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Neil Druckmann on #TheLastOfUs Part 3 👀

"If we can come up with a compelling story that has a universal message and statement about love then we will tell that story. If we can't come up with something, we have a very strong ending with Part 2 and that will be the end." pic.twitter.com/QP1kfg2jSH

— Naughty Dog Central (@NaughtyNDC) January 26, 2023

I think the third storyline will be pretty difficult to come by when it comes to the emotional weight, but not impossible. The Last of Us II is a revenge tale Ellie's pursuit of revenge ultimately gets her nothing in the end but actually causes her to lose her family. Dina leaves her and Tommy dies. Ellie lost, even though she lives, same with Abby. If they continue with Ellie as the protagonist it would need to be a story of redemption, to what extent that exists in the world that she occupies. In the first game she's a kid, in the second game she's a young adult, still reckless and immature. I think she'd need to be older again, possibly 30's, on a path not completely dissimilar to Joel's in the first game. I think it would give her character the chance to come full circle. Maybe she embraces her role as the potential key to saving humanity, even if it means she would have to sacrifice herself for that, but I'm guessing she'd need someone she's willing to pay that price for. Maybe Abby could play a role in that as well, she was 50% of the second game, feels like she'd have to be part of the conclusion of the narrative to me.

If I were writing the story, I'd center it around Ellie giving herself over to the Fireflies to have the procedure Joel stopped at the end of 1, and Abby being tasked with bringing her to a medical facility. Allows you to come full circle on the themes of both games, allowing both moments of redemption.

I think both you guys (girls?) have good ideas for the plotpoints and details that would need to happen. Thematically though, which I guess is what Druckmann is trying to reference, I'm not sure they have much right now. I'm sure they'll figure it out. In my view:

Theme for Part 1 - A love story and why love isn't necessarily a good thing (this is paraphrasing Mazin too)
Theme for Part 2 - Hate and the cost of hate; costs everything, gains nothing
Theme for Part 3 - ???

jokershady said:

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bluefire579 said:

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Confirmed where? From everything I've seen, there's no confirmation they're even working on one. They probably are, given the success of 2, but nothing has officially been announced.

With Druckmann being so involved in the filming of the show, I'd have a hard time imagining anything more than preproduction and tech work happening right now. Given the amount of animation work alone that would need to go into a third game (not to mention the fire Naughty Dog came under for crunch culture for Part 2), I'd say 2026 is optimistic.

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ok maybe not hardcore confirmed but here's something

Quote:

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The Last of Us 3: Waiting For The Sequel

A third game in the series seems to be in active production now. This was claimed by famed and reliable leaker @ViewerAnon, who has revealed several scoops before. According to them, The Last of Us 3 is in production and will be Neil Druckmann's next game.

It will still take a while until we will finally see the game. Naughty Dog has several other titles in development (see more on that further below), and continuing the story after Part 2 will be extremely difficult.

Neil Druckmann revealed last year that it was trickier to find the emotional core of the story in Part 2 than in The Last of Us Part I due to the experiences and previous knowledge of the players. So it will be even more difficult to grab the fans emotionally and to bring innovations in The Last of Us Part 3.

The original Last of Us was released in 2013 and Part II was released 7 years later in 2020, so we imagine a third game would take around the same time. We think 2026 at the earliest for a release. We have to be patient a little longer. But it's still fun to speculate, so let's do that!

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https://earlygame.com/gaming/the-last-of-us-3-how-the-series-could-continue

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https://www.polygon.com/platform/amp/23572852/the-last-of-us-part-3-release-naughty-dog-announcement-story

" In an interview with Buzzfeed, Druckmann said that Naughty Dog hasn't made a decision yet about what's next for the mainline The Last of Us series, and it doesn't feel pressured to either.

That doesn't mean the series is done for sure though. According to Druckmann, the team is batting story ideas back and forth all the time in hopes that something sticks. But until they have the perfect one, we shouldn't expect another entry in the franchise."

Head Ninja In Charge said:

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Neil Druckmann on #TheLastOfUs Part 3 👀

"If we can come up with a compelling story that has a universal message and statement about love then we will tell that story. If we can't come up with something, we have a very strong ending with Part 2 and that will be the end." pic.twitter.com/QP1kfg2jSH

— Naughty Dog Central (@NaughtyNDC) January 26, 2023

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actually very refreshing to hear…

Max and blue fire those are both solid ideas. Toughest part will be how do we get to those points to begin with.

They could also go nuts with the creatures cause if they did another time jump then there'd be a lot of "more evolved" fungus around as well considering the infection would've been around for roughly 40 years if the third game has Ellie has a 30-something year old

I don't know if it makes sense in terms of the entire story stuff, but what if they were to figure out a way to harness the fungus and use it for medical. Thinking about that old lady at the beginning of the TV series that got up and attacked Sarah. Clearly, the fungus can"cure" paralysis. Would you be willing to expose a loved one to the fungus of it meant they could walk again? I don't know how something like that would fit in with Ellie's arc, but I do think there's an interesting story there.

Ghost of Bisbee said:

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" The Last of Us HBO series has ignited a surge in game sales in the UK, with The Last of Us Part 1 rising 238% and The Last of Us: Remastered spiking 322%." - IGN

Only going to keep rising

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Well, you can include my in the numbers that bought TLOU2.

THIS. When her tea cup started to shake I bout got chills.

Thought the soldier with her did an amazing job too.

