@Courtesy of HBO MAX
The second season of the American post-apocalyptic drama television series “The Last of Us” is set to premiere on HBO on April 13, 2025. Based on the video game franchise developed by Naughty Dog.
The series is set twenty years into a pandemic caused by a mass fungal infection, which causes its hosts to transform into zombie-like creatures and collapses society. The second season, based on the 2020 game The Last of Us Part II, follows Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) five years after the events of the first season. And introduces Abby (Kaitlyn Dever).
HBO renewed The Last of Us for a second season less than two weeks after the series premiere aired in January 2023. Series co-creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann were joined in the writers’ room by Halley Gross and Bo Shim; Druckmann wrote and co-directed the video games, and Gross co-wrote Part II. Filming took place in British Columbia from February to August 2024.
@Courtesy of HBO MAX
Press Conference with Actors Bella Ramsey, Perdo Pascal, Kaitlyn Dever, Gabriel Luna and Creators Craig Mazin, Neil Druckmann
Q: How does it feel to be back for Season Two?
Craig Mazin: This is fantastic. We’ve been working very, very hard for two years now because we didn’t really take a break. When Season One ended, we just started writing Season Two, then prep and shoot. Post. We’re very excited to start showing people what we’ve done because we’re extraordinarily proud.
Neil Druckmann: It feels close enough where you could start visualizing and thinking about people watching this show, engaging with it, talking about it. Like Craig was saying, we had an incredible crew that just put everything on the line: incredible sets, and prosthetics, and VFX. We got a wild season in front of us.
Bella Ramsey It’s a little bit scary. When Season One came out it was like this huge thing. I’m so aware of Season Two coming out and everybody looking at it and looking at me and it’s quite scary, but it’s exciting. It’s a celebration of all the hard work that we did. People are going to like it because these guys did an incredible job. We all went into it with complete trust for them. We’ve been literally carried and protected the whole way.
Pedro Pascal: It feels special to be back. And also with such an expanded identity, if that makes sense. Because there are new people and there are old colleagues. There’s something really exciting about giving everyone another season of a show that everyone loved and that everyone has worked so hard on and has put so much into.
Gabriel Luna: It’s good to be back. Get the family back together. But also add these additions that have strengthened the story in so many new and exciting ways. Brought a great love for the source material right into it. There’s a beautiful infusion of youth, excitement and energy that they all brought. We’re really excited for everyone to experience what we made.
Q: Kaitlyn, what was it like coming into this world for you?
Kaitlyn Dever: It was like all of the feelings. I was nervous, I was anxious, but also very excited. I’ve been a huge fan of this game and the show for a very long time. The show is so big. The world of The Last of Us is so large. You can feel that in the wardrobe fitting room when you’re first in prep and then finally getting on set. I felt less nervous once I got onto set because of this wonderful group of people, being held by Craig and Neil. It felt like I was being cared for and taken care of in a way that I haven’t ever experienced ever before. It was a thrill as a person and an actor. We shot in an actual blizzard. We were in the snow, and I was put on a tall mountain. Can you believe that?
Craig Mazin: Kaitlyn did things that I’m not even sure she even should have done. I don’t know how she did it. We knew her obviously as an actor and what she could do, but when you then you meet the person and you’re like: “What can you actually do? What are you comfortable with?” Kaitlyn just would never say no. It was amazing. When you see how physically tremendous her performance is, it’s insane. Very grateful. All of the cast, I can’t wait for you to see what they do and how they interact with each other. It’s amazing.
@Courtesy of HBO MAX
Q: The events of Season Two take place five years after the first season. Can you walk us through what mindset you had to adopt?
Bella Ramsey: It was easy. Obviously a lot has changed over those five years. Ellie was 14 and now is 19. I think in any teenager’s life that’s always the formative years. There’s deeper reasons for their little rift. I didn’t enjoy the feeling of feeling estranged from Pedro within a scene. It wasn’t a nice feeling when the cameras were rolling. It was definitely interesting.
Pedro Pascal: My first day on set it was a beautiful set up by Craig and Neil: the first thing that I got to shoot Bella and I of an intimate setting.There’s an incredibly painful distance between the two of them in the playing of the scene, but we still got to be on set and laugh, that was incredibly comforting, like coming home. My mindset was grateful to be back and yet at the same time, it’s this experience, more than any other I’ve had, it is hard for me to separate what the characters are going through and how it makes me feel. In a way that isn’t very healthy. I feel their pain, so I suppose I was in an unhealthy mindset.
Q: This show offers an apocalyptic view of what is going on. How muchThe Last of Us is a view into what we need to examine about today?
Pedro Pascal: Storytelling is cathartic in so many ways, always has been. It’s the way human beings have made testimony to life. Whether it was handprints on the walls inside of a cave to a television show that you can stream on Max. Starting April 13th. Growing up, all of my development is based on books I’ve read, movies I’ve seen, and television that I’ve watched. I’s very much going to reflect on the human experience under such extreme circumstances. There’s a very healthy and sometimes sick pleasure in that kind of catharsis, a safe space to see human relationships under crisis and in pain. Political allegory, social allegory that we’re living in have been drawn very beautifully and very intelligently.
Gabriel Luna: Pedro is right, there’s a huge catharsis element to it all. The first season, we made a story about a pandemic fear, the experience that everyone had just gave them an entry point to what we were doing. The second season is about conflicts and where do they start? Who started it? All over the world, we’re dealing with these conflicts, people are stuck in the wheel of vengeance, but can it be broken? Will it be broken? That’s where we are, so catharsis is a big element.
