"Endure and Survive" is the fifth episode of the first season of the American post-apocalyptic drama television series The Last of Us. The episode was written by series co-creator Craig Mazin and directed by Jeremy Webb. It was released online on HBO Max and HBO on Demand on February 10, 2023, ahead of its broadcast on HBO on February 12. In the episode, Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) agree to escape Kansas City, Missouri, with Henry (Lamar Johnson) and his brother Sam (Keivonn Montreal Woodard), who are being hunted by resistance leader Kathleen (Melanie Lynskey) and her second-in-command Perry (Jeffrey Pierce).
The episode was primarily filmed in April 2022. A full set was built in an empty lot in nine weeks for use in an action sequence in the episode. Filmed over four weeks, the sequence used around 70 actors dressed by 70 prosthetics artists. "Endure and Survive" introduced a "bloater", a mutated creature significantly larger and stronger than most other infected; the costume was built using prosthetics and later emphasized using visual effects.
The episode received positive reviews, with praise for its writing, direction, cinematography, and performances of Johnson, Woodard, Lynskey, and Ramsey. It was watched by 11.6 million viewers within three days. The episode received several nominations at the 75th Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards, including for Johnson, Lynskey, and Woodard, and editors Timothy A. Good and Emily Mendez won Outstanding Picture Editing.
Plot After a resistance movement overthrows the government and takes control of Kansas City, Missouri, their leader Kathleen Coghlan sets out to find Henry Burrell, whom she blames for the death of her brother Michael. Henry and his young, deaf brother Sam take refuge with elderly doctor Edelstein, who fails to return from a scouting trip ten days later. The brothers track down Joel and Ellie, who agree to help them escape. Kathleen confides to her second-in-command Perry that Michael had told her to forgive Henry before his execution, but she contends that this advice did not work out for Michael; she vows vengeance instead, and Perry agrees.
Henry reveals to Joel that he was a FEDRA collaborator prior to the revolution, angering Joel. He proposes using the abandoned tunnels under the city to avoid Kathleen's followers. Joel hesitantly agrees while Ellie continues to bond with Sam. Henry admits he betrayed Michael to obtain medication for Sam's leukemia. After they leave the tunnels, a sniper pins down the group in a cul-de-sac. Joel kills him, but not before he alerts Kathleen who arrives with an armed militia.
Kathleen rebukes Henry's reason for betraying Michael and declares that Sam deserved to succumb to his leukemia. As she prepares to kill him, a damaged truck crashes through the ground and releases a massive crowd of infected, including a heavily mutated specimen known as a "bloater" which tears Perry apart. Joel provides covering fire while Ellie rescues Sam and Henry. Kathleen corners them and again prepares to kill Henry but is ambushed and mauled to death by a child clicker. Joel, Ellie, Sam, and Henry flee while the infected head towards the city.
At a motel later that night, Henry accepts Joel's invitation to join him and Ellie in Wyoming. Sam reveals to Ellie that an infected bit him during the attack. Ellie spreads her blood on Sam's bite mark, hoping it will cure him. She promises to stay up with him through the night, but inadvertently falls asleep. The next morning, an infected Sam attacks her, prompting Henry to shoot him with Joel's gun. Horrified, Henry shoots himself. Joel and Ellie bury the brothers, and Ellie leaves a written apology on Sam's grave before leaving with Joel.
Production Conception and writing
"Endure and Survive" was written by Craig Mazin and directed by Jeremy Webb. The Directors Guild of Canada revealed Webb would direct for the series in January 2022. Rotten Tomatoes revealed the episode's title in January 2023. The Last of Us series co-creators Mazin and Neil Druckmann, the latter of whom wrote and co-directed the video game on which the series is based, found the differing perspectives of the television series granted an opportunity to explore the backstory of Kansas City—a replacement of Pittsburgh from the game—and show the stories behind the violence, the aftermath of which Joel and Ellie discover in the game.
The writers wanted to honor the game's unseen character Ish—who built a community in tunnels underneath the city—but found they could not properly depict it in the episode, opting for brief references. Mazin felt a standalone episode focusing on Ish may have worked but found environmental storytelling more effective. The writers understood the game's sniper sequence would have translated poorly to television and chose to make the shooter an old man to add sadness to the scene. While meeting with Druckmann and Webb in Santa Monica, California, Mazin realized the full action sequence would be more effective at night—as opposed to day like the game—as its visuals and the creepiness of infected would be improved. The episode's credits use the song "Fuel to Fire" by Agnes Obel, which subsequently ranked fifth on Billboards Top TV Songs chart for February, with 378,000 streams and 1,000 downloads.