(A little hyperbole in the tweet but man what a scene)

The prologue of episode 2 of the Last of Us might be the best opening to an episode ever in a TV series. Intrusive and a real, palpable sense of dread and all carried by this woman, Christine Hakim. Incredible television. pic.twitter.com/AKZ1mYUigh

— Alex H (@LLHallJ) January 23, 2023

Yup! So far all their expansions on the story from the game have been 100% nails and I'm loving that even us big fans of the game seem to be in for some good surprises each episode.

Awesome news, I figured it was only a matter of time but it's great to have confirmation. I know they said they're not going to continue the series after the source material concludes so we're not going to get a GOT situation where the show surpasses the books. I wonder if they'll need to cut the second game into two seasons since the second game is a good bit larger. They could cover it in one season if they stick solely with Ellie's story, but if they make Abby as big a part of the show as the game I think it would be difficult to cover all that material in 9 episodes.

YNWA_AG said:

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‘THE LAST OF US’ has been renewed for Season 2 at HBO.

Read our S1 review: https://t.co/qrdlPbXfO4 pic.twitter.com/SbpPGo7zSr

— DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) January 27, 2023

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interesting I was under the impression this was already known since there'd be reports that they were planning to break the second game into 2 seasons….

I think it was more them talking about how they'd do it than confirming anything official. I'm sure they expected success, but gotta imagine the suits at HBO were still waiting to see the numbers before officially pulling the trigger.

S2 has been known for awhile, just not public until today

Not sure Bella feels old enough to be an older Ellie but whatever. They can modify it

She's 19 in real life, so shouldn't be too much of a stretch. Think that was actually Ellie's age in Part 2

I beat TLoU 2 video game today. I thought it was a good ending, but it leaves so many openings for a Part 3.

Nice!

Haven't seen 210 post here since he clearly made it to the part in TLOU 2 where Joel gets killed in TLOU 2

Nancy thread up in arms over "spoilers" in an HBO-produced trailer. Unreal

I started playing the Left Behind DLC last night. I didn't realize I missed that. Anyways, it got me thinking about the actress playing Ellie. I can't decide if I like her in the role or not. She certainly has Ellie's sass, but Video Game Ellie also had this innocent kid like quality to her that I haven't really seen yet in the show. The only exception is where they are in the hotel lobby and Ellie plays like she's checking in.

What I really like about Video Game Ellie is that throughout all this horrible stuff happening, she's still a kid who likes to have fun. Like when she finds the joke book. You may have just gone through some horrible room where you killed a dozen people and all of a sudden Ellie busts out a really bad pun or something.

I hope they don't just make her character a sarcastic teen ass. I hope they take time to find moments where she can have some child like fun.

To be fair, the jokes don't start until Pittsburgh, so there's still plenty of time to include them in the show.

Side note: between TLOU and Fallout, I think if the apocalypse happens, I'm going to avoid Pittsburgh like the plague. Seems like the place where everything gets extra ****ty.

Is this the 15 sec TV spot?

https://www.ispot.tv/ad/2Qt9/hbo-the-last-of-us

I don't what tcts would complain about with that spot?
Oh I guess it's getting back to Tommy

YNWA_AG said:

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I don't what tcts would complain about with that spot?
Oh I guess it's getting back to Tommy

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yeah that's what it was. That does seem like a mild spoiler but not so much it happening as it's pretty safe to assume it was…..but more about spoiling the emotion of that moment which yeah that'd bug me too as an uninformed watcher.

More surprising to me though is the context of the scene with the background….take a closer look and this scene seems like a setup for the second game/season. When Joel and Tommy first meet up it's not exactly a friendly meet up in the first game from what I remember….can't remember why exactly but they aren't on good terms….course they sorta patch things up but there's also no snow in the background of that scene……it's in a forest area….

I think this is them surprisingly meeting back up in the setting that will begin season 2 because dang it looks a lot like that place in background….

jokershady said:

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YNWA_AG said:

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I don't what tcts would complain about with that spot?
Oh I guess it's getting back to Tommy

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yeah that's what it was. That does seem like a mild spoiler but not so much it happening as it's pretty safe to assume it was…..but more about spoiling the emotion of that moment which yeah that'd bug me too as an uninformed watcher.

More surprising to me though is the context of the scene with the background….take a closer look and this scene seems like a setup for the second game/season. When Joel and Tommy first meet up it's not exactly a friendly meet up in the first game from what I remember….can't remember why exactly but they aren't on good terms….course they sorta patch things up but there's also no snow in the background of that scene……it's in a forest area….

I think this is them surprisingly meeting back up in the setting that will begin season 2 because dang it looks a lot like that place in background….

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I agree

There's a heavy "I'm too cool to be a gamer, pat myself on the back" vibe coming from the non-gaming crowd and there's some jealousy on their end towards those who have the experience of knowing the game/source material well already. Therefore they will find something wrong with anything a gamer happens to say in that thread, nothing of which has been a spoiler yet

"But but but there WILL be a spoiler posted here, I just know it!!!"

AustinAg2K said:

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I don't think that spot spoils anything. If you haven't figured out yet that they are going to meet Tommy, you're as dumb as that Chuck guy on the other thread. They aren't going to spend the whole first episode setting up they are getting a battery to go find Tommy, just to have Joel say, "Eh, f-it. Let's go check out Florida.". This obsession with spoilers has gotten out of hand. A story foreshadow something isn't a spoiler.

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I fear for common sense rationality for the users in that thread