The Last Of Us gives us more reasons to love Melanie Lynskey
The Yellowjackets star kicks off a two-episode arc on The Last Of Us, providing plenty to consider while we wait for Shauna's return
TV Features Melanie Lynskey
While we anxiously await the return of Yellowjackets for a second season (it premieres on March 26), The Last Of Us is serving up a juicy two-episode arc featuring Yellowjackets star Melanie Lynskey to tide us over. In HBO’s hit post-apocalyptic drama Lynskey plays Kathleen, an original character who wasn’t in the video game the show is based on. With note-perfect leads Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey at the center of the story—not to mention guest stars Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett, who blew us away in episode three—the addition of Lynskey is more proof that the show’s casting is one of the secrets to its success.
Prior to her first episode airing, Lynskey responded to a commenter on Twitter who accused The Last Of Us of “homosexual agenda pushing,” presumably in reference to the love story between Offerman and Bartlett’s characters in “Long, Long Time.” “OMG yes,” Lynskey wrote in response. “Let me push that homosexual agenda just by showing up! An honour!” Kathleen’s sexuality was not actually revealed in her first episode, but you’ve got to admire Lynskey’s effusive clap back.
In episode four, “Please Hold To My Hand,” Kathleen is introduced as the leader of a revolutionary group in the former Kansas City quarantine zone. We don’t meet her until about halfway into the episode, but her first scene tells us all we need to know. Her brother was beaten to death while in FEDRA custody, and now that they’ve been driven out she’s got a vendetta against anyone who collaborated with them, or anyone who stands in her way. Lynskey gives us a character who is slightly unhinged, single-minded in her focus, and clearly in a lot of pain. Kathleen is an antagonist and an imminent threat to our core duo, but you understand her motivations through the love and grief that comes through in Lynskey’s committed performance. In the hands of anyone else, she might not be so compelling.
Lynskey excels playing characters who are sweet but damaged, with a hint of a dark side beneath the surface. Her Yellowjackets character Shauna definitely fits this mold. Although Kathleen’s darkness is in plain view in The Last Of Us, she’s another variation on that theme. We can imagine what she was like before FEDRA rolled in, and how the loss of her brother has twisted her into the hardened soldier she’s become. Lynskey brings a humanity and an inherent likability to every role, and the show has already found ways to weaponize that. Everyone under her command follows her orders without question, and we probably would too. That makes her even scarier.
Since Lynskey’s impressive screen debut at the age of 15 in 1994’s Heavenly Creatures—in which she and Kate Winslet play a pair of delusional, murderous best friends—she has steadily built a career as a character actress and an indie movie queen. She specializes in off-beat roles, women with rich internal lives full of quiet seething or palpable desperation. Whether she’s a key supporting player or a lead, she always delivers something memorable to hold onto. In the past few years in particular, her roles in high-profile TV series like Yellowjackets, Candy, and Togetherness have earned her critical praise and recognition come awards season, including an Emmy nomination for best actress in a drama series for Yellowjackets. Although we’ve only seen the first of her two Last Of Us episodes, it’s likely that a project like this might bring even more attention her way.
We don’t know what Kathleen has in store for our heroes in the next episode, but based on where the previous one ended, they’re on a collision course to meet up soon. Unlike most of the characters introduced in the show far, Kathleen has no game counterpart, so she’s a wild card even to those who have some idea of where the story is going. The fugitives she’s looking for, on the other hand, should be familiar to game fans. Without giving away any major spoilers, Henry (Lamar Johnson) and his younger brother Sam (Keivonn Woodard) are part of a multi-chapter story arc in the game. Although showrunners Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin have shown they’re willing to change things up if they have a better idea for the show, we have a feeling Henry and Sam might stick around for a bit. They’ll have to escape from Kathleen first, though. We’re hoping their inevitable confrontation in the next episode will give Lynskey a chance to showcase her considerable talents once again.
37 Comments
the casting on this show is sooo on the nose and boring. pedro pascal playing a gruff guy taking care of a kid, nick offerman playing a survivalist with a heart of gold, now this person playing exactly to type. come on!
