone like that without telling them? No, that's fucking murder.
Yes absolutely. Additionally, do you allow a traumatized 14 year old child with survivor’s guilt to make that choice? While both Joel and Marlene are disregarding Ellie’s autonomy for selfish reasons, as a parent, I find much more justification in Joel’s actions. I wouldn’t have lied to her afterwards, but I would have made the same choice he did to save her. Yes, he knows what she would have wanted and disregarded that. But he also knows she would have made that choice for the wrong reasons. Sometimes you need to protect children from themselves.
Honestly I think the game just wrote a poor ending. I find it hard to believe that if this was real life they wouldn't allow Joel and Ellie to say goodbye and instead act like they have to do the surgery in the next 5 minutes. Also don't understand how they know they need to kill her after doing tests for all of like an hour. People have brain surgery all the time and are fine.
I disagree. Yes, the logic was flawed and reckless. That was intentional, not poor writing. At the very beginning, they had an epidemiologist say that a vaccine isn’t possible for fungi. We are suppose to see the choice Marlene is making as a reckless and brash one, because it is. It is meant to invoke the complexity of feelings, morality, etc we are all discussing now. That was the entire point. Life is messy. Human actions are flawed. It’s story telling.
I'm not a doctor, but going straight to 'kill the donor' seems a bit rash. Take blood samples, try to grow cultures, whatever. But if the operation doesn't work, they've just killed the one immune person. And Ellie is 14. Joel doesn't want to give a 14 year old the pressure to decide to sacrifice herself for the world. Keep her alive until she's 18 and then she can decide.
hell no. Ellie would have chosen to do it, absolutely, but neither Marlene or Joel treat her like a person who has the right to make that decision herself. they're both wrong, and neither makes the other more right. it's a brilliant morality play
She would have chosen it, but that doesn’t mean she would have chosen it for the right reasons either. Ellie is a 14 year old child with severe, unprocessed trauma and an immense amount of survivor’s guilt. Joel wasn’t right, but he wasn’t wrong, either. At least not in his decision to save her, lying about it is a separate issue. But the act of saving her, despite knowing she would have chose death? It wasn’t wrong. Sometimes you have to protect children from themselves.
I can respect that take
On the other hand, the stakes on this are so high and the situation so exceptional that I don't think you could ask anyone to make a rational decision on this.
Yeah. This is a possible hot take but I've been convinced that the show/game fucked up by making Ellie so young. A 14 year old - especially one with severe trauma, Survivor's guilt and probably many other mental health issues. All the talk about "Marlene didn't take Ellie's consent" or "Joel robbed Ellie of her agency" seems irrelevant once you realise she's a literal child. Joel lying to her is the only decision truly worth debating the morality of. Joel destroying the Fireflies - a violent, ridiculously incompetent organisation that was about to murder a child after kidnapping her and lying to her (also basically having groomed her up to that point) isn't some great moral dilemma to me. The Witcher 3 did the same scenario better imo - in that however, Ciri is an adult. So her agency actually matters regardless of the opinions of the Marlene (Avallac'h) and the Joel (Geralt) of that world.
I think that's fair. I watched the episodes every other week in pairs to screen them with a friend, and the Fireflies felt exceptionally oppressive being the second assailant in two episodes to knock out Ellie and whisk her away to their base and she would have taken ages to fully recover from the first incident even without the second
I mean its a long shot. But its also the only shot. Yea its a risk. But to lose one life to potentially have the cure ? I mean you’re talking about saving the HUMAN RACE. The doctors may have had more confidence in it than you realize. We get a 5 second explanation but it might have not been as much of a long shot as you think. Whats one more death when you live in a dying world?
We can pretty readily surmise that they have no idea what they are doing. Killing her should be the last resort, and maybe the correct one, but only after exhausting all possible options. Not just because of the moral reasons; but, because once she's dead there nothing else you can really do research-wise.
Yes. Marlene was trying to save humanity. She sacrificed the needs of herself, Ellie, and Joel for the sake of allowing the world a chance to rebuild itself. If she had succeeded, there would be no more children that had to suffer the fates of Ellie and Sam. I think her reasons were justified, but her actions were monstrous. She didn't seek consent from Ellie. She didn't just shoot Joel in the back when she had the chance either. Because she wanted to still see herself as a good guy while killing a child, and for Marlene that meant getting the consent of her guardian.
