15 Best Video Game Acting Performances Of The Decade
3. Ashley Johnson - Ellie (The Last Of Us)
Young, alone and raised in a dangerous world, Ellie wasn’t your average teen. Rather than confiding in her diary and organising movie trips, survival was everything as she cussed and stabbed her way through a post-apocalyptic America.
Lacking the comfort of similarly aged friends, and already stacking up her fair share of trauma, Ellie is a rough sort of teen that isn’t given any leeway because of her age. Having to learn how to grow up fast, Ellie will throw herself into a fight she may know she has no chance of winning.
Paired with some excellent writing and a tremendous performance, Ashely Johnson countered the clichés of your ordinary escort mission – shooing down any and every preconceived notion of childish antics and vulnerable liabilities. Players grew to love Ellie by extension of the performance, feeling every swipe of a machete and crass expletive, knowing full well that each was an externalisation of the frustration she felt, as a child living in a very adult world.