THE LAST OF US - EPISODE 3 (Patreon)

Super big spoilers for the latest episode of The Last of Us! This is less a review, more something I wanted to do a short note on because it seems a topic of discussion. Also, please forgive if some of the sentences are a little wonkier than usual, my insomnia’s been atrocious and I’m going a little cross-eyed in the edit, but I want to get it out as everyone is talking…

*AGAIN, SPOILERS*

CW: Discussion of gay death, suicide, etc.

So. Judging by initial reactions, we have an episode a lot of people adore. And there are many reasons to adore it. It is a phenomenal episode and as pure a piece of emotional work as you can craft. Meaning it features a complete story, well-told, even with thoughtful time jumps. More resonantly, it shows a depth and sensitivity to gay intimacy. It also features amazing performances from beloved character actors Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett. And if I was doing a traditional recap, I would touch on all the lovely and sweet things found therein. But instead I’m going to focus on a singular topic. Because in a loud and angry corner of the internet, there are people who are screaming at each other. No, no, I don’t mean people who are angry for it gay-ifying TLOU or “going woke,” because seriously who gives a fuck about even engaging with anyone who thinks that. Instead, I’m talking  about whether or not the episode does or not fit a certain trope of queer cinema. Yes, that would be “bury your gays.” I can already hear some of you ugggggh-ing loudly, so to cut to the chase on whether the episode plays into the trope:, “it does and doesn’t,” which is probably why there’s a debate. But like most things, I don’t really care much for giving some kind of answer or taking a stupid side. Because it’s the structure AROUND the debate that goes deeper than that.

Part of the problem is that people seem to be upset that the argument is even happening. On one level, there are folks who want to rightfully celebrate anything that brings up such powerful  feelings and thus treats any criticism like a wrecking ball that ruins it. Criticism is not that, nor rarely can it do that ever. But please also note that in this particular case it isn’t about gay folks lecturing the straights. It’s actually more of a larger discussion both inside and outside the community. But it also requires getting into the specifics of the episode. Because we don’t see a member of our gay couple (Offerman and Bartlett) succumb to murder or sudden tragedy. Instead, they earn a nice long life (at least by apocalypse standards). Yet, death still comes, but in that natural way. He’s not done in by a plant zombie, nor raiders. No, it’s that Murray Bartlett gets a terrible illness (implied to be a kind of cancer) and doesn’t have much time left. He tells his partner Nick Offerman to love him in the way he wants to be loved, which means for them to have one last beautiful day, a great meal, and then put a lot of drugs in his wine for an assisted suicide. The moment comes, but Offerman already made the decision to take enough drugs, too. Which means they will go out together. They then go off to bed together. They die, but they die on their own self-made terms. Which is why it largely seems like a direct bit of conscious contrarianism to the trope… and yet, yes, they still die.

Now, I’m finding that the people who getting angry at people for even bringing up the “bury your gays” trope are assuming it’s because we’re taking it too literally. As if we’re just upset at the episode for violating the letter of the law, but not the spirit of it. And I’m talking, like full on angry TAKE ONE MEDIA LITERACY CLASS!!! type reactions (but i’m not going to link them to put on blast. Because, yes, it’s me, mister non-media-understand-er who is always looking to reduce something to a trope and move on). But, look, this is the kind of thing that brings up a whole range of emotions. And implying that any kind of community has to be a monolith of agreement, especially on things like this, is foolhardy. I even find there even tends to be a bit of a generational divide on this as older people tend to be more sensitive to the trope (perhaps due to experiencing it more), but that’s also not always the case, either. It’s just there’s a reason this discussion happens again and again in criticism. Because the “bury your gays” trope is not JUST about the spirit in which things are done and reading it accordingly. In fact, there are so many times it’s done in amazing spirit. The reason people write about “bury your gays” trope so damn much is…

Because it seemingly always happens, no matter what.

