"Through the Valley" is the second episode of the second season of the American post-apocalyptic drama television series The Last of Us. Written by series co-creator Craig Mazin and directed by Mark Mylod, it aired on HBO on April 20, 2025. The episode follows Ellie (Bella Ramsey) and Jesse (Young Mazino) on patrol as they search for Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Dina (Isabela Merced), while Tommy (Gabriel Luna) prepares for an attack on Jackson, Wyoming, and Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) seeks revenge against Joel.
The episode was filmed in early 2024. The attack on Jackson, written to provide ongoing character conflict and motivations, was filmed over almost four weeks and required more than 600 visual effects shots, around 100 extras, and dozens of stunt performers. The writers chose to depict Joel's death early in the season as it sets its narrative in motion. Critics praised the episode's direction, cinematography, writing, and Pascal, Ramsey, and Dever's performances, the latter being nominated for Guest Actress in a Drama Series at the Emmy Awards; some felt the Jackson attack overshadowed Joel's death, while others lauded the juxtaposition. The episode was watched by 643,000 viewers on linear television.
Plot Sheltering with her group in an abandoned lodge near Jackson, Wyoming, Abby has a dream in which she warns her past self not to enter the room in which her father was killed. When she awakens, she focuses on her mission to kill Joel, while her friends, concerned about the town's security and her lack of a plan, consider retreating. Abby leaves to survey Jackson, and her friend Owen tells the rest of the group that he will try to convince her to return to Seattle.
Ellie tells Jesse that she wants to go on patrol with Joel, but Jesse informs her that he has already left with Dina. Abby accidentally awakens a large horde of infected hiding under the snow, and is rescued by Joel and Dina. In Jackson, the infected tendrils are discovered, redirecting the horde to the town, leading to a battle in which Jackson suffers heavy damage and casualties; Tommy defends his wife Maria against a bloater by drawing it away and killing it with a flamethrower.
Abby lures Joel and Dina to the lodge, saying she has friends who can help them defend Jackson. After knocking out Dina, Abby reveals herself to be the daughter of the Firefly doctor who Joel killed in Salt Lake City. She shoots Joel in the knee with a shotgun and repeatedly hits his knee wound with a golf club, beating him until the club breaks in two. Ellie, who had been searching for Joel and Dina, is restrained and forced to watch as Abby kills Joel by impaling his neck with the broken club. Ellie swears to kill Abby as revenge, but the group spares her and leaves. Jackson begins to recover from the carnage of the battle, as Ellie, Dina, and Jesse return home with Joel's body.
Production Conception and writing
"Through the Valley" was written by The Last of Us series co-creator Craig Mazin and directed by Mark Mylod. Mazin had wanted Mylod to work on the first season, but he was busy directing Succession. After Mylod mentioned wanting to work with Mazin during a panel, Mazin sent him the episode's script, which Mylod read and found irresistible. He previously directed the Game of Thrones episode "The Broken Man" (2016), which marked the first acting role for Bella Ramsey (who portrays Ellie). Mazin felt Mylod's experience in directing different genres made him suitable for the series, especially balancing the action scenes in Jackson and the delicacy in Joel's death. Deadline published Mazin's script in June 2025, considering it among the year's best drama episodes.
In The Last of Us Part II (2020), the game on which the second season is based, Joel is paired with Tommy on patrol and Ellie is paired with Dina; Joel was paired with Dina in the episode to show their relationship (as they do not interact in the game) and to more closely connect her with Joel's death. Keeping Dina separate from Ellie also made their ongoing relationship more ambiguous. Mazin felt it gave another reason for Joel not to defend himself against Abby, as doing so risked Dina's life. Ramsey found it added an element of resentment for Ellie, as Joel's final day was spent with Dina instead of her. Pairing Ellie with Jesse also allowed focus on their relationship.
Mazin learned of Joel's death during the development of Part II, before he began writing the show's first season. He felt it was the correct narrative decision and did not wish to remove it from the series, reasoning that its brutality was an effective consequence of Joel's actions. The writers spent a long time deciding which episode should depict Joel's death, and after briefly considering delaying it to later in the season, they decided against it. Mazin felt that plotting it in the season's second episode was appropriate after witnessing Joel and Ellie's strained relationship in the first. Neil Druckmann, the series co-creator who wrote and co-directed the games, thought it should occur early in the season, to parallel when its story begins in earnest; he believed plotting it later would feel like they "were kind of dragging [their] feet". Mazin also considered the real implications of leaving Joel's death until later in the season, understanding that viewers who had played the game would constantly be aware that it had not yet occurred, and he did not want to feel like the writers were "toying with everybody".
