Summary
Warning: This article contains spoilers forThe Last of Us Part II.
The Last of Usseason 2’s biggest challenge will be making the audience empathize with Abby without the benefit of gameplay, but it’s HBO’s signature move to make audiences empathize with the last character they expected to empathize with. After season 1 adapted the first game, season 2 will begin to tackle the epic narrative ofThe Last of Us Part II, presumably with a similar chronology. Kaitlyn Dever has been cast to play Abby, one of the greatest but also most polarizing characters in video game history.
The game’s best narrative trick is making the audience hate Abby right away with the gruesome inciting incident, then slowly forcing them to empathize with her as they experience the story from her perspective. For the first half of the game, the only thing the player knows about Abby is that she beat Joel to death – and they want revenge. But the second half puts the player in her shoes and shows them that, from her point of view, Joel is the villain. It’s ingenious storytelling, but it’ll play a little differently on TV than it did in the game.
Abby’s 10 Best Scenes In The Last Of Us We Can’t Wait To See In HBO’s Season 2
Kaitlyn Dever has been cast as Abby in The Last of Us season 2, and it’ll be a joy to see her recreate the best scenes from The Last of Us Part II.
The Last Of Us Season 2’s Biggest Challenge Will Be Getting TV Audiences To Empathize With Abby
The TV show won’t have gameplay to actively endear the audience to Abby
The Last of Us Part IIuses gameplay to actively endear the audience to Abby. As they play as Abby escaping from a horde of infected and keeping Lev safe from the Seraphites hunting him down andkilling the Rat King, the player can’t help but love Abby as much as they love Joel or Ellie. But without being able to use gameplay to literally put the audience in Abby’s shoes,The Last of UsTV show will have a tough time getting viewers to empathize with her.
HBO Has Made Audiences Empathize With Much Worse People Than Abby
HBO has a deep bench of antiheroes who have done horrible things
Although it’ll be a lot tougher forThe Last of UsTV show to force audiences to empathize with Abby than the game, which literally controlled the player’s perspective, this is where it comes in handy that the show is on HBO. HBO has a long history of introducing characters who seem despicable and irredeemable – much like Abby aftera certainLast of Us Part IIsceneat a snowbound mansion – and making the audience see them as a three-dimensional human being and empathize with them. HBO has a deep bench of sympathetic antiheroes that audiences didn’t expect to like.
Succession’s Logan Roy is an abusive patriarch whose own children fear him;The Sopranos’ Ralph Cifaretto murdered the woman who was carrying his child;Game of Thrones’ Jaime Lannister assaulted his own sister; andBarry’s Barry Berkman is a professional killer. HBO managed to get audiences to empathize with all these characters, and they’re all worse people than Abby. It might not be as impossible as it seems for Abby to win over TV audiences inThe Last of Usseason 2.
The Last Of Us
Cast
The Last of Us is a post-apocalyptic drama series set two decades after a global catastrophe. It follows Joel, a seasoned survivor, who is tasked with escorting Ellie, a teenage girl, across a desolated United States, transforming into a harrowing journey of survival and companionship.
