Changes: Joel Miller

Revision as of 18:10, 21 June 2013

Template:Spoilers

“

Lyin' on the couch watchin' Sunday football. That...greasy smell of a downtown hot dog. 4th of July, family barbeques. The sound of a plane flying overhead. Just one peaceful night; a clean conscience -- all gone...

―Joel's monologue, The Last of Us teaser trailer.

”

Joel is a playable character and the protagonist of The Last of Us. Joel is a ruthless survivor of the Ophiocordyceps unilateralis plague that has decimated mankind. He is voiced and mo-capped by Troy Baker.^[1]^[2]

Biography

Background & Early life

Not much is known about Joel prior to the events of the Ophiocordyceps unilateralis plague. Joel grew up in Texas with his brother Tommy. When he was younger, Joel married an unnamed woman and they had a daughter named Sarah. Since he got married very young, he did not have a chance to go to college. Joel and Sarah lived by themselves in central Texas, probably outside of Austin (due to Tommy and Joel saying they need to leave Travis County in the opening scenes), where Joel worked in construction, possibly as a carpenter due to the reasonable demand for carpenters in Texas and the contruction materials seen outside his house in the prologue. His job kept him fit, and he also owned a treadmill seen in his bedroom; in addition to this, he tells Ellie that he often went on hikes with his daughter. Despite having to work hard, he still found time to spend time with Sarah, such as supporting her during a soccer match in a photograph of the two together.

Events of The Last of Us

File:Joel being hit.png

Joel is hit in the face with a wooden plank

In the beginning of the game, Joel is seen arguing with his brother Tommy over the telephone about his job before he hangs up when he sees Sarah on the couch. Sarah gives him an expensive watch for his birthday. After watching TV, Sarah falls asleep and he carries her to her room. Joel leaves the house to meet up with Tommy but soon races back home after hearing explosions in the city to get Sarah. On the way back, he encounters Jimmy, his neighbor attacking his family. Jimmy sees Joel and rushes towards him. After shooting and killing his infected and mutated neighbor, he and Sarah flee the house into Tommy's truck and escape to avoid the chaos, they encounter mainly 3 events, Louis' farm burning, encountering a family, but drive past them. The last event is where a person gets mauled to death by an infected man who escaped the nearby hospital. Driving into to town, the three of them drive through some fleeing people, but they are involved in a car accident in the city. Joel grabs Sarah, whose leg was in pain, and together the three of them flee to safety from the now infected people of the city. While Tommy fights off the infected people, Joel and Sarah try to flee to the highway through an embankment, where they are confronted by a soldier who is ordered to open fire on Joel and Sarah. Before the soldier can kill Joel, Tommy races in and shoots the soldier dead. Joel finds his daughter next to him, bleeding from gunshot wounds and they share final moments together as Joel cries over the loss of his daughter.

Twenty years after the initial plague that eliminated millions of people across the United States, Joel is known as a man who runs drugs and weapons through the quarantine zone in Boston. At some point he also became acquainted with a woman known as Tess, who maintains the Boston branch of the underground market and specializes in contraband. The two appear to work with each other frequently to smuggle in/out supplies, and they seem to have a respectful alliance at the start of the game. The two are tasked with the job of transporting a fourteen year old girl named Ellie to the Fireflies' Capitol Building. Joel is reluctant to smuggle Ellie, but eventually follows Tess on the journey.

On the way there, Joel leaves the task of taking care of Ellie to Tess. Tess is usually the one who calms the frightened girl down, while Joel is the one who clears out the infected. When the three finally reach the Capitol building, they find the place filled with dead Fireflies. Tess suddenly becomes hysterical, and eventually reveals that the reason that Ellie was so important to her is because Tess herself was bitten during the trip to the Capitol Building. Joel is visibly upset and refuses to allow Tess to sacrifice herself as they escape, but he's pushed away by Tess. Joel and Ellie see Tess' dead body as the military begins to enter the building. He gets Ellie out of the building, but refuses to talk about Tess.

The two set out on a journey across the U.S or whats left of it, all the way to Salt Lake City. On their way to Salt Lake City, they encounter infected, bandits, friendly survivors who will fight with Joel and Ellie.

Personality and Traits

Joel has been described as a "violent thug, a brutal killer, and a torturer."^[3] During the aftermath of the epidemic that struck the country, he has resorted to working in black-market dealings and smuggling items or people of interest through quarantine zones or other designated areas.^[4] Because of this, he has accumulated valuable knowledge in regards to surviving the post-apocalyptic environment and is a ruthless killer when presented with enemies. He has also revealed to Ellie that he has "been on both sides" in response to having known about a third-party ambush, and this dark past likely contributed to his experience as a hardened survivalist. However, Joel was not always like this. He was a hard working single-father who loved his family dearly, especially his daughter, Sarah but his personality changed, after her death during the epidemic which is one of the major reasons that caused him to be what he is now. Despite having a rocky relationship with Ellie at first, Joel grew to trust her and finds her reliable at most times such as Ellie spotting for Joel or providing support. As time passes, Joel establishes a father-daughter relationship with Ellie, reminding him of his beloved daughter, Sarah. He is certainly an antihero- he has done things which give his brother Tommy 'nightmares', and at the game's climax kills three innocent surgeons in cold blood (or only one, as only one that must be killed to progress). Whether being selfish, or not wanting to lose another 'daughter' to the whim of another again, he chose to save Ellie and try and start some semblance of a normal life again.

Described as being in his late 40's, Joel knows what the world looked like before it was devastated. Over time, he has begun to become less bound by morality and more driven by doing whatever is necessary to survive. "What he wouldn't do in the past is almost a daily occurrence at this point," Bruce Straley, the game's director, notes.^[5]

Skills and Abilities

As an extremist survivor, Joel fights with a fierceness that seems to apply as much force as possible as efficiently as possible. Joel can perform chokeholds, a consecutive string of punches, and other miscellaneous attacks with little sign of physical fatigue or hesitance, and can usually overwhelm opponents within seconds of engagement. Over time he has also learned to wield a wide range of weapons, including handguns, molotov cocktails, and bows. He is an expert strategist and can operate well in stealthy situations. He is also adept at crafting improvised weapons and tools, and possesses an acute sense of hearing that allows him to pinpoint the relative location of those around him when focusing.

Joel, however, is only human, and is just as vulnerable to the punches and chokeholds of other ruthless survivors and Infected as they are to his. When fighting, he will often face the very same tactics he uses, and needs to consistently patch himself up in order to stay alive.

Later in the game, Joel begins teaching Ellie how to fight more directly and with a broader, more lethal skillset, using what he knows as reference.

Weapons

Trivia

Joel comments that he was never fond of video games before the plague; this is ironic, as he is the deuteragonist/protagonist of one.
Joel is a fan of music like Ellie, and stated that as a kid he wanted to be a singer. He also played guitar before the outbreak, and also intended to teach Ellie to play guitar after their journey was over.
By the ending of the game, Joel is calling Ellie "baby girl" like he used to with Sarah, meaning he grew fond of Ellie and treated her like she was his daughter, first calling her when Ellie brutally killed David..
By the ending of the game, Joel got some of his morals back turning more into his old self again mentality wise after growing fond of Ellie.
The outbreak started right around the day of his birthday.
His signature weapon seems to be a revolver as it is seen in his pictures, trailers, and even keeps one in his house before the outbreak, similarly to Rick Grimes from The Walking Dead series.
The ending of the game is very reminiscent of the beginning, as Joel carries Ellie through the hospital, while in the beginning he carried Sarah through the streets in a similar fashion.
As Joel is in his late 40's to early 50's, Sarah was born while he was still a teenager.