HBO dropped the first teaser for The Last of Us’ second season as part of a preview reel for Max’s next year. While it focuses on Pedro Pascal’s Joel, who seems to be undergoing some kind of therapy after the violent events of season one’s finale, there’s a lot more to pick through in the brief flashes of other scenes that the trailer provides. Given that we know this season will be a pretty direct adaptation of The Last of Us Part II, we can contextualize a fair bit of what we see in the 24-second clip. Let’s break down this preview of Joel and Ellie’s next chapter.
Ellie at the dance
The first shot is easily recognizable to The Last of Us fans as it’s Ellie at a dance held in the Jackson, Wyoming settlement she and Joel live in at the beginning of Part II. It looks like they’re re-creating the establishing shot 1:1, as we see Ellie from behind, looking on as other folks dance the night away. She’s an introverted wallflower at this point in her life, and it will take a good dance partner to get her on the dance floor. But we’ll get to her later.
Ellie’s tattoo and chemical burn
Next, we see a close-up of Ellie’s arm where she was once bitten by someone infected with the cordyceps fungus and thus learned of her immunity. In the years since the events of the first game, she has since burned off the bite with a self-inflicted wound and covered it in a tattoo of a moth landing on a fern. Some set photos of the tattoo had fans concerned about it looking worse than professional cosplayers’ versions of the ink, but the shot we see of it here looks pretty good, I’d say.
Catherine O’Hara makes her debut
The first Last of Us season introduced new characters who weren’t part of the games, and it seems like season two may be following suit with Schitt’s Creek actor Catherine O’Hara’s character. We don’t know her name at this time, but she appears to be Joel’s therapist. She is shown asking him if he “hurt” Ellie, which he denies, claiming he “saved” her during the first season’s finale when he killed members of the Firefly resistance group planning to kill her to make a vaccine. The next few seasons will most likely be unpacking that viewpoint from multiple perspectives.
Ellie screams out in anguish
One scene here that I’m not sure how to place is Ellie screaming in what looks like a hospital bed. Could this be a nightmare she has about the events of the first season finale? Could she be waking up in a Jackson medical facility after the inciting incident of the second season and realizing what’s transpired? It’s unclear, but actor Bella Ramsey will be dealing with a lot of Ellie’s most traumatic moments this season, so at least they’re selling the tormented young girl of it all.
An infected attack on Jackson?
There’s a brief clip of what looks like members of the Jackson settlement fighting off a horde of infected from attacking the town. Gabriel Luna’s Tommy is shown with a rifle firing down on them from the top of the gate. In The Last of Us Part II, Ellie, Joel, and other townsfolk were shown doing regular patrols around the perimeter to take out infected stragglers, but there wasn’t a scene of infected attacking the town itself. A group did attack a nearby mansion where some survivors were hiding away in the opening hours, though. So perhaps this is just a retooling of those early fights.
A group of Seraphites on the hunt
While it doesn’t appear to be fan favorites Lev and Yara, we do see a few members of the Seraphite cult that occupies Seattle running through a forest area. Ellie faces a few groups of these bow-sporting cultists during her time in the city, but it’s likely that we won’t see as much of them until sometime after 2025, given HBO seems to be dividing Part II’s story across multiple seasons. The Seraphites are a footnote on Ellie’s story, but are much more significant for other characters in the game’s ensemble cast.
A brief shot of Dina
Unfortunately, we only see the briefest of flashes of Isabela Merced as Ellie’s girlfriend Dina in this trailer. She’s seen holding a lantern and looking frightened of something off-screen. Most likely she’s trying to be quiet as a Clicker lurks around the room. But I’m sure she’ll be her usual upbeat, chatty self when there’s less danger around. This trailer seems to be looking to capture the violence and drama of the season, so even the brightest lights like Dina are dimmed here.
Jeffrey Wright returns as Isaac
Like last season, there will be some members of the Last of Us games cast joining the live-action show. This time, Jeffrey Wright will be reprising his role as Isaac, the leader of the militaristic Washington Liberation Front. Ellie never meets Isaac in Part II, so if he’s showing up in season two, it does seem like the show will probably be playing around with perspective shifts to some degree. All we see of him do here is draw a gun at someone, but considering he’s a violent sadist in the game, that just sounds like a Tuesday for him.
Our first look at Abby
Booksmart actor Kaitlyn Dever is playing Abby, the co-protagonist of The Last of Us Part II. We only get a brief shot of her crawling underneath a toppled-over metal fence as a group of infected claw at her through the gaps, which is a pretty faithful recreation of one of the most tense set-pieces in the early game. It seems like they’re still trying to keep her role a secret from the casual audience, but if you’re new to the series, know you’ll be seeing a lot of her in the coming seasons. She’s bundled up for the winter weather, though. So we don’t know if Dever’s been putting on Abby’s muscles.
Ellie runs from a clicker
The final shot of the trailer is Ellie in what looks to be the underground subway tunnels of Seattle running away from one of the iconic, blind infected called Clickers. These fuckers have been infected by the cordyceps fungus for so long that their eyes have been overtaken by the mushroom-like growth. All things considered, they recreated these creatures pretty well in the live-action show. That makeup team deserves props.
The Last of Us season two is set to premiere in 2025. While we didn’t see many of them in this trailer, we already know a handful of other actors who will join the cast as Abby’s friends from Seattle. Though it’s unclear how much of a role they’ll play next season given much of this trailer’s focus on Ellie’s journey while also having what looks like interstitial cuts with characters like Isaac. So there’s still a lot we don’t know.
Leave a Reply