Warning. Major spoilers for The Last of Us Season 2. The Last of Us returned for Season 2 with a bang, as the HBO show brought back Joel, Ellie, and the town of Jackson, Wyoming. And the numbers showed that people were not just interested, but that the show had grown in comparison with Season 1, which had already become one of HBO’s biggest hits. Both The Last of Us video games were big hits, too, which is why the adaptation was anticipated by gamers and casual fans alike.
But ever since the show was announced, fans were wondering if one of the biggest twists of the second game would actually be adapted. The Season 2 premiere, which starts with a five-year time jump and sees Joel and Ellie going through some issues, seems to indicate that we are indeed heading there. The first episode, after all, adapted some of the scenes of the game beat for beat, including the relationship between Ellie and her friend Dina, who ends up being a big character in the games, and is played by Isabela Merced in the show.
Related: Who dies in The Last of Us Season 2?
So now the question on everyone’s mind is, will the show do it? Does Joel really die in The Last of Us Season 2? And if so, how soon? We’ve got the heartbreaking answer.
Does Joel really die in The Last of Us Season 2?
There’s no escaping the inevitable. The Last of Us Season 2 is set to kill Pedro Pascal’s Joel, just like the source material before it. That is, after all, the main impetus behind the second game the season is based on, so it’s impossible for the show to avoid the inciting element that sets Ellie on her path to revenge. The trailers for the season have already shown us scenes of Bella Ramsey’s character in Seattle, hunting down Abby. There would be no reason for her to be there if Joel weren’t dead.
Considering that we already saw Abby on the outskirts of Jackson at the end of Episode 1, Joel’s death is happening in Episode 2 or Episode 3 at the latest. But the show is set to change the circumstances of Joel’s death in a big way, one that could have repercussions for how the rest of the season unfolds.
In the game, Joel is with Tommy when he is captured by Abby and her crew. In the show, he is on patrol with Dina when this happens, and the two are the ones who save Abby, which would make Dina the witness to his death that Tommy was in the game. The show has given Joel and Dina a bond they did not possess in the game, likely to strengthen Dina’s decision to go with Ellie to Seattle to avenge Joel, but in doing so, they have perhaps weakened Joel’s relationship with his brother Tommy.
In the game, Tommy is responsible for killing Manny, one of the men in Abby’s crew, in revenge for what happened to Joel. But considering Tommy might not be there to witness Joel’s violent death, is the show changing this, too? And does that mean Manny will survive, or will someone else kill him? And how does Joel’s death affect Tommy, considering he wasn’t there to see him? All good questions that the show will now have to grapple with in a different way than the game did. Perhaps not a huge change, but something new for the show to bring to the table.