Q: Abby’s character is tied to the fireflies into Salt Lake City immediately in the show. How did you want that level of clarity as the starting point for the season?
Neil Druckmann: There are two reasons why we change certain contexts or move certain things up in the story compared to the videogame. In the game if you start as Abby, you immediately form an empathic connection with her because you’re surviving as her. You’re running through the snow, you’re fighting the infected, we can withhold certain things, make it a mystery that will be revealed later in the story. We couldn’t do that in the show because you’re not playing, we need other tools. We had to spend quite a bit of time to achieve something similar. Another reason is where that revelation happens in the game. If we were to stick to a similar timeline, viewers would have to wait a very long time to get that context. You would probably get spoiled to them between seasons and we didn’t want that. So it felt appropriate for those reasons to move that up and give viewers that context right off the bat.
Q: What were you looking forward to most in terms of adapting the game? Did any of you guys get excited to do something specific, and then you came on the other end and you loved something even more?
Craig Mazin: I don’t want to say what it is, but there was a scene in the final episode of the season. It’s quite impactful in the game, there was this evolution of it as we put it on film that blows me away. Those moments are very exciting. This is not a spoiler, it’s in the trailer: You see Pedro and Bella both by the space capsule in the museum, that scene is the first thing that Neil ever showed me from Season Two. It’s beautiful, watching them inhabit that and make it their own was spectacular. Pretty, pretty good.
Bella Ramsey: I agree with that. Some of the stuff in the last episode, particularly the last two, were my favorite things to film.
@Courtesy of HBO MAX
Q: With the first season, we did have a couple of episodes that inform the story and the plot, but they also give us a little slice of life. Are we going to see some of that this season?
Craig Mazin: One thing that Neil and I talked about was making sure that we didn’t just say: “That Bill and Frank episode, people really like that. Let’s do a very special episode of The Last of Us Season Two”. It just has to happen as it happens. But I will say that there is a gorgeous episode this season directed by Neil that is different. It’s not Bill and Frank, but it is its own thing, because it needed to be.
Q: Now that Tommy is a dad in this new season, what do we need to expect from him?
Gabriel Luna: In these five years, his family has grown. He’s been reunited with his brother. He and Maria are raising a baby and the only real turbulence there is the way that you raise a son and how you raise a daughter. You get to examine a lot of that because our family is now these five people. It’s just a really interesting thing about growing the community: who we let in, how we protect those that we love, how we allow those that we care for and how we let the children go in the right direction. What elements of danger are we allowing them to encounter so that they can develop their skills? As Uncle Tommy to Ellie, I can see her capabilities as a warrior, while Joel would very much like to keep her as close to him, protected. I am, as the uncle, allowed to have more of a longer leash that can absolutely be snapped at any moment because Ellie’s a very convincing person. You see this growth of their small nuclear family and also his maturity as the leader of the Security Council, the responsibilities he holds for the safety of the community.
Q: How has it been watching the brothers grow between seasons?
Pedro Pascal: There was a very well-placed arc for us. We started Season One together on D-Day. There was a bonding initiation process stepping into all of it. We had our rehearsals and in pre-production we went river rafting. Really fun. Then we were separated and then put in the snow together. I had Gabriel there when I felt like a lot of the flesh of my character started to display itself and got to be played. In Season Two, it felt like a real natural building of what we had established as characters and as scene partners.
Gabriel Luna: When we first started, we had a really nice FaceTime call where I felt a very uncanny familiarity with Pedro. We worked on just the accent. We both spent time in Texas. I grew up in Austin, he spent time in San Antonio.
Craig Mazin: You guys and everybody’s generally incredibly respectful of the writing we do. But we’re also respectful of you guys. Sometimes a director would say: ”Do we need this line?” And I’d be like, “I guess not.” And then Pedro would come over and say: “Let me just defend the script for a second,” which enlightens my heart as a writer. Once these guys took a scene and they’re like: “Look, we’ve taken this chunk and moved it here. I read and I was like: “That’s so much better” That’s the level of attention and care. That scene is a beautiful scene. That’s a beautiful moment between the two of them. I love that scene.
Q: Since the launch of this show and The Mandalorian, you have become a celebrated name all over the world. What has it been for you to navigate this new level of fame? Could talk a little bit about how it has impacted your life on a professional and a personal level?
Pedro Pascal: This job definitely created a new chapter in my life in a profound way. Because of the personal experience I had making the show, and then of course the way the show was received, how deeply important it means to all of us is a rare thing. It will never happen again. When the work is this, it kind of shields you. It is just an anchor, you know? It happened in season two as well.
Q: Years ago, when this was in development as a movie, you did the table read. What does it mean to come back to this world as Abby for you?
Kaitlyn Dever: I loved what Craig and Neil did in the first season. It was just pure magic. I had become a fan of the game. It was like a real bonding moment for me and my dad playing it together. To have it come back around ten plus years later, it really felt like something I would always think about. I just admired this story so much, it felt surreal because it felt like: “Well, things that are meant to be in your life will happen if they’re supposed to”. It just felt right. Abby felt right. It was very cool.
Q: Joel has such a protective nature with Ellie. Is there someone in real life you draw inspiration from with his protective nature?
Pedro Pascal: I’m protective… I’m protective of the people that I love. That’s probably the main component that I relate to.
@Courtesy of HBO MAX
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Here’s the trailer of The Last of Us Season 2: