Please Hold to My Hand

"Please Hold to My Hand" is the fourth episode of the first season, and the fourth episode overall, of HBO's The Last of Us. The episode was directed by Jeremy Webb and written by series creator Craig Mazin. The episode aired on HBO on February 5, 2023.

Synopsis[]

After a harrowing trek across a desolate United States, Joel and Ellie find themselves navigating a dangerous Kansas City on foot. Later, rebel leader Kathleen instigates a manhunt—one that pits her violent civilian militia against the world's best hope.

Cast and characters[]

Main cast

• Pedro Pascal as Joel Miller
• Bella Ramsey as Ellie Williams

Guest starring

• Lamar Johnson as Henry Burrell
• Melanie Lynskey as Kathleen Coghlan
• Keivonn Montreal Woodard as Sam Burrell
• Jeffrey Pierce as Perry
• John Getz as Edelstein
• Juan Magana as Bryan

Co-starring

• Eric Breker as Bryan's father

Uncredited

• Patrick Chan as stranger
• Kory Grim as scavenger

Plot[]

Road trip[]

In a gas station bathroom, Ellie plays around with the gun she stole from Bill and Frank, making sure to remove the magazine and the bullet in the chamber before practicing her stance in a mirror. After storing it in her backpack, she heads outside to find Joel siphoning gas for the truck from an abandoned car: they have to make a stop for gas almost every hour due to the fuel's age, compared to the 10-12 hours that cars used to drive on a full tank of gas. To pass the time, she pulls out No Pun Intended: Volume Too by Will Livingston and tries reading a series of bad puns to an unreceptive Joel. As they head back on the road, Ellie finds another cassette tape, this one of Hank Williams' "Alone and Forsaken", which Joel enjoys. She also finds one of Bill's porn magazines, and messes with Joel by marveling at the images and pretending to not know why the pages are sticky, before tossing the magazine out the window. They continue on their way, observing the ruins of civilization as they drive.

As dusk falls, Joel decides to call it a day and drives them into a wooded area to camp for the night. He serves Ellie some twenty-year old cans of Chef Boyardee ravioli, which they both agree is pretty good. Joel plans to sleep for the night, before driving non-stop to Wyoming for the next 24 hours and hopefully get there by the next morning. Ellie suggests they start a fire, which Joel objects to strongly: rather than alert any infected, it will alert other people, whom Joel warns will do far more than just rob them. As they climb into their sleeping bags, Joel sets his rifle up next to him. Ellie tries to lighten the mood before sleeping by asking, "Why did the scarecrow get an award?"; Joel, slightly amused, replies "Because he was outstanding in his field" before telling Ellie to go to sleep. Ellie asks if anyone will find them out in the wild, which Joel denies. As Ellie drifts off, however, Joel's paranoia gets the better of him and he climbs out of his sleeping bag to keep guard with this gun all night.

Ellie wakes up the next morning to Joel making coffee, the smell of which she finds disgusting. As they drive, she expresses incredulity that it is what Starbucks used to serve, to which Joel slurps it loudly in response. She asks him about Tommy: Joel explains his last known location was somewhere near Cody, Wyoming, and if he is not there he will be in a nearby settlement. With some prodding from Ellie, Joel further explains Tommy has always wanted to be a hero, and so enlisted in the Army after graduating high school; however, he became disillusioned after serving in Operation Desert Storm. After the Outbreak, Joel followed him from Texas to the Boston QZ to make sure he would not get into trouble. It was there that they met Tess and Marlene, the latter of whom triggered Tommy's dreams of saving the world by recruiting him into the Fireflies. However, the last Joel heard he had also quit and is on his own, prompting Joel's mission to find him. Ellie asks why Joel is so determined to keep on going if he has given up on the world. Joel retorts that she has not seen the world, but he keeps going for family. Ellie points out she's not family; Joel agrees, saying "You're cargo," but he made a promise to Tess.

