Thu. Mar 28th, 2024

Picture by way of Naughty Canine

Wednesday, March 8, marked 2023’s Worldwide Girls’s Day, an annual celebration encouraging all of humanity to understand and empower the influential females of their lives. Followers of Naughty Canine’s The Final of Us franchise — and extra lately, HBO’s live-action adaptation — might be showering protagonist Ellie and with reward and love, in addition to aspect characters Marlene, Sarah and Tess. However there’s one particular person whose involvement was instrumental within the making of The Final of Us: Half II however who’s grossly undervalued in a male-dominated trade. We’re speaking about Halley Gross, the co-writer for Half II whose private experiences with PTSD formed Ellie and Abby’s character arcs, in addition to tapping into their trauma and exploring their motivations for setting out on their respective revenge missions. We additionally owe numerous LGBTQ+ scenes, together with Ellie and Dina’s kiss, to Gross, who campaigned for Ellie and Dina’s relationship to blossom.

It’s not an understatement to say that with out Gross, Half II wouldn’t have been the masterpiece that it was, nor wouldn’t it have painted such a passionate portrait of feminism. Each of our protagonists (or antagonists, relying on whose story you’re taking part in via) in Ellie and Abby have been completely fleshed out, which we are able to solely assume is the affect of Gross, whose contributions to the screenplay gave further depth to 2 of probably the most iconic and complicated online game characters to ever exist. Sadly, Gross is commonly ignored inside the fanbase, however it isn’t essentially ignorance that’s accountable, however extra so Naughty Canine’s have to push Neill Druckmann’s achievements into the highlight in favor of Gross’.

We’ll by no means let Halley Gross go unappreciated, although. She’s been a pivotal a part of Half II‘s manufacturing, guaranteeing that the sequel would play out as a love letter to sturdy, unbiased girls in all places.

We aren’t the one ones who suppose Half II wouldn’t be the identical with out Gross. Generally, it takes one other lady to inform the tales of hardened girls.

Gross additionally drew from her personal struggles with PTSD to delicately painting Ellie and Abby’s hardships with a delicate method. It’s straightforward to argue that with out Gross, we wouldn’t have gotten the ending for Half II that turned out to be so controversial but so highly effective.

There’s even a suggestion made that Gross ought to be a part of showrunners Craig Mazin and Neill Druckmann within the author’s room for the upcoming second — and doubtlessly third, fingers crossed — seasons for HBO’s The Final of Us. Think about the highs that HBO’s model might attain with Gross concerned?

There’s nonetheless speak of The Final of Us: Half III coming in future years, so right here’s hoping that Gross has a hand in persevering with Ellie’s story for a lot of extra installments to return.

Avatar photo

By Admin

Leave a Reply