‘The Last of Us' season 2 let me down — here's 3 things the finale can do to win me back

I'm a "Last of Us" superfan. The PlayStation duology ranks among my favorite video games of all time, and I was hugely impressed by the first season of the HBO show. Sadly, I've had a less enthusiastic response to 'The Last of Us' season 2.
I've been left feeling largely disappointed by the show's long-awaited return, as each episode makes more and more significant changes to the source material that, in my opinion, don't benefit the overall story.
It's not that 'The Last of Us' season 2 has been especially bad, it's just not hit the heights of season 1, and hasn't resonated with me in the way The Last of Us Part 2 video games did, and continues to do so to this very day.
Nevertheless, with the finale set for this weekend (airing on HBO and Max on Sunday, May 25), I'm preparing to watch with an open mind and the hope that the season can be salvaged at the death. For that to happen, here are the three things I want to see in 'The Last of Us' season 2, episode 7.
But first, a quick spoiler warning: this article contains spoilers for The Last of Us Part 2 game and may contain spoilers for future episodes of the HBO show.
One of the most curious changes that the HBO show has made compared to the original video game is its handling of the character of Tommy (played by Gabriel Luna in the show).
In the Part 2 game, Tommy is the one who first heads out to Seattle to find (and kill) Abby, with Ellie and Dina following in his wake. Alternatively, in the world of the show, Tommy is a pillar of the community in Jackson and a family man with a young child. He stays behind to rebuild the makeshift town following its attack by a horde of infected, with Ellie and Dina trekking to Seattle on their own to find Abby.
I wasn't a fan of this change, but with the die now cast, at the very least, I want Tommy to be properly brought back into the mix. The good news is Tommy's reemergence appears almost certain. We know he's now on the board, as Jesse revealed in episode 6 that the other Miller brother accompanied him to Seattle.
Tommy's role should be sizeable in the finale, and that'll make me very happy.
"The Last of Us" as a franchise has never been scared of shock character deaths, and arguably the most out-of-the-blue kill in the series to date is that of Jesse.
There's no buildup to this murder. Instead, Ellie and Jesse hear somebody breaking into their theater base, sprint to confront this intruder (revealed to be Abby), and in a split second, Jesse is snuffed out via a bullet to the head.
It was a moment that left me nearly breathless when playing the game for the first time. I was initially convinced that Jesse hadn't just died in such a sudden way. But in the world of "The Last of Us," key characters don't always get heroic deaths or dramatic send-offs. This apocalyptic world is much too brutal for every character to go into the dark night with a fitting swansong.
The show needs to keep this important moment intact, and fortunately, I think it most likely will. While season 2 has made a boatload of changes, it has, at least so far, kept the narrative broad strokes the same, and I hope it won't go as far as to alter a key character's untimely fate.
OK, so I'll fully acknowledge this one is a bit of a nitpick, but I was super disappointed that Joel's iconic line just before his brutal murder at Abby's hands ('Why don't you say whatever speech you got rehearsed, and get this over with.") was removed in favor of one that lacked the same punch.
The much-anticipated theatre confrontation between Abby and Ellie, which all signs point towards being the bookend of 'The Last of Us' season 2, contains an equally iconic moment, when Abby, shocked to discover the person hunting her and her friends down is Ellie and Tommy, spits out 'we let you both live and you wasted it' before raising her gun to shoot. Cut to black.
It's a real fan-favorite line, and I'll be pretty miffed if this dialogue is also removed (or significantly reworked). Here's hoping the show opts to keep this intense scene pretty much unchanged.
When you land on perfection the first time, why alter things the second time?

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Learn with AIFact CheckingText to SpeechAI Summary

Related Articles

Cosmopolitan

36 minutes ago

• Cosmopolitan

How to watch the 28 Days Later movies in order

Before we had HBO shelling cordyceps and Pedro Pascal smut in The Last Of Us, we had the 2002 hit 28 Days Later. Two decades later, in the abyss of The Last of Us hiatus, the original 'infected' are returning. With the long-anticipated 28 Years Later at our fingertips—rumoured to be the first film in a new trilogy—it's time to revisit the nightmare. Here's your guide to watching the 28 Days Later franchise in the proper order, plus a preview of what's to come. Directed by Danny Boyle and written by Alex Garland, the mother wound that is 28 Days Later opens on a crew of animal rights activists who accidentally release a deadly lab-grown virus into society. 28 days later, Cillian Murphy wakes from a coma and finds himself in a deserted, post-apocalyptic London. What follows is equal parts horror and psychological drama, with the survivors navigating a world where the line between humanity and monstrosity blurs. The film originally was considered a piece of lost media, since it was so hard to find on streaming and home video. Back in February 2024, producer Andrew Macdonald bought back the rights to film, allowing it return to streaming and now we can watch it for ourselves again, this time for free on BBC iPlayer. Boyle and Garland returned in 2007 with a new iteration, directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo. The sequel takes place six months after the events of the first film. The virus is 'contained,' and NATO forces are repopulating a secure zone in London. But a new outbreak—fuelled by a carrier with natural immunity—spirals into chaos. This sequel trades the intimacy of the original for broader scale, faster pacing, and some truly haunting visuals (the helicopter scene lives in infamy). 28 Weeks Later expands the universe and introduces the idea that the virus might never truly be eradicated. It's also the movie that confirmed: containment is a myth. You can now watch 28 Weeks Later on Netflix. Landing in cinemas on 20 June, 2025, 28 Years Later picks up three decades after the original film's timeline, following a group of survivors living on a small, heavily-defended island. Our main players here are a father and son who leave the island to traverse the infected-populated mainland. With the original team at the helm, the film is written by Alex Garland and directed by Danny Boyle. Cillian Murphy hive, stand down. The stars of this film include Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and Ralph Fiennes. If the first two films were about shock and spread, 28 Years Later may look at legacy. What does the world look like after generations of rage—both viral and political? How have survivors evolved? And can the infection ever truly be cured? Much like The Last of Us and the (read: actually good) films in the broader zombie canon, the 28 Days Later franchise is a reflection of our anxieties—about science, government, violence, and each other. Sigh. Reality bites.