Your shitty opinions are boring.
^^^pathetic nerd with no reason to live
What wasn’t clear to me in watching the episode is whether Kathleen is supposed to be Brian’s mom that he was talking about before Joel finished him off. She’s certainly old enough to plausibly have a son Brian’s age. I couldn’t tell if Kathleen was going on a rampage to find the supposed “mercs” because she was upset about Brian specifically being killed or just because she thinks they’re helping Henry.
Not a single mention of Two and a Half Men? Wow!
I will say, even her character on 2 1/2 Men, while seemingly sweet and sort of a doormat, was capable of shocking violence
It has to be one of the dumbest casting choices I have seen recently.In no world do some of her “roughneck” military looking dudes follow this Karen. Seriously silly.
That garbage Walking Dead show has rotted your brain.
What does this have t do with a luke warm show like TWD?
Counterpoint: nothing really in this episode showed her to be the badass you’re making her out to be. She seems to be hired for her amazing performance in Yellowjackets, but in this episode, we only got to see her whack the doc who was already tied up (maybe don’t kill one of the only doctors in your community during the apocalypse?). Not extremely spooky stuff, but hopefully she gets more to do in the next episode. If you’re going to create a character for the show that didn’t exist in the game, at least give her character something interesting/memorable to do.
well, she and her people will surely pay badly for her ignoring the threat of the ‘infected’ below them. And that won’t look very ‘badass’.
Right, her kicking the can down the road, where the can in this case is an underground network of horribly pulsating mushroom mutant zombie creatures, did not do much to endear me to her character.
That’s on purpose. You’re not supposed to know in that episode why they’re following her yet.
There’s only two damn episodes that she’s appearing in, in a 9 episode season. We’d better find out pretty quick.
Hmmm-this was the first deviation from the game that did not work for me in the moment. The chaos of KC (Pitt) was always terrifying enough for me without a central antagonist to focus on. And it seems spending time with Kathleen would take away time from Joel and Ellie or two other characters I don’t want to spoil even though this is spoiler space. I love the clap back in this article, and I though the performance by the actress was good. I just thought her intro was pretty rushed, and that a central human antagonist was not necessary for this arc. I guess we will see-the team has done such a good job bringing this to TV that I have faith it will all work out. Pittsburg was the most disturbing part of the game for me, hands down. The human against human brutality was horrible, and it is driven home forcefully who Joel really is. I thought the episode did a good job showing that last night.
There was definitely something about going from the dumb, blind Clickers, to humans who can see you, flank you, and throw Molotov cocktails and stuff. Pittsburgh was intense. I agree they captured that well.Something that felt different though was when Ellie asks how Joel knew about the ambush, and Joel saying he’s been on both sides. In the game he’s more matter of fact about it. He doesn’t care if Ellie judges him, whereas Show Joel seems more ashamed and apologetic. It’s an interesting choice.
Well, you get pretty desensitized to the violence in the game. And at this point he’d already killed a ton of people. This is more realistic.
Sorry I am a couple of days late with a response, but this is well said.I was talking about the very thing you write in your second paragraph with my wife after the episode aired. In the game, you come across all of the clothes and stuff that the ambushers have stolen from other people along with a list. Then Joel, in a blunt way, tells Ellie what the deal is with his past. I thought it was a very powerful sequence.I was very surprised they cut it from the show, because it was both powerful and easy to do (did not require effects or anything like that). Instead they just had the two discussing it while climbing some stairs, which I did not think worked nearly as well. Interesting choice, and one I don’t really understand.I agree with you that the rest of the ambush captured the game really well in a good way. The Pittsburg chapter was the most intense for me (and the longest in the game), and it all started with the brutal ambush. I really felt that brutality watching the episode.
So Cindy White says “In the hands of anyone else, she might not be so compelling” but David Cote’s recap/review is “waiting to be convinced”…I hate it when AV Club mummy and daddy fight.
I’m not buying it, yet. Her acting is fine, but nothing about her character screams badass leader. It comes off a little too PTA mom/Karen for me. The vague introduction and borderline comical anger about her men who were killed didn’t help either.