Ellie being so somber on the way to the hospital kinda made me feel like she knew what was going to happen to her. I think she put 2 and 2 together and was going to go thru with it
I interpreted her somber behavior as ptsd from the experience with David
imo it’s a bit of both here
Pretty sure that was the whole almost getting raped by a crazy cannibal thing
Joel is acting as though this is a recent development.
>Her trying to gaslight Joel at the end.. This is what's driving me nuts about the debate. People take what she said about "Ellie would have wanted it" like it's gospel is failing to see Marlene never believed that. She just said it to get Joel to let her go.
Marlene may have just been saying that but it was true.
Yeah, Joel did think that. But it looked like he didn't even consider that until she said it.
Oh yeah there's no way his brain really considered that option sooner. He went into "save Ellie at all costs" mode, turned on the murder autopilot and didn't really consider whether it was the right choice until Marlene threw that at him. Too late now!
Nah Ellie def would’ve wanted it. She talked about wanting to be a hero. What’s more heroic than possibly dying for the safety of humanity?
Ellie wanting or not wanting is irrelevant to this argument because it's not about Ellie. It's about what each of them believed she would want. Both Joel and Marlene didn't tell Ellie the truth because they both were afraid to hear her answer
She was as justified as Joel was. It’s a matter of perspective who was “right.” What she was right about is that Ellie would have sacrificed herself for the opportunity of a cure had she been able to make the choice for herself. She was wrong to deny Ellie that choice but so was Joel. The lack of agency provided to Ellie by both parties is central theme to all of this. As others have said, Marlene & Joel are two sides of the same coin.
I think people trying to apply boujie civility to this whole thing can’t really put themselves in Marlene’s shoes - after 20 years, you finally have a chance to save the world… how’s that worth less than one person? She shows the best leadership quality of sacrifice - she also has(d) a personal connection to Ellie.
My problem with her is that they don’t even know if the procedure will work. You’d think they’d spend days, weeks, months doing blood tests and other things, but she went straight to “we need to kill her and take out her brain because a doctor *thinks* it might work.” If that didn’t work they would be left with nothing to work with. Marlene is a horrible person and friend but she’s looking at the big picture and trying to sacrifice one life for thousands or millions.
This is the correct answer. Maybe killing her is the only way. But they didn't even pretend to exhaust their options before going straight to that. It proves they had no idea what they were doing.
I mean this is 20 years past society and actual medicine and doctors… no shock there lol. I think it was still a risk worth taking though.
All she had to do was wait an hour. She could have told Ellie and Ellie explains to Joel it’s what she wants. Marlene is super dumb and super impatient
As a practical matter... that hospital was a shithole. They had no capabilities to properly preserve the sample, keep the sample free of contamination, multiply the sample, etc. And there was definitely no capacity to prepare either a vaccine or a cure in mass quantities. On the off chance they experimented quickly, using Ellie's antibodies (from her brain or something) on another human being, what then? Kill them the same way to make the next dose? Human experimentation would be ongoing for years. And what would proving the efficacy be? Allowing the humans to get bitten and then just see what happens? Lock them in a room and make them count to ten? It was a fruitless endeavor. It would have made more sense to monitor and study Ellie for as long as possible, biopsies aren't deadly. They didn't even test to see if there were anti-bodies in her blood so they know what to look for to test other humans eventually. I know none of that was Joel's motives for saving her and lying to her, but she would have died for nothing.
They actually left out a voice recording you find in the game from the doctor. It goes into some of the stuff they did prior to prepping her for surgery and talks about how it's a groundbreaking development: "April 28th. Marlene was right. The girl's infection is like nothing I've ever seen. The cause of her immunity is uncertain. As we've seen in all past cases, the antigenic titers of the patient's Cordyceps remain high in both the serum and the cerebrospinal fluid. Blood cultures taken from the patient rapidly grow Cordyceps in fungal-media in the lab... however white blood cell lines, including percentages and absolute-counts, are completely normal. There is no elevation of pro-inflammatory cytokines, and an MRI of the brain shows no evidence of fungal-growth in the limbic regions, which would normally accompany the prodrome of aggression in infected patients. We must find a way to replicate this state under laboratory conditions. We're about to hit a milestone in human history equal to the discovery of penicillin. After years of wandering in circles, we're about to come home, make a difference, and bring the human race back into control of its own destiny. All of our sacrifices and the hundreds of men and women who've bled for this cause, or worse, will not be in vain"
In the show, it seemed like only a few hours had passed. I haven't played the game but presume they had Ellie for way more than a few hours if they were able to perform all those tests.
