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Ellie when Maria was trying to convince her that Joel was a bad person:

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you're looking for somebody, but he isn't me

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Joel's look of 'oh shit it's queit, where the fuck is my kid?'

Cue him finding her, of course, at the highest possible altitude she could climb to, appearing to be considering midnight cliff jumping.

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Another scene that is so funny to me. He's so indignant and hurt when she suggests he doesn't care about her. The way he switches so fast from 'I don't give a shit about this annoying little punk' to 'how dare my child insinuate I don't give a shit about her, I would literally slit my wrists for you right now.'

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I'm counting this as the equivalent of Joel and Ellie getting their sheep ranch.

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This is how it starts.

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Aw, guys, he thinks he's in charge.

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This part is SO funny to me. The way he grabs the bat and then looks at her as if to say, "Ok, kiddo. Prepare yourself because Dad's about to un-impale himself, okay?"

And her little face after he pulls it out is just like, "Dude, what the fuck? That's so not cool."

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Funnily enough, this scene is one of the more intense as far as Joel's brutality goes, in my opinion. As much as the torture scene in Silver Lake really shows the extent Joel will go to protect Ellie and the level of violence he possesses, or when he kills the guard without hesitation with his own hands to protect her, or of course when he massacres a hospital, for me, this scene right here shows the true viciousness of his ruthlessness. The way he practically growls at the man, immediately throwing him against a tree and bashing his own skull against his to protect his kid. There are no meditated acts of violence, just pure determination to desecrate this man by any means necessary, if it means protecting his kid.

Bonus for the immediate look back to ensure Ellie hadn't been harmed, as if he hadn't just head-butted someone like a bull and then snapped their neck with his bare hands.

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Loving the idea that, once they returned to Jackson and had to settle into normalcy, Joel realized how difficult it was for Ellie to learn what it meant to be someone's kid in a semi-normal society. Cue Joel checking out an abundance of family counseling and child development books like "You've Adopted A Child: Now What?" Bonus if he started seeing Gail solely for advice on how to help Ellie acclimate.

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When Marlene is trying to explain to Joel after he wakes in the hospital how they can create a cure using Ellie and his reaction is literally:

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Laughing at the idea of Tommy thinking that getting to know Ellie would be easy because she's so outgoing, but the second Joel's out of the room, she's silent and stone-faced like nobody's business. One second she's joking around with them, but once Joel gets up, she's off and scurrying after him like a little duckling. It takes months for the kid to actually tolerate his presence without Joel in the room.

I kinda feel like they dealt with it the same way you deal with dropping off a baby at daycare. You get them engaged in an activity, a little hand grasping onto their parent's shirt or knee, and then the parent slowly and silently creeps away.

Joel literally has to stand right next to Ellie, her little body pressed against his, and Tommy has to immerse her in something she likes, like space or dinosaurs, and then Joel can slowly back away. It works like 60% of the time.

I'm just imagining Tommy showing her a toy dinosaur he found for her on patrol, while Joel is trying to navigate out of the kitchen, and then he bumps into a chair or something, and the sound makes her realize she's alone in the kitchen without Joel and she's like 'fuck my person is leaving' and scurries after him and they have to start to whole process over.

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Plus, when Tommy agrees to take her, she's all silent and moody, because she's upset that her person is forcing her to go with someone else. But like she also doesn't know this man from Adam, so now that Joel's no longer there, she has no interest in engaging with said strange man.

Tommy's little look of sympathy he throws her, yet there's also an edge of confusion, because this same kid who's mute and trudging behind him is the same kid who cussed his wife out less than 24 hours prior.

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Laughing at the idea of Tommy thinking that getting to know Ellie would be easy because she's so outgoing, but the second Joel's out of the room, she's silent and stone-faced like nobody's business. One second she's joking around with them, but once Joel gets up, she's off and scurrying after him like a little duckling. It takes months for the kid to actually tolerate his presence without Joel in the room.

I kinda feel like they dealt with it the same way you deal with dropping off a baby at daycare. You get them engaged in an activity, a little hand grasping onto their parent's shirt or knee, and then the parent slowly and silently creeps away.

Joel literally has to stand right next to Ellie, her little body pressed against his, and Tommy has to immerse her in something she likes, like space or dinosaurs, and then Joel can slowly back away. It works like 60% of the time.

I'm just imagining Tommy showing her a toy dinosaur he found for her on patrol, while Joel is trying to navigate out of the kitchen, and then he bumps into a chair or something, and the sound makes her realize she's alone in the kitchen without Joel and she's like 'fuck my person is leaving' and scurries after him and they have to start to whole process over.

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An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Short one-shot I've whipped up :)

Hopefully, more chapters to come of A Brother's Intuition as well.

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Cackling at the idea of a modern universe Ellie doing a Hear Me Out cake with her friends and all of them bring pictures of Joel.

Her genuine shock and disgust when she sees that all her friends have little printed pictures of Joel glued to toothpicks and yells out, "IS THAT MY DAD?!?"

I don't know what to tell you, kiddo. Your dad's hot.

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This scene always gets me, the way he just exits the conversation with no warning. I have to imagine he was immediately searching for his kid because he needs to lay eyes on her as of yesterday.

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I love how Joel is pulling out all the stops to cheer Ellie up, like Boggle, 20-year-old canned ravioli, the promise of guitar lessons, joking about explosives. When none of it works, he decides it's time to pull out the big guns.

Cue him telling his child the scintillating story of the time he tried to blow his head off.