In HBO's The Last of Us, a handful of human survivors struggle to get by in a world overrun by formerly human, zombie-like monsters. It portrays its post-apocalyptic America as bleak and authoritarian, with a quasi-federal security apparatus, FEDRA, maintaining brutal control over the remaining population centers. Trade and travel are heavily restricted—the show presents the zombie apocalypse as a libertarian nightmare.
The third episode specifically can be understood as a vindication, or at least humanization, of libertarian survivalists, who are normally portrayed as cranks. The story follows Bill, a gun-nut bunker-dweller who mumbles rants to himself about how FEDRA is the New World Order. When an uninfected man named Frank falls into a trap Bill has set, he lets Frank into his home.