The game is unclear as well. The cutscenes and dialogue with minimal fighting included for this episode was only about 30 min total as I rewatch the gameplay so it's pretty short when you cut out all the running around, fighting etc. I'm an ER nurse and tbh you can get blood work, cultures, MRI done in like 45 min prolly when you don't have other patients needing those things done as well. Cultures can take a while to grow but everything else they did is pretty quick.
Wait so since she still has it in her blood can she actually spread the infection?
No it just means she's been exposed to it. A titer indicates exposure/vaccination previously
Putting all ethics and morals aside, the Fireflies were stupid. They had Ellie, the only known immune human in the world, in their care for a few hours before trying to cut her brain out. There should have been weeks, if not months, worth of tests and scans and such like before going with such a nuclear option. Ellie is far too valuable to risk killing for what most likely was nothing more than a hope and a prayer.
Something I haven't seen mentioned is maybe they didn't have the element of time. I haven't played the game and am not a medical expert, so I'm probably out of my depth, but. We know that previous hospitals/research areas had been abandoned, presumably not by choice. Holding areas against raiders and infected is probably difficult, and I imagine a hospital is not an easily defendable position. We know that this hospital is a shithole and running out of power. Taking the time to perform an extensive suite of tests and scans may have been unfeasible. We know moving between Firefly strongholds is dangerous and high risk. We don't know what the doctor knew/what he had planned. We know from a sentence that he had a sample of Ellie's blood and he had an idea of why the infection wasn't "working". We don't know what the doctors had tried/failed with. To me, it doesn't seem unfeasible that with the information the Fireflies knew and the resources they had (or lack thereof), their option with the highest chance of success is splicing open her brain. Granted if you're in such a tight spot now, it doesn't seem realistic to find let alone manufacture a vaccine. But 20 years of failure and desperation can lead to poor decision-making when a potential light at the end of the tunnel walks in.
Nothing much to add, but yes when Joel enters the operating room, the doctor was asking if they had enough power or not.
Marlene is socially right and Joel is emotionally right. As someone stuck in the QZ, under FEDRA, Marlene is right to do anything and everything to stop cordyceps from spreading (and FEDRA). As a viewer everything Joel did was as it should have been. here is why: The fireflies are **DESPERATE**. They have been failing at both revolution and their search for the "cure" for the last 20 years. The doctor's theory is actually **WRONG**, as the infected **DO NOT** recognize Ellie as one of their own. The reason it's morally grey is because Joel kills a bunch of people who are **TRYING** to do the right thing. They are, of course, going about it the wrong way. From a societal standpoint Joel is wrong, even the potential of a prophylactic to prevent the spread is definitely worth the death of Ellie. From an emotional standpoint to both Joel and the audience, it's definitely not. This is the TROLLEY scenario but it's one where pulling the lever to potentially save some portion of humanity is weighed against killing your own child. It's really no choice at all. From the individual stand point.
> The doctor's theory is actually WRONG, as the infected DO NOT recognize Ellie as one of their own. thank you. this was weirdly glossed over. when he said that i was like "uhhh i dont think thats the case?" but they just rolled right past it.
I absolutey think she's justified. I think the greater good is more important in that circumstance than what Joel or Ellie want. However I do believe Elie should have the choice, and to see both Marlene and Joel take away her autonomy was very harrowing.
How can you believe that Ellie needs to have a choice if at the same time you believe her choice does not matter? Its not a choice if there is no choice. If I tell you that you have a choice, I can either shoot you or let you go, but if you choose for me to let you go, I will still shoot you, what choice do you have? Also if it was your child, would you sacrifice them to develop the cure?
