The Last of Us 2 is a rollercoaster of a game that takes player expectations and emotions and turns them upside down. The game has been incredibly well received by critics, despite some backlash against certain narrative decisions, and a few weeks after its launch the zeitgeist is still buzzing about it. Now that the initial craze has died down, the community is starting to take a closer look at the game's secrets, hints, and subtle moments to look for answers to some potentially open-ended plot points.
After one fan spotted a key detail in the closing scene that has changed some opinions about one character's fate, many players have been revisiting the final hours of the game for another look. Along the way to those closing moments, there are some other questions that are raised and seemingly intentionally never clearly answered in The Last of Us 2. One of those mysteries revolves around the current status of the Fireflies, an organization that has been central to the narrative of both games, even if it has remained mainly off screen.
From this point forward we will dive into some major spoiler territory and discuss key plot points that take place during the last third of TLOU2. That means that if you haven't finished the game yet, stop right here, bookmark this article, and come back after the credits have rolled.
After Ellie and Abby go their separate ways at the end of act 2, Abby and Lev head to California to chase a lead about where the Fireflies may have regrouped. This was originally presented as a wild goose chase Owen was going to follow and Abby was very dismissive of it, but with the Wolf's now an official enemy (what's left of them, anyway) Abby runs away with Lev and heads towards the only remaining family she might have left. After months of search, Abby and Lev are given an address and seem to find an abandoned Firefly safe house. From there, Abby finds a radio and manages and connect with someone who claims to be at a Firefly headquarters that has 200 members and is ready to accept Abby and Lev. As the duo leave the house and plan to follow the directions given by the mysterious voice on the radio, all goes to hell.
Abby and Lev are immediately jumped when they leave the house, as if a group of people have been alerted to their presence and knew that they were about to walk out. This is where the Firefly story begins to become more of a question mark. Players seem to be split on whether or not the person on the other end of the radio really was a Firefly or if this group, the Rattlers, use the radio outposts as bait to trick travelers into revealing their locations. We quickly learn that the Rattlers are slave-owners and seem to somehow make a living by kidnapping as many people as they can who pass through Santa Barbara or their other territories. With that in mind, the whole lead and ambush seem far too convenient to be an accident.
That said, there are some hints that point towards the Firefly radio call being legit. For starters, if it was a trap, why would the Rattlers give them complicated directions to follow and send them them out of the house, instead of saying something like "Wait where you are, we're on our way to retrieve you." That sort of seems like a much safer way to ensure that the group the Rattlers want to entrap don't get out of town in a hurry before they can be kidnapped and taken back to their prison cells.
One other point that many Fireflies are alive theorists point to is the post credits loading screen. After players complete the game for the first time, the dark foggy boat in the water scene is replaced by mostly clear skies and water as a storm is seen receding in the distance. Some theories suggest that the building seen on the shore is one of the locations in Catalina described by the Firefly that Abby talked to on the radio. Less optimistic fans seem to think the shift in home screens is more symbolic and has to do with the storm that has passed over both Abby and Ellie now that they both seem to have moved on from their vengeance quests in one way or another.
Although no specific DLC has been planned, hopefully more answers about the true fate of the Fireflies does arrive at some point in the future. The game's creators are already speculating about a third installment in TLOU series, so it would be interesting to see what direction the central narrative would go from here. Although the path of vengeance seems to be resolved, there's definitely still a lot of room for Ellie (and Abby) to earn redemption for all of their past sins and all of the pain they have caused. Many fans have already imagined that Ellie mends her relationship with Dina before the final scene of the game, but getting that officially into the canon would certainly make a lot of players feel better about Ellie finding some peace after her long, bloody journey in the controversial sequel.
Be sure to check back soon for more The Last of Us news, guides, theories, and updates. Until then, may your survival be long.
The Last of Us 2 is available now for PS4.