[Editor’s note: The following contains some spoilers for Season 2 of The Last of Us.]

Summary

In Season 2 of the HBO series ‘The Last of Us,’ Ellie faces new dangers with the high liklihood of perils ahead.

Joel’s previous actions have consequences in Season 2, exploring the notion that one person’s hero can be another’s villain.

The creative team discuss the process of breaking the story, emphasizing flexibility with episode count for meaningful storytelling.

The seven-episode second season of the HBO series The Last of Us takes place five years after the events of the first season, with Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) at odds in an even more dangerous and unpredictable post-apocalyptic world. Surviving and thriving in a community can give a false sense of safety and security in a world where you should never become complacent. Tommy (Gabriel Luna) and his wife Maria (Rutina Wesley) want their family and the residents of Jackson, Wyoming to thrive, but new additions and an always looming threat could risk it all.
There’s a deeper weight to Ellie in Season 2, as she trains for what could be to come, and while scouting for Infected is risky, the first episode back leaves viewers with a sense that that’s only the beginning of the dangers to come. At the same time, we’re introduced to a young woman named Abby (Kaitlyn Dever), who’s experiencing grief so deep that it’s intertwined with a pain and rage that’s palpable. Joel’s actions at the end of the Season 1 finale will have consequences in Season 2, as we learn that the hero of one person’s story can very well be the villain of another’s.
During this interview with Collider, video game creator Neil Druckmann, who is also co-creator, executive producer, writer and director on the series, and Halley Gross, who is co-executive producer and writer, talked about figuring out how to break the story, that they like working with an ending in mind so that they can write toward the destination, having flexibility with the episode count, learning the difference between writing for a TV series versus writing for a video game, how surreal it is to see this world brought to life, and what they think the fan reaction will be after they watch the Season 2 finale.
The Creative Team for ‘The Last of Us’ Knows the Story They’re Telling But Are Not Quite Sure How Long They’ll Need to Get There

“We know what has to happen after this season.”

Collider: Neil, showrunner Craig Mazin has talked about how it was clear that the story of Part II of the game would not fit nicely into one season, so it would have to be broken up into two seasons. Was that something you guys had always talked about from the beginning of working on Season 2? At the same time, did you also have to have a very clear sense of what Season 3 would be?
NEIL DRUCKMANN: Yeah, some of our earliest conversations in the writers’ room with Halley [Gross] were, how do we break the story? Pretty early on, maybe day one, we were like, “Oh, it’s too big to fit in one season.” But we like working with an ending in mind. We need to know the destination. That destination allowed us to make the correct creative choices as we did set-ups and payoffs and slowly, over time, moved towards that destination. So, that meant we had to break the whole story, ignoring seasons or a number of episodes, all the way to the end. And then, we had to start working backwards and say, “Okay, what’s enough material for a season? And with that, where’s a good break point? Okay, we know that chunk, and we know what has to come after that chunk.” And then, we got into the details of what happens moment to moment and bit by bit, what new ideas we had, and what had to change in the adaptation. That process gave us the seven-episode count. So, we know what has to happen after this season. We know all the major stops and we know the final destination. But as far as how many episodes or how many seasons it would take to get there, we don’t quite know yet. That’s something we’re gonna have to figure out when we get back in the writers’ room.

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Do you feel like you have some flexibility, as far as episode count per season?
HALLEY GROSS: Yeah, it’s whatever the holistic story of the season requires. We don’t want to thin it out and we don’t want to pad it out just because there’s some expectation of an episode count. We want to make every episode meaningful and make every episode impactful. If that’s 10 episodes, if that’s six episodes, if that’s eight episodes, that’s something that we’ll discover as we break the season. But we’re not bound to a number.
DRUCKMANN: This is the luxury we have in working for HBO. From the get-go, every conversation has been like, “Well, how much violence should there be in the show?” “Only as much as the story requires.” “How many set pieces should there be?” “Only as much as the story requires. “How many episodes should there be per season?” “Only as much as you guys think is appropriate for this chapter of the story.” Every step of the way, there are so concerned with telling the best story possible.
Learning to Write for ‘The Last of Us’ Video Game Required a Big Learning Curve

“Ultimately, it’s about building empathy and challenging the audience to find empathy.”

