We’re nine days away from The Last of Us premiering on HBO, but showrunner Craig Mazin already knows how it’s going to end. Presumably, there’ll be more than one season of the much-anticipated show, providing room for Mazin and his fellow execs to decide which route to take the narrative. Despite drawing inspiration from Naughty Dog’s acclaimed 2013 video game, it might not be the case for The Last of Us to follow the same structure precisely, which leads us to presume that the ending could be drastically different too. We’re not seeing any sign of Abby until at least the second season, surely, so Mazin must have carefully accounted for every possible scenario.
In an interview with Collider, Mazin made it clear that he’s not planning to drag this out. Unlike how The Last of Us: Part II left both Ellie and Abby’s stories open-ended, Mazin wants to reach a definitive conclusion, rather than turning The Last of Us into another The Walking Dead that runs on for so long, the network is forced to put the nail in the coffin. Interestingly, since The Last of Us video game series is still ongoing with a third rumored to be in development, Mazin still claims to know exactly how and when Joel and Ellie’s stories will end.