The Last of Us Part 2's newest main character, Abby, has caused quite a bit of a stir amongst the fanbase. She's probably one of the most controversial, if not outright hated, characters in video game history, as most of the problems people have with The Last of Us Part 2 can be linked back to her.

The majority of the hate comes from the fact that Abby's character suffers from fundamental flaws within the frame of the story she exists in. Her role is supposed to be embodying the lesson that revenge is never worth the outcome and that it doesn't change the events that spawned the desire for it, but she can't accurately drive home this idea for quite a few reasons.

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Perfect Villain Introduction

Players' introduction to Abby reveals her stubborn and strong-willed nature. We don't know what exactly her goal is at this point, or why she's seeking it, but we do learn that she will stop at nothing in pursuit of it. Players watch as this character flings herself into a zombie-filled setting in the middle of a harsh winter without any real plan. When things inevitably go wrong, and she ends up nearly eaten alive by an entire horde of Infected, she finds herself saved by Tommy, and, of course, Joel. And this is where the fun begins.

The three of them work together to survive the horde, and in the process, Tommy and Joel learn Abby's name — but not until after she learns theirs. Joel and Tommy do everything in their power to keep Abby alive, and as this is a fight for survival, Abby plays along. When the trio has a moment to breathe and figure out how to get out of their situation, Abby suggests her and her friend's current hideout, and Joel and Tommy — not having any other options — follow her. When they make it to Abby's place, things take a turn, and Abby reveals what kind of person she really is.

Without any hesitation, without any regard for the fact that Joel just saved her from one of the worse deaths imaginable, Abby blows out one of his legs with a shotgun. At the same time, her friends beat Tommy into unconsciousness with the butt of their weapons. Abby then proceeds to torture and bludgeon Joel with a golf club, and if that wasn't enough, Ellie arrives only to be pinned down and forced to watch as Abby caves Joel's skull in, killing him despite Ellie pleading for her not to. In other words, Abby shows up out of nowhere and brutally murders the protagonist of the previous game right in front of the old deuteragonist — both of whom have had over seven years at this point to win over the player base.

And all of this happens without the player knowing why. A hint comes up beforehand that it's happening because of something Joel did in the past, but nothing else. Therefore, this is our introduction to Abby, and through it, we learn two things: She does not believe in mercy, and she does not give the benefit of the doubt. For a story and game themed around revenge, this introduction for a villain is perfect. It happens in a way that makes the player hate Abby right out of the gate. If we weren't already before, we are now firmly in Ellie's corner, and can't wait to hunt Abby down.

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And not just Abby, but her friends too, as all of their actions were just as despicable as hers. They all stood around and watched her go through with the act. Then they broke into an argument over deciding whether to kill Ellie and Tommy or spare them. Both of these choices have their issues. Why the first is contemptible is obvious, but the second is pretty bad, too, because of the reasoning behind it.

The half arguing for it believes killing Ellie and Tommy would make them no better than Joel — the man they just brutalized in front of loved ones and spat on. The fact that they would even entertain this "holier than thou" idea is laughable, and that's what makes this the perfect villain introduction.

There was no way for this group of people to redeem themselves after this incident, so the player now has no problem killing every last one of them. The problem is this is not how the story wants us to feel about Abby and her friends. As it will later try to convey, all of them are supposed to be somewhat sympathetic and relatable characters — Abby especially. We're supposed to feel conflicted about hunting them down because Abby had a reason for doing what she did to Joel. There's just one problem: it's not a good one.

The Fireflies Were Not Innocent People

the last of us 2 fireflies header

The idea that Abby took revenge on Joel because he killed her dad does sound good on paper. If there ever were a way to help people understand why the character did what she did, this would be it. But the flaw in this method lies in the fact that Abby's father — Jerry Anderson — was just as unlikeable as she is. There are other reasons too, but this is the primary one. For those unaware, Abby's dad was the doctor Joel canonically stabbed in the throat to save Ellie at the end of The Last of Us Part 1. Jerry's role in The Last of Us wasn't very significant, but Part 2 fleshes him out a bit.

After the events of Joel's death, Part 2 has players spend the latter half of its act 2 controlling Abby. Of course, throughout this section of the game, Abby's reason for torturing Joel is revealed, and so Jerry receives development. The game tries to pass Jerry off as a loveable and kind person: He helps animals in need, he's supportive of his daughter and her relationships, and he wants what's best for the world. He's also willing to kill a fourteen-year-old girl to justify the deaths of Fireflies and excuse them of the sins they've committed over the years.

