The Last of Us Season 2 creator reveals the place in the series where they had to differ from the game for good reason 

The Last of Us Season 2 deviated from the video game in one particular aspect. The deviation is around Joel's death. In The Last of Us Part 2 video game, the killing of Joel results in action-packed gameplay with a brief grieving period. In contrast, the HBO series showrunners employed nearly an entire episode to concentrate on his death.

As The Last of Us co-showrunner and game director Neil Druckmann puts it, the show had to make this change because of how video games and television writing differ.

I love episode three. It does something that we just couldn’t do in the game," Druckmann explained in The Last of Us' Inside Episode 3 aftershow.

He said that while the game was action-oriented and forced players to jump into action, the series provided room for more emotional exploration.

"In the game after Joel dies, because the mechanics of the game are very action-oriented, the mourning period is relatively short. Here, we can take almost an entire episode and really feel the loss of this character," he said.

This approach allowed the show to offer a deeper and slower examination of Joel's impact on the people around him.

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Using time to show grief after Joel died in The Last of Us Season 2

Episode 3 of The Last of Us Season 2 centers on Joel’s death, portrayed by Pedro Pascal. Unlike in the game, where the character’s death quickly shifts into action, the show devoted a full episode to mourning.

Druckmann indicated that this was intentionally done to create a focus on the emotional implications of the moment.

"This really beautiful scene where Tommy has to come in and he has to clean up his brother’s body" he continued.

Co-creator Craig Mazin also spoke on the larger loss that the town of Jackson suffered.

"The entire town of Jackson suffered," Mazin stated in the same aftershow.

He added,

"I have a problem sometimes in television shows where a character we care about loses someone in a battle where a lot of people lose people. Those people matter too."

So the episode wasn't solely about Joel's demise. It also illustrated that some in the town lost someone they cared about in a recent Infected attack.

The shift in pace was facilitated by the variation in media. In television, characters are normally forced to keep moving. In television, however, the writers can slow down the narrative and present reactions by characters in detail. This helped the show to slow down and emphasize feelings, something the game could not achieve to the same level.

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Tommy's role and the story's direction after Joel

Gabriel Luna, who portrays Tommy, Joel's brother, discussed how the character responds to the loss.

In Luna's opinion, Tommy causes Joel's death.

"There’s this scene that follows the events of the second episode. I won’t get into it too heavily, but there’s a transition that happens, a passing of the torch, so to speak," Luna said.

Luna also mentioned that the shift was not only in the narrative. It also echoed what was taking place behind the scenes of the production.

"It felt not only was it happening in the story but in our work and in our production," he further added.

This indicates that the show is moving its attention, and new characters, such as Ellie and Dina, are becoming more accountable. In the show, Ellie, played by Bella Ramsey, and Dina, played by Isabela Merced, start making plans for their trip to Seattle.

Ellie and Dina set out to track down Abby, the one responsible for Joel’s killing. Although Ellie's grief is a large focus, the show also touches on the effect on Tommy and the rest of the community. This larger consideration of loss is a big aspect of what sets the show's handling apart from the game.

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The Last of Us Season 2 is now streaming on Max.