Joel rescues Ellie from hospital.
The needs of the many, as Spock once reminded us, outweigh the needs of the few, or the one. Yet at the climax of this season, with Ellie being prepped for involuntary surgery by the Fireflies, Joel makes a choice to sacrifice the entire human race in exchange for her life. It is the most divisive moment in the series, as Joel, knowing that a cure is within reach but that Ellie won’t survive the procedure to acquire it, slaughters his way through an entire hospital to stop it.