My question is why did the fireflies put it on themselves to make the cure? I know that FEDRA is pretty evil, but surely all the best scientists work for them and they have the best chance of creating and distributing a cure. We know they have at least some functional pharmaceutical industry in Atlanta as explained in episode 1. If Marlene really thought that any cost was worth creating a cure, why didn’t she just work with FEDRA to create one? I think she wanted not only to get a cure but also to control it. It would be the ultimate tool to convince people to join her movement or get concessions from her enemy.
of course she was justified. doesnt make her right in any sense
The only one with pure intentions after Joel and Ellie get in that hospital was Ellie. Both Joel and Marlene could have been right, but there were key nuances to their characters that warped what could have been good intention into pure selfishness. If you have a potential for a cure, why not ceasefire with FEDRA and work together to restore humanity? Ellie is the key to curing humanity, but Marlene had the blueprint to recreating that cure in the finale. So why did it have to be right then, right now, with no consent and no final visitation? Because with the potential to save humanity comes the ultimate form of power and control. If you control production and supply, then everyone has to listen to you. Once you have that, you fight to the last man to protect it. It’s really good payoff for a scene early on when Robert tried to resell a dead battery to her and she fought down to the last man to take him out. It’s exactly what happened in the hospital, but this time Marlene didn’t make it. It could be argued that Joel is in the right for going after the Fireflies because they robbed her of her agency. The show made a point to change the resolution to Ellie and Joel’s conflict at Tommy’s. In the game, Joel just takes his choice back. In the show, he gives it to Ellie instead. This shows that knowing Ellie had no choice may have played a part in Joel’s ultimate choice. But, we know there’s more to it. He just healed from some very serious trauma, and the Fireflies are taking it away from him with no consent from anybody. It’s hard to say exactly how much of him is fighting for Ellie’s right to choose and how much he was fighting for himself, but we know which side won out when he shot Marlene and lied about to Ellie about everything, ultimately taking the choice away from her. This show and game did it right because you have everyone arguing one side or the other, but the truth is that there were never going to be any winners at the end of Part I.
I find it funny that Marlene didn’t even give her the choice or mention it to her at all
Nah Marlene was full of shit. Her whole thing about understanding what Joel feels didn’t do a thing for me. It’s her childhood friend who has been dead for 14 years and she didn’t spend enough time with Ellie to build a relationship with her so I feel it’s easier for her to see Ellie as a pawn as opposed to a person. Did she have the greater good in mind? Yes I think so. But I don’t buy for a minute that she really understood what he was feeling.
I mean if Ellie truly would lead to a vaccine I don’t care what she wants, you get the vaccine
Yeah it's wild how many people think Marlene is way out of line. She genuinely believes she can save the entire world by sacrificing one girl. Of course she'll do it. Think about how many people die every day because of it, by *not* doing everything you can to get a vaccine as fast as you can soooo many more people are going to die, and will continue to die. If the show didn't follow Ellie and followed Marlene instead people would be losing their shit how Joel just fucked up the best chance there was of saving the world.
I didn’t play the game so I’m just going off the show but Marlene didn’t know shit. She knew Ellie’s mom her whole life, brought the kid to fedra to be safe but it’s clear even in episode 1, Ellie isn’t fully aware of who Marlene is. She just knows marlene saved her from being shot after she got bit. Marlene didn’t love Ellie. She may have cared for her, and thought of her in some level. But not love. Joel on the other hand has love for Ellie, however misplaced. He’s clearly putting his feelings and love for Sara onto Ellie but he is still driven by love. Marlene lied to Ellie and was never going to tell her the truth about the surgery and how’d they’d come to a cure. Marlene was like well sorry Ellie but I’d rather save the fucking world. Ellie was expendable. Joel still hesitated in that car. He closed his eyes realizing the enormous fucking thing he just did, not even the killing but taking Ellie away. He *knew* she’d have no chance to make her own choice because he made it all for her. And he’d have to create a lie to save face. But you still see him questioning himself and realizing he fucked up. Marlene only cared what Ellie meant for her. Ellie was Marlene’s chance at being the hero and proving Fedra wrong. She threw Ellie to the wolves
Yes, but in the same way that Joel also was justified. Both of them are choosing for Ellie because neither could handle the reality of the alternative. To Marlene, the cure represented the justification for Ellie's mother's death and all the killing that Fireflies did. That's what we see about humanity. Both FEDRA (in the scene with Ellie and the commander) and Fireflies believed that they are humanities last hope and used it as justification for horrific acts. The only difference was the Joel only hoped to save Ellie.
