| Areym said: It's not heavily focused but based on this rash decision and multiple call outs to the fire flies being hunted down in boston and even marlene losing a sizable group from her travel to the hospital, it's kinda clear that they are desperate. They've sacrificed so much and probably have done terrible, villainous things. The tapes that marlene leaves behind in the last level show how tired and worn out she is from being the leader of the fire flies and how they are becoming more desperate and skeptical. I assume they did not want to risk the chance of ellie backing out from the procedure. It's essentially all they had to their name after all their loss. It kinda makes joel's decision more poignant, to me anyways. Are these people worth saving or the world as a whole? Will the cure actually bring peace or are we too far gone? Obviously, he wasn't thinking that far ahead during the saving of ellie but yeah. |
I have never brought the tapes into the discussion, either on here or on other forums, and that's because I don't see them as a great part of the narrative arc, or to put it another way, as the motivator for the protagonist. The reason is, as a player (the player being 'Joel' without any ambiguity due to the restraints put upon the narrative) you can pass those by. Therefore, the relevant arc can only been construed from everything unavoidable.
You also have to bear in mind -- and I know I've said this so many times now -- that it isn't a 'decision'. Joel isn't deciding, he's reacting. The reaction is instinctive and that of a Father. To attribute 'decision' (requiring choice) to Joel at the point of rescue is to completely dispose of the painstaking detail Neil and his team put into fleshing out the characteristics and developing personalities of both Joel and Ellie. It's an insult to the heart of the narrative to broaden it beyond it's well crafted boundaries.
The clear and unequivocal conclusion Neil wanted the player to focus on was the morality of lying and whether that was justified or not. That's where the interesting discussion is. Those who argue beyond the boundaries of narrative, for ('we don't know if Ellie would have been the cure anyway') and against (those who think him not saving the world is selfish) are missing the whole point of the story. Some people may think it's 'deep' to consider that aspect but it's not, it's cliqued, which I'd suggest is one of the reasons Neil decided to craft the narrative to lead to the question about the lie and the ambiguity of the final word 'OK'.
Last edited by GribbleGrunger - on 29 June 2018
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