Just again and again and again and again and again and again. Seemingly every gay plot-line in media has to go to the place of death. The list is staggering (it was even a huge part of my discussion about The Last of Us Part II and the problems of being “included” in the apocalypse). Somehow, someway, and it doesn’t matter how gracefully treated otherwise, it seemingly always happens. I mean this is the SECOND time in two years that a gay Murray Bartlett character has been on an HBO show where he dies. Are both times filled with all sorts of interesting complex nuance, from the tragic-comedic to nobly heartbreaking? Of course they are! But that’s the whole point. It always happens anyways. And as everyone gets tripped up on the meaning and nuance of each telling, we keep failing to talk about the larger set of conditions, purpose, and catharsis involved with WHY the trop happens in the first place and how it really plays into how people view things from the onset.

Because the reason it happens so often is the age old case of sympathy versus empathy. Sympathetic straight creators often view gay people lovingly, but still as “the other” in society and thus they think the way to maximize emotion in the viewer (who is like them) is to make the most gut-wrenching story possible, often invoking a sense of loss. Maximum anguish = maximum minds changed or something (there are similar parallels to the kinds of historical stories told about racism in America). And with queer cinema, even if that loss or end point is a beautiful one, the point is to make it part of some grand operatic ending. Again, this is all about getting that sympathy… But it looks different from the place of empathy. That is when you’re the person supposedly being depicted. Which means the long-running narrative for queer kids who watch media is not the pleas for sympathy, but instilling the narrative of fear. “Bury your gays” means you are doomed. That being gay equals death. And growing up in deeply homophobic Boston, where I didn’t understand my attraction to men, I can’t tell you how much I deeply internalized this. It’s all part of the same equation and ecosystem., really And I can’t help but look back at all the movies and shows that reinforced this with outrageous sensitivity. I feel the weight of all that’s come before. And so, in 2023, I have to simply ask of any piece of art in question, does this narrative feed into that fear or help set it free?

Again, here it’s the half-measure answer of “it does and it doesn’t.” Because while the episode avoids all the murder-y specters of the trope, the thing about “bury your gays” is how often the burying stories are beautifully romanticized, too. It’s not just the clutching of the shirt in something like Brokeback Mountain. It’s more like the plot-line in TAZ, which is so well-meaning, but just has the two gay characters magically turn into trees. The grand romantic gesture is PART of the burial. And here, note the way Bartlett’s character calls Offerman’s mutual-drug-taking a grand gesture of romanticism all the same, even if there’s a tinge of recognition in it. And in going with this, it inadvertently evokes the oft-held notion that queer love is doomed in a different way, because it is thing so precious, so pure, and so impossible, that if you were to lose it you might as well just fucking kill yourself. Because why even leave space for grief? Please forget the logic of the apocalypse and the chances of meeting someone else, etc. It’s all a metaphor anyway. And I know I’m putting those statements bluntly, but if that’s the feeling it stirs up inside, then that’s the feeling it stirs up. Because that’s what happens when it always ends there… Because your death is apparently always more touching than your life.

Now, if your response to any of this is to look at burying / not burying as if it’s some fucking rulebook we all have to follow, that’s also missing the point. It’s not even a “strike” against the show (I mean look at the responses, it won). My question is this: if it is something we’re aware of with tropes, why does it always ALWAYS seem to end there anyway? Even if just half-way? What is preventing us from telling the stories that don’t even end up halfway?