It comes off a little too PTA mom/Karen for meYou’re so close to getting it. You’re mad because they went the realistic route instead of the cliched unrealistic route.
Yeesh dude, I get it. I’m not remotely outraged, certainly not outraged the same way you are about my comments. The point is that anyone can be a leader and she’s meant to subvert expectations. That doesn’t change my opinion.
Lol the “not directly responding to the grays” screenshots shtick. You are definitely not mad.
“Yellowjackets” showed everyone that Melanie Lynskey can project a ton of menace and authority, but that’s definitely not what she’s showing us in “The Last Of Us.” I was excited when I saw her appear, because I know she’s a skilled actor who *could* nail a role like this, but was left really cold by what she did with this character, and I just didn’t buy it. Frankly maybe the problem is that she doesn’t want her performance here to just be a clone of “Yellowjackets,” so she made this character less forceful and confident, but that feels like the missing ingredient in buying into her as a commander here.
I buy it because that’s what she is.I can see her as a local conservative schoolboard member, someone the local community is used to seeing as authoritative and bossy, perhaps they were on HOAs, were very active in the local church and wrote newsletters, always getting into people’s business for what she saw as wrong, or against her “community values”.Then the shit hits the fan and people are just used to her being like that, FEDRA gets ousted and anyone of any military rank is going to leave or be killed.Who’s left?Predominantly right wing survivalists with mommy complexes who aren’t leaders, they’re grunts, followers by their very nature.Of course the militiamen will fall behind her – who else are they going to follow?
Once they’ve picked a side, what are the rest of the folks going to do? She has a private army willing to kill just to have someone in charge who echoes their conservative values.
I buy it because that’s what she is.Which is exactly why I don’t buy it. People like her are barely tolerated by society as is. In a post-apocalyptic world, I don’t see someone with that type of attitude succeeding at convincing anyone to follow them. Particularly in a world where they can’t hide behind laws/rules/police to act the way they do, and anyone they accidentally piss off has the potential to respond in a deadly manner.
Barely tolerated?Not seen what’s happening in Schools in Florida, they’ve infested local politics and show no sign of abating, this is what local community leaders look like in Ameirca.The Jeffrey Pierce has even said in a behind the scenes video launched for the 5th episode, “My character was ex army, when FEDRA was overrun he saw her as a leader so he just followed”.She’s not convincing them to follower “post apocalypse”, they were already used to her being in a position of power before it.
I agree with you, even though I think the “Karen” meme needs to die, as someone with a sister named Karen who is awesome
You sound like a very simple person.
You can tell who the nerds raised by the most hacky post-apocalyptic movies and shows are by their angry opinion of her not being “a bad ass leader.”
I haven’t seen Yellowjacks, and I wonder if Yellowjackets fans are projecting something onto this character, because what they are saying of her vs. what I saw of her, are two different things.
And I don’t mind the idea of Kathleen, because otherwise the enemies in this leg of The Last of Us journey are mostly faceless. But I’ve seen her described as having “I want to speak to your manager!” vibes, and I wholly, hilariously agree.
I loved it, and I truly don’t understand the people who didn’t buy her as a leader, especially since we don’t see the events that lead her to where she is.
Exactly. We also don’t know why she’s after Henry either. That’s kind of the point of TV, to spread things out over multiple episodes.
I see so many people bitching about her being in charge but apparently can’t wait for another episode to see her character fleshed out more? I mean she didn’t even show up until the last half of the episode. We also don’t know what Henry is wanted for either.
Melanie Lynskey for my money might be the best actress alive. I especially love her as a delusional murderer in Heavenly Creatures, an agoraphobic divorcee in Hello I Must be Going, a pissed off suburbanite in I Don’t Feel at Home in this World Anymore, and a sweet but manipulative bluebird in Over the Garden Wall
Hell, even when she was tasked with being Cinderella’s step-sister who surprisingly wasn’t a horrible person, she still will handily steal the scene.(And full agreement on that “maybe the best actress alive” viewpoint)
Don’t need any more reasons.
She’s a national treasure.
(in Aotearoa/NZ that is)