Summary
- Season 2 of The Last of Us on HBO features 5.3 million viewers, a 13% increase from Season 1.
- Showrunner Craig Mazin says that Pearl Jam's 'Future Days' is crucial to Ellie and Joel's story.
- Despite timeline shifts in the series, fans can expect iconic elements like 'Future Days' to stay.
HBO's The Last of Us Season 2 has finally burst into 2025 to adapt the sequel to its successful second video game in the franchise, as fans eagerly watch with anticipation at the continuation of Ellie and Joel's now strained relationship. With the show's timeline now being moved forward, showrunner Craig Mazin has addressed how one of its most talked about songs, 'Future Days', will actually play out. Season one of The Last of Us was a huge hit for the streaming network, with the hopes that its return will do the same. So far, the second season has reached 5.3 million viewers with its Season 2 premiere, which is a 13% increase from its Season 1 premiere.
Although the series will follow the main narrative when it comes to many of its plots and characters, its timeline will not follow the exact layout of The Last of Us Part 2, even though it has stayed mostly faithful to the first game in season one. Now, fans can expect some shifting around when it comes to season 2, and even though it looks set to be as explosive as ever and includes some never-seen-before faces like the therapist Gail, played by Catherine O'Hara, and Ellie's ex-girlfriend Kat, some fans have been worried that bigger tweaks could impact season 2's storyline in a way that might ruin what made it so good to begin with. However, they likely don't need to worry about one beloved feature from the sequel being removed from the show completely (even though it doesn't make a lot of sense).
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The Last of Us Showrunner Talks About Future Days' Influence in Season 2
In the official HBO podcast for The Last of Us, series co-creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann said that they decided Pearl Jam's 'Future Days' song was far too important to not be included in Season 2 in some way, as its meaning is "incredibly important" to Joel and Ellie's relationship. In The Last of Us Part 2, the iconic tune plays a big role in the pair's lives due to its heartbreaking and meaningful words, which run as a constant stream throughout its narrative. Even though the band didn’t release the hit until 2013 and The Last of Us video game's outbreak day was in 2003 when the world ended, Mazin said that he wanted to "just go ahead and rip the scab off on what I think is going to be a lot of commentary."
"And Neil and I had, you know, a solid conversation and arrived at the following conclusion: We didn't give a sh*t because it is an important song to the story. And thematically, it's incredibly important because Joel is trying to figure out what his future is with Ellie, and Ellie is trying to figure out what her future is as herself, not as someone's kid. And where they're heading into the future, which we accelerate them into five years later, they have arrived at Future Days. It is, in fact, the past that is the anchor that is still holding them back."
Not only does Pearl Jam's Future Days song have a hugely impactful meaning for Joel and Ellie's traumatic journey, but also the franchise's fanbase, who would likely have an issue with it not being mentioned in some way in Season 2. Although it's not clear if the creators will have Joel play the song to Ellie on the guitar or if they will have another way of including it, maybe even Eddie Vedder could make a guest appearance, but it seems very likely from Mazin and Druckmann's comments that they haven't forgotten how important the song is.
The Last of Us Season 2 will premiere on HBO at 9 pm EST every Sunday until May 25.
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- Release Date
- January 15, 2023
- Network
- HBO
- Showrunner
- Craig Mazin
Cast
-
Pedro PascalJoel Miller -
Bella RamseyEllie Williams
WHERE TO WATCH
- 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, Halley Wegryn Gross
- Franchise(s)
- The Last of Us
- Creator(s)
- Neil Druckmann, Craig Mazin
Source: Comic Book