The Last of Us Fireflies — individuals like Abby and her crew — are not good people. Part 1 does an excellent job of relating this. The first time Joel and Ellie come across Firefly soldiers is after they've both nearly drowned. Joel is doing everything he can to resuscitate Ellie — who isn't breathing — when Fireflies show up and tell him to put his hands in the air. Joel, of course, ignores this order and continues to try and save Ellie, which the Fireflies have a clear view of him doing. Instead of offering to help him in any way, they knock him out in the middle of his doing compressions.

After Joel wakes up in one of their hospital beds, he learns that the Fireflies saw him as expendable and were simply going to kill him now that he's risked his life traveling across the country to bring Ellie to them. The only reason they didn't move forward with the plan is that Marlene — the only individual shown to be somewhat decent in this group — saw the value in what Joel had accomplished and wanted him to live. Part 2 even touches on the Fireflies' duplicity when it takes players through Eugene's life, a character who risked the lives of, and murdered civilians to kill soldiers.

Jerry doesn't do anything to separate himself from these other Fireflies. He's just as underhanded. Ellie's life, and the potential that it could offer outside of a cure means nothing to him. She's a means to an end. If she has to die in order to make the vaccine, then that's fine with him. As Marlene so eloquently puts it, Jerry's isn't Ellie's father. He doesn't know her, so it's easy for him to simply dismiss her as nothing more than the "host" for the cure. Abby doesn't make this conversation any better when she enters it. She actually makes it worse, as she reinforces Jerry's resolve to kill Ellie by saying that if it were her on the table, she'd permit him to do it.

The problem with this logic is that it isn't Abby's life on the line here; it's Ellie's, and the one thing that none of these Fireflies have done is ask her what she wants to do with it. It doesn't matter that Ellie doesn't mind dying to make the cure happen; what does matter is that nobody knows this. She hasn't told anybody that this is what she wants. She's implied it to Joel, but never outright said it, and the Fireflies weren't going to bother asking her. They weren't going to let her say goodbye to Joel; they weren't going to let her discuss her options; they weren't going to give her the chance to say "no." Jerry was just going to kill Ellie without her consent because if Ellie did say "no," well — again — the Fireflies aren't good people.

Joel was the only person that ended up putting a stop to this. Yes, he did it for selfish reasons, but Joel ignoring Ellie's wishes is a conflict between them, and it does not promote Abby's actions toward Joel at the beginning of The Last of Us Part 2. It also doesn't change the fact the entire situation with Ellie was mishandled on the Fireflies part, turning the whole thing into "bad vs. evil," with Joel being bad, and the Fireflies being evil. And that leads us to the final point:

Abby Doesn't Have Any Moral High Ground

Abby doesn't work as intended because none of her actions are justifiable; she's on the wrong end of the moral spectrum every time. This is important in a revenge-based story with an outcome like The Last of Us Part 2, which sees Ellie letting Abby live. For players to be okay with this ending, they would need to be conflicted about killing Abby, but there's nothing in place to make this happen.

Neither she nor her father had any redeeming qualities. Both conspired to kill a child without taking time to consider if there were any other outcomes available, and more importantly, they planned to do it without even getting consent. Ellie doesn't automatically owe her life to humanity because she can cure them, especially when most of the people she's run across have either tried to rape her, torture her, or straight-up murder her. This isn't even mentioning little things like how Jerry was so callously going to break his oath as a doctor or how Abby went way overboard with Joel's death in comparison to how Joel kills Jerry.

Abby just has too many factors working against her, and this causes a disconnect between her and the player. Aside from pacing issues and personal opinions, this is the primary reason why playing as Abby throughout the latter half of the game would feel so jarring. Sympathizing with Abby feels as off as trying to do the same for David from Part 1: Sure, Joel wiped out a pretty sizeable chunk of his men, but that was only after his men tried to murder him without warning.

Abby is supposed to make it hard to choose sides between her and Ellie but naturally can't. The Last of Us as a whole just makes it so easy to root for Ellie in this ordeal. To give Abby the benefit of the doubt, a player would either have to gloss over her sins or not notice their severity. The latter would be the same as only looking at the game on a surface level: Joel kills Jerry, so Abby kills Joel, and Ellie hunts her down only to realize the lesson of the story right before she kills her.

But the learned lesson feels hamfisted because — again — Abby can't bring the player to feel something positive toward her, not without overlooking everything she's done. For the player, it feels less like learning revenge isn't worth it, and more like they just let Abby get away with murder. Thus the game's campaign and ending offer no catharsis, which would have been fine had Abby had the tools to do her job.

The Last of Us Part 2 is available now for the PlayStation 4.

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