History Recap / TheLastOfUs2023S1E1WhenYoureLostInTheDarkness

* ForWantOfANail: It's only by immense fortune that Joel and Sarah avoided becoming infected: it's revealed in the next episode that the infection initially spread through fungal spores in flour. The Millers manage to be out of pancake flour, refuse the biscuits that the Adlers offer, and Joel forgets to pick up a birthday cake on his way home from work. Had any of these changed, they could have become infected.

* TheHerosBirthday: After a brief opening scene set decades earlier where people on a news program talk about the danger of fungi, the first thing we see is protagonist Joel celebrating his birthday.

* ABirthdayNotABreak: [[ExaggeratedTrope Exaggerated]] on Joel's 36th birthday, during which not only does the ''zombie apocalypse'' begin out of nowhere, but he also has to see [[spoiler: his daughter bleed out to death after sustaining a fatal gunshot wound]].

* ABirthdayNotABreak: Taken UpToEleven on Joel's 36th birthday, during which not only does the ''zombie apocalypse'' begin out of nowhere, but he also has to see [[spoiler: his daughter bleed out to death after sustaining a fatal gunshot wound]].

* ABirthdayNotABreak: The Cordyceps outbreak occurs on Joel's 36th birthday.
** Also Exaggerated. Not only does the world end on his birthday but he also has to see [[spoiler: his daughter bleed out to death after sustaining a fatal gunshot wound]].

* DecoyProtagonist: This episode lures the viewer into thinking Sarah is the protagonist much longer than the game did. About half of the 85 minute runtime is seen through her eyes and follows her through the entire day of the outbreak and into the next morning. The game opens with Sarah being woken up by the commotion the night of the outbreak and she’s dead within fifteen minutes.

* DecoyProtagonist: The 2003 sequence is mainly shown through Sarah's perspective, setting her up as the apparent protagonist of the story until she is killed.

* RefusalOfTheCall: Joel initially turns down the request for Ellie's MacGuffinEscortMission but changes his mind when realizing that it would be his best shot at getting hold of a vehicle to look for Tommy.

* EarAche: Of of Marlene's companions had her ear shot off during an offscreen shootout between the Fireflies and Robert's men.

* DistantPrologue: TheTeaser for this episode takes place in 1968, about 35 years before the actual start of the story.

* ChekhovsNews: While going about their normal lives right before the ZombieApocalypse, Joel, Sarah and Tommy hear about a fungal disease showing up in Jakarta on the radio.

* CoincidentalBroadcast: While going about their normal lives right before the ZombieApocalypse, Joel, Sarah and Tommy hear about a fungal disease showing up in Jakarta on the radio.

* LifeSavingMisfortune: Tommy gets arrested after trying to break up a fight in a bar, but thanks to this and Joel having to drive to the jail to bail him out, the brothers get a front row seat to the chaos that's starting on outbreak night and realise they have to grab Sarah and flee. Sarah tragically ends up dying, but if things had gone otherwise the Miller family might have been attacked by the Adlers or other turned neighbours before they realised what was happening.

* MercyKill: The soldiers from FEDRA do this to any infected refugees who come to the quarantine zone (or at the very least, they do with children). It's assumed to be partially because death by humane euthanasia is obviously preferable to being simply shot on sight or [[PainfulTransformation turning]] into a [[LossOfIdentity Runner or worse]].