Mylod was more nervous about filming Joel's death than the action scenes due to its impact and his desire to do justice to the game's performances. Druckmann felt depicting its brutality allowed viewers to understand the characters' mindsets and their subsequent decisions, though it was reduced slightly from the game due to the realism of live action. Mazin and Mylod spent a long time discussing what level of violence to depict, believing it was necessary to justify Abby's actions while also being restrained enough to avoid glorifying it. The brutality was initially intended to be more subtle but Mylod thought avoiding showing Joel's death felt "coy" and like they "were ducking out". Mazin thought showing Abby's fists hitting Joel's face "would have been gratuitous and sort of action movie-ish", not reflective of the scene's true sadness and reprehensibility, while Mylod "wanted to avoid overt torture". In the game, Abby kills Joel with a final blow of the golf club, but Mazin felt this could not reasonably be achieved in the episode, instead seeking realism in the violence. Ellie's crawl towards Joel was present in Mazin's first draft of the script, reflecting her need to be with him. Mazin wrote unspoken dialogue in his scripts in italics to allow the actors to understand the characters' motivations; when Joel attempts to move after Ellie pleads with him to get up—in contrast to the game—the script clarified that he was aware of her presence and sought to act for her:
The writers felt the lack of a player character allowed the series to show attacks on Jackson that are not depicted in the game. Druckmann appreciated the depiction of the infected's scale, which is implied in the games and first season but rarely demonstrated. The writers' familiarity with the show's production allowed for more action sequences, through which they maintained connections to character development. Mazin felt relationships like Tommy and Maria's increased the stakes, making it feel like more than "just a fight". Druckmann thought the inclusion of the siege added more ongoing conflict for the characters as they are dealing with more losses than just Joel, and Mazin felt the characters' loss of stability and safety in Jackson was palpable. Tommy's use of a flamethrower against the bloater is a reference to a weapon in the games and reflected the fear Mazin felt during gameplay. The battle originally featured two or three bloaters but was trimmed to one in post-production. The sequence with the frozen infected was expanded upon from the same scene in the game, whereas other sequences such as Abby being chased by the horde and saved by Joel were adapted more faithfully.
Casting and characters
Pedro Pascal, who portrays Joel, was aware of the character's death when he first accepted the role. He felt unchanged while filming until his gory makeup and prosthetics were applied, which he felt "killed the vibe completely as soon as anyone set their eyes on me" out of grief. Mazin was not concerned about losing Pascal's popularity in his departure from the series, noting that the world and story are "the star". Pascal bonded with Kaitlyn Dever, who portrays Abby; he found their close relationship ironic considering their characters' conflict but felt it made them closer. Dever struggled to watch Joel and Ellie's emotional scene during filming.
Ramsey felt sick and cried while reading the script—a first for them. They prepared for Joel's death scene by treating it as ordinary, listening to the Buckwheat Boyz's "Peanut Butter Jelly Time" on a loop until seconds before each take to offset the darkness and exhaustion. They felt like they were experiencing the events for the first time alongside Ellie, recalling "it just all came out" during filming but finding it generally easier to perform than other moments as they knew "exactly what that scene needs to be". Ramsey performed the sequence around six times. They immediately smiled after each take to "snap out of it", and felt an "exhausted satisfaction and catharsis" after filming was completed. Ramsey performed 13 takes reacting to Joel's death. Mazin felt Ellie begging Joel to "get up" was imitative of the audience who felt the same. As Ellie looks upon Joel after he is killed, the script describes her face as "etched in pain... all at once a frightened, sobbing child and a terrible, vindictive monster".
Gabriel Luna, who portrays Tommy, anticipated the Jackson assault sequence since reading the script, comparing it to Game of Throness "Battle of the Bastards" (2016). With Rutina Wesley, who portrays Maria, he underwent firearms and stunt training, including with recreations of guns used in the game such as Tommy's M1 Garand. Luna practiced with a flamethrower for several minutes the day before filming; he later had recurring visions of flaming figures running towards him, which he suspected was due to trauma. He ensured he had his friend, stuntman Ty Provost, present on set to help him with stunts. Luna was bothered by Tommy's incapacitation during Joel's death in the game, and later became concerned about Tommy's absence in the episode; he felt reassured when Mazin sent him a large text outlining his plans for Tommy's story, including the Jackson battle. He wanted viewers to fear that Tommy would die during the episode. Druckmann felt Tommy's goals shift throughout the story: from protecting Jackson to saving Maria, who, alongside his son, he cares about the most. Wesley felt the two characters were "anchors for each other". Costume designer Ann Foley was inspired by a 1980s Marlboro advertisement with Tommy's outfit, which Luna found unique from the games.