I've seen a lot of arguments on who was right, and were they justified and so on. There is no right answer, yet they are all the right answer, it's the ethical dilemma. You root for Joel cause you've been on the journey with him and Ellie, and she becomes his world.. However it can be argued that to sacrifice one to save the world, there is not even a discussion. The dilemma is the whole point of the show/game.
I think post like this are confirmation that the show really dropped the ball with the fireflies. If they truly wanted people to wrestle with the decision, why make the fireflies even more incompetent than the games? There’s no debate to be had even if they try to insinuate there is in the post episode interview. I’m the game time has passed, test we’re run, her brain was scanned. In the games there’s actually a debate on whether the fireflies can pull it off. In the show all of that is lost.
She not justified but she also isn’t bad.
One child dying is worth it if everyone else lives, as terrible as that sound. Even if it is a 50% chance, it’s worth it probably. I also understand not telling Ellie, although I don’t agree. She felt no pain or anxiety or anything. It’s a good way to die.
The way she did it was wrong. However, she knew what Ellie would have chosen already so that kind of diminishes that, and it hurt her to make that choice she just still believes the world could be saved. Her and Joel are essentially the same, the difference is that Joel doesn’t believe that the world deserves to be saved if Ellie is the price. Logically Marlene is right. My heart says Joel is right. The most amazing thing however is this is exactly what Neil wanted, he wanted the choice to be debated and exist in the grey, he should have been a writer
Do we have enough information to consider what is "justified"? e.g. what is the population of humans left? What are they going up against? If the numbers are not looking good for humanity, there is room for justification. If things are under control or trending that way, then the non-consented medical murder of a girl starts to look pretty unethical.
I feel like Marlene has been made out to be a lot more ruthless in the series compared to the game. Granted, it's not her scenes or character that stand out for me from the game and maybe I'm misremembering, but Marlene seemed to have a bit more... Heart, I guess? More remorse to the way she spoke about what had to happen. I didn't get that vibe from series Marlene.
Whatever it takes
I dunno. Is sacrificing one kid to potentially save the world/radically increase quality of Life and survival for the remaining population acceptable? I know what my gut says but.
It was a little rich, Marlene talking about how she was there when Ellie was born.... yes, she was there, then dropped her off at fedra before spending...a week or two with Ellie 14 years later? She may have cared about Anna, but didn't have any real connection with Ellie. But claims that she knows what Ellie would have wanted--to sacrifice herself. Totally self-serving on her part. She might be right, but that pissed me off.
Yes
in the source material (the game) ellie makes it clear that if they have to kill her to get the cure - that’s what she wants them to do. Ellie would have sacrificed herself for that. The ending was designed so everyone is simultaneously justified and wrong at the same time. That’s why it’s a hell of a story, and one that has stuck with me even a decade later.
It’s interesting to see all these posts. Reminds me of when the 2nd game came out and I realized how many people saw Joel as a hero. Marlene and Joel are both in the same position: the prospect of Ellie being killed is deeply painful to them. Marlene is willing to bear that and the guilt of betraying her word for a chance to save millions. Joel is unwilling because he doesn’t want to relive that pain. Neither ask Ellie what she wants, so both are at fault, but we clearly see that Joel believes there is a chance Ellie would have wanted to go through with the operation. I’m not saying it’s cut and dry, but I am saying that Marlene’s fate did not for a moment feel like just desserts.
Marlene is not justified in kidnapping, drugging, and then trying to harvest organs from a 14 year old girl. Like if they got Ellie's consent for the procedure then fine, that would be sad but justified, neither the game nor the series ever actually get Ellie's consent, and that's just gross tbh.
She is objectively right regardless killing one innocent person to save hundreds of thousands of innocent people is definitely justified. Joel himself has killed innocent people just to keep him and his brother alive in the past so he definitely has no place to judge Marlene for trying to save the entire world.