Ambush in Kansas City[]

As they arrive in Kansas City, Missouri, they find the road blocked by an abandoned truck. Faced with a clear road up ahead versus having to drive back and around the city, delaying their arrival in Wyoming, Joel resolves to take a detour through the city streets and get back on the Interstate from there. However, they quickly become lost navigating the streets, failing to notice recently burned body piles. They soon come across the entrance to the Kansas City QZ, but are alarmed to see no FEDRA presence. They are soon interrupted by a man in the street claiming to be injured. However, Joel is not fooled, and immediately steps on the accelerator: sure enough, the man turns out to be a rebel, and they are quickly ambushed and crash the car into an abandoned laundromat.

Joel instructs Ellie to hide in a hole in a wall, before using his rifle to kill two revolutionaries shooting at them. As he reloads, however, he is ambushed by a third raider who attempts to choke him to death. However, Ellie gets the drop on him with her gun, shooting him in the back and paralyzing him. Ellie watches as the man, whose name is Bryan, starts pleading for his life. Joel tells Ellie to get back behind the wall, which she does. She listens as Joel ignores Bryan's frantic pleas for mercy and stabs him to death. Disturbed, Ellie feigns indifference upon reuniting with Joel as they venture outside. They watch as armored vehicles discover the carnage before heading into another building.

In the remains of a FEDRA Detention Center, Kathleen, the leader of the revolutionaries, interrogates Dr. Edelstein regarding the whereabouts of Henry Burrell, whom she blames for causing the death of her brother by ratting him out to FEDRA. Edelstein tells her she is taking things too far, which she denies, claiming FEDRA forced her hand, and demands at gunpoint he reveal where Henry is. Edelstein remains silent, and they are interrupted by the arrival of a truck carrying the bodies of the people Joel killed. Kathleen's lieutenant, Perry, explains he thinks the killers were outsiders. Kathleen concludes they must have been brought in by Henry. Furious, Kathleen returns to the detention block and kills Edelstein before instructing the revolutionaries to find any "collaborators" and kill them.

The revolutionaries take to the streets in their trucks, forcing Joel and Ellie to hide in an abandoned bar. As they wait for the coast to clear, Joel apologizes for putting Ellie in a situation where she had to kill or seriously injure someone, acknowledging she is just a kid. Though Ellie wipes some tears away, she admits it was not actually the first time she has hurt someone. Joel gives her the gun back, and makes sure she understands basic gun safety, which she explains she learned in FEDRA school. He then gives her some tricks on how to hold it before entrusting it to her, telling her to hide it in her backpack. However, Ellie puts it in her coat pocket instead before heading back to the streets.

Navigating the city[]

Kathleen checks in with Perry, reporting no sign of Henry or the people who killed her men. However, Perry escorts her into the attic of a nearby house, where they find several drawings clearly made by a child. She surmises that Henry is running low on supplies but that he will not let "Sam" starve, telling Perry to guard the provisions. However, Perry points her to a more pressing matter: he takes her into the basement of another building, where they find an indentation in the ground from which something is growing. Perry suggests alerting the others, but Kathleen tells him to wait until they deal with Henry and seal off the building until then.

Joel and Ellie break into a high rise apartment building, hoping to identify a clear route using the view from one of the upper floors. As they climb, Ellie asks how he recognized the ambush: Joel explains he had both seen and done the trick himself with Tess and Tommy. Ellie questions if Joel has killed innocent people, to which he does not respond. They manage to make it up thirty-three floors before Joel runs out of steam, and camp out in one of the abandoned apartments. Ellie watches with bewilderment as Joel places broken glass between them and the door so no one can sneak up on them. As they lie on makeshift bedding, Joel follows up on their previous discussion by asking what she meant about the day's events not being her first time hurting someone, which she refuses to answer. He accepts this and reiterates it is not fair for her to have to deal with what they have seen at her age. Ellie responds to his honesty by admitting she noticed he is slightly hard of hearing in his right ear, which he attributes to his years of firing guns. Before he can go to sleep, Ellie catches him off guard by revealing diarrhea is hereditary: "It runs in your jeans." Joel is unable to stifle his laugh, and he manages to drift off to sleep at ease.