Casting and characters Lamar Johnson and Keivonn Montreal Woodard's casting as Henry and Sam was announced in August 2021. Johnson recalled his casting process occurred quickly: he sent his audition tape on Monday, received the role by Wednesday, departed for the set by Saturday, and began filming by Wednesday. He had played the game and wanted to avoid imitating the original performance due to its impact. He was nervous about the role due to the character's importance, but found his nervousness prompted him to challenge himself. Mazin provided information to Johnson regarding Henry's backstory to help him understand the character. Johnson felt Henry was hurt by his own actions against Michael, but Sam was ultimately more important to him. Mazin and Druckmann had several long discussions regarding Henry's fate and considered many alternatives, but ultimately considered his suicide, like in the game, reflected that he had nothing left after Sam's death. Johnson found the final scenes emotionally draining due to his relationship with Woodard; he "tried to be as present and authentic as possible" as he considered it the most important and iconic scene of the characters, and felt Pedro Pascal did the same opposite him as Joel. He was allowed to experiment with the scene, including performing lines similar to the game; he wanted to portray Henry's shock and confusion at the sudden events. Johnson believed Henry's final decision was to join Sam, as he felt they were likely religious. He recalled crying behind the camera with Webb during Ellie's final scene with Sam.
Bella Ramsey, who portrays Ellie, felt Sam brought out Ellie's childlike energy, which they largely attributed to Woodard. Mazin wrote Sam as deaf—a change from the game—to avoid his relationship with Henry feeling repetitious of Ellie's with Joel, which he felt would have been emphasized due to the different perspectives of the series. He had been watching the television series This Close (2018–2019)—which follows two deaf characters—and felt it may have influenced his decision. He found it automatically introduced intimacy to the scenes due to their quietness, which contrasted with Ellie's talkative nature. Druckmann was instantly drawn to the idea and wished he had included it in the game. Mazin hired This Close co-creator Shoshannah Stern to review the scripts. The production team faced difficulties in casting Sam; they were met with minimal candidates. In February 2021, Mazin distributed a casting call for a boy aged 8–14 who is deaf, black, and proficient in American Sign Language (ASL) or Black American Sign Language; Deaf West Theatre confirmed this was for the character of Sam. He had expected to receive around 80 auditions, but ultimately got about five, including Woodard; it was his first acting role.
Mazin felt Sam's leukemia was a more significant part of his story than his deafness. CJ Jones, whom Mazin met through Stern, acted as Woodard's liaison to the crew and helped teach ASL to cast and crew; Johnson began learning the language via Zoom shortly after arriving in Calgary, and spent his time away from set learning the language. He did not want viewers to think his knowledge of the language was fake, and considered his performance important for deaf representation. He felt spending time around Woodard for production gave him a better grasp on the language; Woodard would sometimes correct his mistakes in scenes. Ramsey similarly learned ASL during production. Sam's age was reduced from the game to allow him to look up to Ellie; Mazin felt this justified his revelation of his bite to Ellie, which does not occur in the game. In portraying Sam's bravery, Woodard recalled his own experiences of being told to stay brave after his father died. Johnson and Woodard worked on the series for two-and-a-half months.
Mazin and Druckmann did not want characters like Kathleen to feel like non-player characters from a video game, opting to give them full stories to humanize them and justify their actions. They felt adding a connection between Kathleen and Henry—and, by extension, to Joel and Ellie—made the storylines more effective and justified the different perspectives. Mazin wanted Kathleen's death to represent the notion of violent actions meeting violent ends, and Druckmann felt her obsession with justice led her to become distracted from her own survival. Melanie Lynskey knew of Kathleen's fate when she accepted the role. She found the scene easy to film due to the coordination of the team, as they had been planning for weeks. Mazin found it important that Kathleen was killed by a child, as minutes earlier she had told Henry that children die all the time. Lynskey recorded her death sounds as automated dialogue replacement (ADR); Mazin and Druckmann directed her to "sound like someone was ripping your throat out". Lynskey's husband Jason Ritter had a cameo appearance as an infected creature.
Jeffrey Pierce felt Perry was in love with Kathleen, which prompted several of his actions. He considered Perry's sacrifice selfless as it was to allow Kathleen to escape, and thought it reflected Perry's constant wish to be a hero. Mazin had told Pierce earlier that he was "gonna get the best death of the entire season". Pierce played the role akin to a rōnin from an Akira Kurosawa film and saw his death as an honorable "samurai death", sacrificing himself for the woman he loves.
Filming
"Endure and Survive" was primarily filmed in April 2022, shortly before production finished on the season finale. Eben Bolter worked as cinematographer for the episode. Johnson and Woodard were on set in Calgary on March 23, 2022. The classroom and tunnels were built in the cellar underneath the old Inglewood Brewery in Calgary; production designer John Paino and his team enjoyed the "kind of dankness" it had. The team mapped the room with laser scanning to allow the visual effects team to extend the hallways. Production took place around the Calgary Courts Centre and Victoria Park in May. Pascal and Ramsey were spotted on set in Calgary in May, followed some days later by military vehicles representing FEDRA.