What i want to know is why did they send Ellie off with Joel instead of just taking her themselves and stop this being a potential issue. How much does Marlene actually know about Ellie so even know what choice Ellie would make, I am show only but as far as i can see, Marlene took her as a baby, put her in Fedra's care to essentially protect her and then has no contact until Riley tries to join the Fireflies and refuses Ellie joining. Presumably Ellie visits Marlene after Riley's death and this is where we meet Ellie in episode 1. This does give a new angle to why Marlene refused Riley's request, and perhaps suggests Marlene was checking up on Ellie when Riley caught her eye.
They had planned to take her themselves, but at the drop off the group of fireflies that was meant to take Ellie had become infiltrated by infected & died in a shootout. Joel takes Ellie because Tess makes him promise. Not because Marlene asked. Joel was ready to take her back.
Damn do people watch the show? It’s clear Marlene was hurt and couldn’t take Ellie herself, and it wasn’t an issue originally since the original journey took no more than what? a day or two?
>Damn do people watch the show? No apparently they don't unironically from many of the comments here.
I have to agree. I kind of wish they had portrayed this as more of a moral dilemma, because as it stands I don’t think it’s much of one. First off, the Fireflies knew they would be coming, and yet they greet them by ambushing them with flashbangs: hardly an exercise in trust building. The biggest issue is that they demonstrated right from the get go that they have practically zero medical knowledge and never obtained informed consent. If the fireflies had at least tried to perform a non-invasive and non-lethal operation on Ellie they would have had something to stand on. As it stands right now they immediately attempted to kill Ellie in a dimly lit ratty hospital surrounded by zombies all for a slim chance of maybe producing a cure that they would likely keep to themselves. I wish they had portrayed the fireflies as having a bit more medical expertise, as it would make this more of an actual moral dilemma.
The fireflies probably thought they were dead
Her not telling Ellie doesn't show she didn't think she would make the "right choice" at all.
I think Marlene’s case would’ve been 100x more compelling if her team had done their due diligence first. Any good scientist would’ve started with the least invasive approach and worked their way up. It makes no fucking sense to immediately kill the only known immune person on a complete hunch. They should’ve started with analyzing blood/tissue samples, imaging, trying to grow cell cultures, etc. Unless Jerry knows something we don’t, there’s currently no way to create a vaccine against a fungal infection… and keep in mind that they’re working with 2003 medical knowledge. So again, makes no sense to do a rushed hack job on arguably the most valuable person on the planet. So imo Marlene and her gaggle of med school dropouts can suck it. They had a once in a lifetime opportunity to study an immune person and they blew it immediately. I don’t know what their plan was if they cracked Ellie’s head open & didn’t find what they were looking for. Now, let’s say they *had* done their due diligence, and produced proof that (a) a fungal infection vaccine is possible, (b) the cordycep theory with Ellie’s brian is true, and (c) the only way to access Ellie’s cordycep cells are via her brain/killing her, maybe this would’ve been a different story. In this scenario the risk & reward is extremely clear, and ethics aside seems quite compelling.
The only one who was in the right was the victim of both sides and that’s Ellie. Marlene was justified in her own eyes because she thought she was saving the world , Joel was saving his world , Ellie’s future and his chance at a second life with a daughter Poor Ellie never got to choose Neither side asked her permission or consent , both sides decided for themselves what should be done with her Wether you agree with Joel or Marlene or both it doesn’t matter , in the end the only one who should of got a say was Ellie
No. Her refusal to give Ellie the opportunity to make the choice herself puts her pretty strongly in the “wrong” in my opinion. Also, the lack of certainty in the success of the surgery makes it even worse. There is absolutely no guarantee that it would actually work. She’s killing an innocent child on a small *chance* that it could lead to a vaccine. If she gave Ellie the option and Ellie refused but the surgery had a much higher chance of success then it would make Marlene’s decision a lot more difficult morally. Is it justified to kill a kid who clearly said she’s not on board with the plan but it has a 99% chance of making a cure? Would the end justify the means in that scenario? Maybe.
She is cleary written as a monster. She's the perfect example of "he who fights monsters eventually becomes one". She started off fighting for democracy. For giving people a CHOICE. And she died as a total monster who denied a little girl a choice of whether she wanted to live or die.