However, having turned over and thus covered his good ear in his sleep, he is awoken by the sound of Ellie shouting for him. He opens his eyes to see her being held at gunpoint by a man, and turns to see a young boy also pointing a gun at him, who signals them to be quiet.

Reception[]

The fourth episode aired on February 5, 2023 and was watched by 7.5 million viewers in the U.S. overnight.^[1]

Like previous episodes, it oversaw an increase in viewership, revealing the show continued to gain popularity among viewers tuning in weekly. Critics praised the episode for its further focus on Joel and Ellie's relationship, though faced some criticism for its slower pace and distinct changes to the video game's narrative with the introduction of Kathleen and her group. Despite that, the cliff-hanger ending was supported and the overall consensus was favorable, with the average of 67,000 views on IMDB rating it 8.4 out of 10.^[2]

Transcript[]

Main article: Please Hold to My Hand/Transcript

Behind the scenes[]

Featured music[]

• "Alone and Forsaken" by Hank Williams, plays during a driving montage before reaching Kansas City. The episode's title references lyrics from the song, ^[3] which was also used during a similar scene in the video game, as well as one of the series trailers.^[4]
  • The lyrics represented Ellie's promises to Joel and foreshadowed her apparent immaturity.^[5]
• "True Faith" by Lotte Kestner, plays during the end credits.^[6] Kestner's version was previously covered by Ashley Johnson in-character as Ellie Williams in a 2020 trailer for The Last of Us Part II.^[7]

Production[]

• In this episode, Kansas City replaces Pittsburgh as seen in the video game on which the series is based. Co-creator Craig Mazin found the production locations in Canada more closely imitated Kansas City and felt Pittsburgh was not important enough to the story to justify the difficulty of reproducing it. Co-creator Neil Druckmann, who wrote and co-directed the video game, considered it a superficial change as the characters are more important than the location. He and Mazin felt the additional distance to Kansas City justified the story beats and character development.^[8]
  • Mazin found Joel's decision to allow Ellie to use a gun demonstrated his trust in her, and considered it "the most father-daughter moment they've had".^[9]
• Mazin enjoyed the use of Ellie's joke book in the game and felt its inclusion in the series allowed effective development between her and Joel.^[10]
• Joel and Ellie enjoy a can of twenty-year old Chef Boyardee ravioli during this episode. Although there have been no studies on the subject, it is generally believed canned food items are safe to eat long past the expiration date on the label, so long as the can is not damaged in the intervening time. However, the flavor will most likely degrade over time, and the food will have a distinct metallic taste that may not be seen as appetizing, especially after twenty years.^[11]

Easter eggs and references[]

• A warning sign that says, "WLF, TRESPASSERS KILLED ON SIGHT" can be seen at the Kansas City QZ main gate in this episode.^[12] It is the same warning sign from the video game, The Last of Us Part II, where it was found at the Seattle QZ main gate.^[13]

Gallery[]

Promotional images[]

"The Journey" graphic released by HBO Max Nordic.

Official stills[]

Joel and Ellie wander Kansas City at night.

Perry outside the detention center.

Perry beside one of the resistance's trucks.

Joel checking the streets for signs of the resistance.

Joel tries to console Ellie after killing Bryan.

Joel and Ellie hiding in a Hi-Lo bar.

Kathleen surveys the crash site.

Kathleen addressing her followers.

Kathleen stands with her group.

Kathleen sees Bryan's corpse.

Kathleen interrogating Edelstein.

Behind the scenes[]

Videos[]

Episode 4 Preview - The Last of Us - HBO Max

The Last of Us - Inside the Episode - 4 - HBO Max

Episode 4 - The Last of Us Podcast - HBO Max

External links[]

• Watch "Please, Hold My Hand" on HBO Max
• Listen to The Last of Us Official Playlist on Spotify
• "Please Hold to My Hand" at IMDb

References[]