Yellowjackets royalty Melanie Lynskey has made her grand entrance in The Last of Us, and she’s already killing it — literally. She straight-up murders a doctor this episode, so if you weren’t scared of her character before, you definitely should be now.
Lynskey plays Kathleen, the leader of a revolutionary group in Kansas City, Missouri. She spends much of episode 4, titled “Please Hold My Hand,” searching for Henry (Lamar Johnson) and interrogating those who might know where he is. While the name Henry will be familiar to those who have played through The Last of Us, Kathleen presents more of a mystery.
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Is Kathleen in The Last of Us games?
Credit: Liane Hentscher/HBO
Kathleen is an entirely new character created for The Last of Us TV show. However, she still has roots in the game’s Pittsburgh section, which the show has transposed to Kansas City.
When Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) reach Pittsburgh in the game, they encounter a group of violent Hunters — people who ambush and kill travelers in order to steal their supplies. While on the run from the Hunters, Joel and Ellie meet fellow survivors Sam (Keivonn Woodard) and Henry, and they team up. They overhear the Pittsburgh Hunters mention that they have a leader, but we never actually meet that person. Kathleen takes on the role of that leader in the show.
Kathleen’s Hunters share several similarities with the game’s Hunters. Both groups overthrew FEDRA’s militaristic rule in their city’s quarantine zone and have since turned to hunting outsiders. Aesthetically, the show even recreates the Hunters’ infamous “Run” Humvee from the game. Other vehicles belonging to the show’s Hunters have phrases, too — like “We the people” scrawled across one to emphasize the group’s revolutionary roots.
With a character like Kathleen, the show is able to give us a bit more of a sense of the Hunters’ inner workings. We know they’re hunting down FEDRA collaborators — likely QZ civilians who informed FEDRA about revolutionary activity. We also know that Kathleen particularly wants to find Henry, believing he played a key role in FEDRA’s capture and subsequent murder of her brother.
This storyline marks a departure from the game. There, Henry was a survivor from Hartford traveling through Pittsburgh. In the show, it seems like he lived in the Kansas City QZ before the Hunters took over. Since we only meet him and his brother Sam at the very end of the episode, we’ll have to wait until episode 5 to find out more about their lives in the QZ — and what they did to make Kathleen so hell-bent on finding them.
What does Kathleen add to the world of The Last of Us?
Credit: Liane Hentscher/HBO
The Last of Us co-creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann have said that they only deviate from the game when the deviation is better. We’ve seen the rewards of that deviation in the Bill (Nick Offerman) and Frank (Murray Bartlett) storyline, and now we’re primed to see it with Kathleen and the Hunters.
Having Kathleen around does let us learn more about the Hunters and their motivations. It also allows us to see another way in which love manifests itself in The Last of Us‘s apocalypse. Mazin and Druckmann discuss the role of love in the show quite often on HBO’s official Last of Us podcast: How does love push us to act in times of crisis? Bill and Frank’s love for each other gives them hope. Joel’s love for his deceased daughter Sarah (Nico Parker) distances him from much of the world. In Kathleen’s case, her love for her brother drives her need for revenge — and this comes with some frightening consequences.
The Kansas City Hunters may have liberated their QZ, but their own ambushes and pursuit of collaborators are reminiscent of FEDRA’s brutality. Is Kathleen’s quest for vengeance simply continuing a cycle of violence that’s become all too common in this world? Will there ever be a moment when she believes she’s gone too far? Or is the price of revenge worth it no matter what?
We’ll have to wait until episode 5 to see how the conflict between Kathleen and Henry shakes out (and what role Joel and Ellie will have to play). The bad news? Our heroes are up against a militia in a city they aren’t familiar with. The good news? We’ll get more Melanie Lynskey. Everybody wins! (Except for FEDRA.)
The Last of Us is now streaming on HBO Max.(opens in a new tab) New episodes air every Sunday at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.
