Joel Finally Called Ellie “Baby Girl” In ‘The Last of Us’ and Fans Are Not Okay

Episode 8 of “The Last of Us” was the most harrowing yet. (Although we say that almost every week.) In search of food for a still-bedridden Joel, Ellie goes hunting and stumbles across David and James, two armed men from a nearby community. In exchange for half a deer, David offers Ellie medicine, which she gladly accepts to treat Joel’s nasty infection (not a cordyceps infection, just a regular infection from his stab wound). While Ellie and David wait for James to return with the penicillin, they get to talking, and David reveals he knows who Ellie is travelling with — and that his people are looking for Joel.

Lulling her into a false sense of security, David lets Ellie leave with the medicine, only to follow her back to Joel. In the ensuring chase, his people take Ellie hostage and lock her in a cage. She soon spies a severed human ear lying on the floor of the kitchen, and realises David has turned his people into cannibals in a desperate attempt to stop them from starving to death. And now he’s trying to convince Ellie to stay.

“I’m a shepherd surrounded by sheep, and all I want is an equal,” he says, which is a very normal thing for a fully adult man to tell a 14-year-old.

When Ellie makes it clear she won’t join him, David and James drag her out of the cage, only to be caught off guard when she kills James and makes a run for it. In a brutal showdown, David stalks Ellie through a burning building, threatening her with rape and torture until she gets the jump on him and hacks him to pieces in a screaming rage.

Joel — now back on his feet thanks to the penicillin — finds a blood-soaked Ellie stumbling out of the burning building and wraps her in a tight embrace. This leads us to the heartbreaking moment (in a heartbreaking episode of a heartbreaking series) that people are currently obsessing over.

As he hugs her, Joel tells Ellie, “It’s okay, baby girl. I got you.”

And friends, believe me when I say that people are not! Coping!

If you remember from episode 1 (weeks ago before we were all emotionally broken by this show), “baby girl” is what Joel calls Sarah as she’s dying from her gunshot wound. And now, after 20 years of PTSD from not being able to save Sarah, he can finally save Ellie from a similar fate. Of course, Joel isn’t the one who kills David — Ellie saves herself. But he is there for Ellie emotionally after her traumatic experience, and that’s enough for him in this moment.

Viewers were quick to compare the scene to its counterpart in the game, and have commented on how completely Pedro Pascal’s delivery destroyed them emotionally. Here are the best reactions to Joel saying “baby girl” in “The Last of Us” episode 8.

the way i started bawling hiccups and all when joel said that and my dad just kind of frowned at me.

— aubrey (@donotwa1t) March 6, 2023

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• Joel Finally Called Ellie “Baby Girl” In ‘The Last of Us’ and Fans Are Not Okay