HBO‘s series adaptation of Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us video game could run for up to four seasons.
The news was hinted by series co-creators, executive producers, showrunners and directors Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann, who told Deadline that the amount of storytelling may not fit in just two additional seasons. “We don’t think that we’re going to be able to tell the story even within two seasons [2 and 3] because we’re taking our time and go down interesting pathways which we did a little bit in Season 1 too,” Mazin said. “We feel like it’s almost assuredly going to be the case that — as long as people keep watching and we can keep making more television — Season 3 will be significantly larger. And indeed, the story may require Season 4.” He added, “One thing is absolutely for sure, I don’t see how we could tell the story that remains after Season 2 is complete in one more season.”
The pair also confirmed the upcoming second season will be relatively shorter than its predecessors with a seven-episode count. “The story material that we got from Part II of the game is way more than the story material that was in the first game, so part of what we had to do from the start was figure out how to tell that story across seasons,” Mazin said. “When you do that, you look for natural breakpoints, and as we laid it out, this season, the national breakpoint felt like it came after seven episodes.”
While season two is already confirmed for a 2025 release, HBO has yet to greenlight two more seasons for the adaptation.
The upcoming season will see the return of Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey as Joel and Ellie, as well as the addition of Kaitlyn Denver (who was previously a fan-favorite for the role of Ellie due to her resemblance to the character) as Abby, the second protagonist in the second installment of the video game series.