As part of that wondering, let’s imagine a simple, ever so slight alternative for the end of this episode. Let’s say they’re still in that late period of the relationship. We know Bartlett’s character is sick. We could even know their end plan is coming and see them talk about it… But what is lost in actually having Joel and Ellie come to visit them in that late stage? To see them. To talk. To see the things Offerman’s character is willing to give up. To see him make those same statements to Joel, especially as he has the last moments with his partner still there… if only for the moment at hand. And as Joel and Ellie drive off, it is not with two corpses left slightly off screen, but two men, still in the midst of appreciating the time they have… To echo the theme, what is more “live for what you have right now?” than that? What about the story would this change affect in any way? From the plotting to the impact? And in a weird way, the choice to go have them suicide pact actually betrays some of the thematic spirit of what’s going on and what they are ultimately saying…

For the rest of this paragraph [SPOILERS FOR THE FIRST GAME AND PROBABLE EVENTS OF THIS FIRST SEASON] So when Offerman is talking about holding onto what you have in the letter, he’s basically spelling out EXACTLY the thing that will likely happen at the end of the first season (or at least that we know is coming at some point in this narrative, because this season may end on the winter part and joel’s injury and having rabbit arrow open next, or whatever I’m getting distracted). The point is, it’s all building to that essential moment where Ellie goes in for surgery and rather than let her die, Joel kills the doctors and takes her away and lies about what happened cause he can’t imagine a life without her. Offerman’s note is DIRECTLY invoking this as set-up. But the thing I can’t stop thinking about is how this plays against Bartlett’s actions in a way. Like, in the game, Ellie genuinely wants the romantic death. In the sense she’s been through hell and wants to be of use and to save the world. In a way, it’s the same spirit in which Bartlett says “love me as I want to be loved.” It’s easy to think “She’s just a kid” etc. But Joel doesn’t abide. To be clear, I think it’s powerful and I get it and even agree with it. The entire game is essentially an argument for non-romanticization of such sacrifice (though that’s reductive, it’s obviously more complex). For that, I adore the ending. And you can get into how much the second game is about the responsibility for all the choices made. But there’s a piece of reflexiveness I can’t get out of my mind. Namely, why is the romanticization celebrated for the gay couple and yet not in Ellie’s attempted choice? I understand the way the scenarios are radically different. I really do. I’m just saying I think there’s a reason we choose certain narratives for some characters and not for others. And it can’t help but hang over how I see the way this story gets told [END SPOILERS].

To reiterate, I don’t think any one way about any of this. The whole point of writing about the complexity of this stuff is so we can hold competing ideas in our head. I know it can be read with humane understanding in either direction. But in the end, it’s less about the intellectualization of all the possible reactions and more about reflecting on our own. Which is why I want to talk about the emotional experience of catharsis. Because the notion of storytelling catharsis is built upon a simple idea: you see something early on, it creates a want inside the viewer, we see conflicts preventing us getting the thing we want, then we are delivered the catharsis in the most satisfying way possible… So it immediately gets to that question with gay stories, what do you actually want?

I was watching this episode with a friend and the moment Bartlett started speaking, from coding, I immediately registered “oh they’re gonna do a gay plot-line” and at the same exact time I realized “oh god I’m going to have to watch them die.” With that realization, my stomach clamped up. I was filled with this immense, inescapable feeling of dread. I don’t want them to die, but somehow, someway, I knew they would. But I wanted them to be alive. The episode plays with the tension that they’ll die this way or that way, but in the end, it’s not the way you think, but yes, they die. Because in the end, regardless of on whose terms, it was probably what these characters were really there for… So my question is this…

if the show went with that alternative idea of what I “want,” that is them being alive and them watching Joel and Ellie go off… Would that not feel cathartic enough to you? Why wouldn’t it? I ask because it’s 100% more cathartic for me. And to be clear, I don’t expect a piece of media to cater to me. But I can ask why it NEVER does. Specifically with this trope, I can ask why this sort of thing is 95% of what happens in these stories and why it’s always so cathartic for everyone else? Honestly, why is it more powerful if they die, regardless of circumstance? Because, in the end, who is this all really for? I know that’s all annoying or even boring to talk about. I know you are probably tired of reading or hearing about it. But I can assure you, I’m so much more tired of writing about it. I am so completely over it. I want to be talking about a billion other things. The problem is, whether it's done inelegantly or with all the grace and respect in the world… It just keeps happening.

And I want to know why people can't stop.

<3HULK