My review of this week's eventful episode of The Last of Us: https://t.co/BoOz0ZwYXT
— Alan Sepinwall (@sepinwall) April 21, 2025
Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey recently shared their thoughts on a heartbreaking death in the second season of HBO’s “The Last of Us.” In an interview released by HBO, Ramsey said, “I knew that Joel was going to die right from Season 1. But reading it in the script… I was dreading getting to it, and I cried. Actually sobbed my little heart out.
That was the first time I’ve ever cried from reading a piece of writing.”
Pedro Pascal and Kaitlyn Denver on the set of ‘THE LAST OF US’ Season 2
“Blizzard buddies
Thank you, scene partner. You little miracle” pic.twitter.com/pNzxxuoJm8
— Pedro Pascal Daily (@pascalarchive) April 21, 2025
Pascal also acknowledged the powerful way the show’s creators handled his character’s death.
New behind the scenes pic of Pedro Pascal on the set of ‘THE LAST OF US’ Season 2
📸 ann.foley | instagram pic.twitter.com/MfiJLw4XHp
— Pedro Pascal Daily (@pascalarchive) April 20, 2025
“I have nothing but respect for the level of investment that people have in a video game or television show, a movie or book. I experience it myself, and I’ve flung the books across the room because its impact is so profound on me in experiencing a story,” he said.
“And I think that if it is incredibly painful for people, that’s obviously a brilliant achievement of the storytelling.”
The series stayed true to the source material, with Joel being killed by Abby, a former member of the Fireflies whose father was murdered by Joel during his massacre of the group at the end of Season 1. In the opening moments of Season 2, Abby vowed to get revenge on Joel and kill him “slowly.” Five years later, she and her group of friends tracked Joel to Jackson, Wyoming, where several twists of fate put Joel and Abby together. During a brutal snowstorm and an attack of thousands of infected, Joel saved Abby from certain death.
She brought him back to her hideout under the guise of getting more help but then revealed her true intentions. She incapacitated him, beat him with her fists and a golf club, stopping only when Ellie entered the cabin. She then stabbed him in the neck with the broken golf club, killing him in front of Ellie, who, in turn, vowed revenge on Abby.
Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey reflect
Co-creator Craig Mazin said, “When we get to the moment where Abby does what she does, it was as hard for us to write and to shoot as it was, I think probably, for a lot of people to watch it. But this story is about how we all deal with those moments which do confront us in life.”
Mazin compared Joel’s death to Aslan’s mane being shaved in “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.” “It’s a very sad scene.
I cried my heart out because he was brought low,” Mazin said. “And Joel is brought low here in a way that’s so heartbreaking. He can’t get up off the floor, but he almost does, because Ellie asks him.
It’s so upsetting. We don’t do these things to hurt people. We’re doing it because we’re with Ellie, and she’s experiencing this horrible thing that we will all experience, which is just grief and heartbreak.
It’s coming for us all.”
The show will now focus on how violence begets violence, with Ellie threatening to kill Abby in an echo of Abby’s vow at the start of the season. Co-creator Neil Druckmann said, “I think some viewers will start seeing some parallels between Abby and Ellie. Abby has lost her dad, and now, inadvertently, Abby has created those same memories for another character.
This event will change all the characters we know forever from this point on. Now, this person that’s capable of such violence, this impulsive character, what’s going to happen to them next?”
New episodes of “The Last of Us” air Sundays on HBO and stream on Max.