Tom's Guide

an hour ago

• Tom's Guide

I skipped Fallout 76 at launch — here's why I finally gave it a shot in 2025 (and you should too)

I love Fallout. Exploring a vast, post-apocalyptic wasteland filled with horrible enemies has always brought a smile to my face. I'm also prone to getting addicted to online looter shooter games like Destiny 2 and I even got sucked into The First Descendent. So when Fallout 76 came out, it should have been the game for me. But based on the negativity from Fallout fans when it launched, I passed. Now, it's 2025, and the game has been chugging along since 2018. It's had hours and hours of content added to it, and it's become closer to the Fallout experience I always hoped it could be. It doesn't have as much personality as the numbered Fallout games (and New Vegas), but it has one key factor that keeps me coming back: it's incredibly fun. Is 2025 finally the perfect time to lose yourself in the Appalachian wasteland? I think it just might be, and here's why. For me, one of the biggest reasons to jump back into Fallout 76 is the value. Because the game is a few years old, you can get it for cheap most of the time. Even at full price, the game is $39 on Steam, PlayStation and Xbox. It's on Game Pass and can often be picked up on sale, either from the first-party platform store or from retailers like Amazon. I've been primarily playing through Game Pass, as I have an active subscription. The ridiculous number of quests and vast wilderness available to explore make it feel like a game that should cost a lot more. I've played more than 40 hours of the game in a few weeks, and it feels like there are a million more quests for me to do and powerful items to find. Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. And then there's the building mechanics... Fallout 76 offers a lot of content for the price. You can spend hundreds of hours exploring the wastelands if you like the game, so you'll certainly get your money's available on: Xbox and PlayStation I was a little worried that Fallout 76 might not be fun without a group of friends to play with. My normal group of looter shooter friends has dispersed between various games, with a few still hanging onto Destiny 2. Getting them to try Fallout 76 was a no-go, so it was just me rolling solo (and playing with randoms). Fortunately, after grinding my way past level 50, I can say that I'm having a blast without friends. Friends or not, the core loop of shooting enemies, looting their corpses and leveling up your character is fun and addictive, which is what you want to see from a game like Fallout 76. Whether you play a V.A.T.S. character or one who sprays all over the place, there's a lot of fun to be had in Bethesda's semi-MMO version of Fallout. While the Bethesda game may not have the official Steam Deck badge, in my experience, the game works just fine. And best of all, you don't need to do anything crazy with the settings to get it working. All I did was install the game and launch it. No startup tweaks and no crazy settings to change. Just run it and go. It's not perfect — the frame rate is lower than a traditional gaming PC or console, but the fact that I can play my current looter-shooter addiction while my family does other stuff with the TV is amazing. Now, if only there were a way to transfer characters between platforms (there isn't and probably never will be). Bethesda offers a quality of life (QOL) subscription for Fallout 76 that provides things like scrap and ammo storage, preventing you from having to deal with the headache of encumbrance as much. It costs $99.99 per year or $12.99 per month. I signed up for a month, and it's great to have if you're playing a ton of the game. However, I played all the way to level 50 without it, and it was fine. Will I keep my subscription after the first month? Probably, because I'm incredibly addicted to the game and I like the QOL changes. But I could also live without it, and I think you can, too. I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm late to the Fallout 76 party. Players around the world have already known how good the game was for some time, and I'm just walking in like a beginner trying to tell people the game is good. Are there bugs? Sure. Does it crash occasionally? Of course, it's a Bethesda game. Do any of those things stop me from loving the game and wanting to finish this article to play more of it? Not even close.

Hypebeast

6 hours ago

• Hypebeast

Ryan Coogler's 'Sinners' Receives Max Streaming Premiere Date

Summary Ryan Coogler'sSinnersofficially received aMaxstreaming date for at-home viewers. TheMichael B. Jordan-led feature hits the streamer on July 4, followed by anHBOpremiere on July 5 and physical copies on July 8. Sinners sees Jordan portray a set of identical twins, Stack and Smoke, who return to their hometown of Clarksdale, Missisipi after a tenure for the Chicago Outfit. They, along with their cousin and preacher's son Sammie, open a juke joint for the local Black community, but are haunted by the supernatural on opening night. Joining Jordan in the cast are Hailee Steinfeld, Miles Caton, Jack O'Connell, Wunmi Mosaku, Li Jun Li, Yao, Jayme Lawson, Omar Miller and Delroy Lindo. Sinnershas since grossed a total of $363.8 million USD in the global box office since its release and was met with critical and commercial acclaim. Sinnershits Max July 4, and premieres on HBO on July 5.