Image via HBO

Halley, looking at the shows you’ve previously written for, like Banshee, Westworld and Emerald City, it feels like The Last of Us is a blend of all those elements. What do you love about this world? What did you learn from working on the video games that really translated to TV?
GROSS: For me, it was actually more the reverse because I came from TV. It was about, what can I bring from my experience in writers’ rooms into Naughty Dog? And then, from there, it was learning an entirely different language. What I love about The Last of Us is how character-focused it is, how dimensional these characters are, and how the world is used to help articulate the pains, the sorrows, and the joys of these complex characters that are going to make decisions you’re uncomfortable with. Ultimately, it’s about building empathy and challenging the audience to find empathy.
To answer your second question, I came in with an understanding of how to write TV and how to do a three-act or five-act structure and how to break a season. What I did not understand was, how do you write to service developers and action set pieces and layouts and thinking about the pieces of a player? What if they go fast through space or slow through space? How do you evoke conversation through environmental storytelling? Part of writing a game feels like you’re writing an HBO series, but another part of writing a game feels like you’re writing a play because everything has to happen in real time as you progress through a space. For me, it was a radical learning curve. I was just fortunate that everyone at Naughty Dog had the patience to let me sit in on meetings and learn this entirely different language that I’m now madly in love with.

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Dever also talks about how the shock of grief has shaped Abby in Season 2 of ‘The Last of Us.’

Neil, after the long journey to finally get this adaptation from film to TV series to the actual screen, what was it like to see Bella Ramsey as Ellie and Kaitlyn Dever as Abby actually sharing the same world together?
DRUCKMANN: It’s incredibly surreal. It’s incredibly humbling. It speaks to what we created at Naughty Dog, and how special it is and how it resonated with people that the story can live beyond the game. It’s the kind of story that could be retold, and maybe in the future can be retold again in a different medium or by different people. It transcends any one of us that originally worked on it and has become part of the public and our audience. I’m just incredibly proud, and I feel privileged to have worked with so many talented people that are taking the source material so seriously. It feels like a celebration of the thing that we’ve made, and now we get to do it again with a whole new audience that gets to appreciate it and talk about it. As an artist, what more could you ask for?
By the End of Season 2, ‘The Last of Us’ Fans Will Want Season 3 as Soon as Possible

“I hope they say, ‘When is Season 3 coming out?'”

Image via HBO

There is so much going on in the first episode and there are so many things ahead for this season. What do you think people will say after they see the last episode of the season?
GROSS: I hope they say, “When is Season 3 coming out? Dear God, please let it be soon.”
DRUCKMANN: That’s what I hope, as well. I think what they’ll say is, “Okay, that was a lot.”
GROSS: Maybe they’ll need their own time with Gail.

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“If They Feel the Way I Feel, They’re Going to Be a Little Shell-Shocked”: ‘The Last of Us’ Showrunner Is Already Predicting Fans’ Reactions to the Season 2 Finale

“We certainly are aware of where it all has to end, so we’re working backwards and towards that, at the same time,” says showrunner Craig Mazin.

Custom Image By Yailin Chacon

Custom Image By Yailin Chacon

The Last Of Us

Release Date

January 15, 2023

Network

HBO

Showrunner

Craig Mazin

Directors

Craig Mazin, Peter Hoar, Jeremy Webb, Ali Abbasi, Mark Mylod, Stephen Williams, Jasmila Žbanić, Liza Johnson, Nina Lopez-Corrado

Writers

Neil Druckmann, Craig Mazin

The Last of Us airs on HBO and is available to stream on Max. Check out the Season 2 trailer: