It’s been over a year since Last of Us series director Neil Druckmann left the live-action HBO series in the less-than-capable hands of showrunner Craig Mazin, and perhaps there is a god, because the show is going to wrap up after its third season rather than spreading things out into a proposed fourth one. Druckmann, however, can’t really speak to how the third season, starring Kaitlyn Dever as Abby, is shaping up, because he’s not involved. However, it sounds like he has more Last of Us projects in the works, as he seems to have once again teased a possible third game in the post-apocalyptic drama.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Druckmann talked about the process of writing for video games and how his work on the first two seasons has (or hasn’t) informed his creative work in video games in the years since working on the show. Right now, Druckmann is directing Naughty Dog’s upcoming sci-fi action game Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, and cited his desire to focus on it as a key reason for his departure from the show after the second season wrapped. However, when asked if he had any update on the third season, Druckmann pretty much says point-blank that he doesn’t know and isn’t part of whatever Mazin is cooking up.
“I wasn’t involved in shaping this season’s creative direction, and Naughty Dog did not have a creative role in the direction of this season,” Druckmann said. “So I can’t personally speak to how production is progressing.”
However, Naughty Dog is apparently doing something within the series, though whether that be a new game, a different adaption, or just some other creative projects in the post-apocalyptic world is unclear.
“It’s important for us to note that as the creator of the games, Naughty Dog is still steward of this IP and even though this might be the end of this adaptation, we’re not done with The Last of Us,” he says. “There’s a couple projects in the works that, when the time is right, I’m very excited to talk about.”
I’ve made no secret of the fact that I find HBO’s version of The Last of Us to be one of the most abhorrent works in video game adaptation history. As I write this, it’s the end of the work day and if I get too in my feelings about HBO’s show I’m gonna be here all night, but I will say that in addition to my trepidation about the TV show’s final season, I’m also pretty wary of the possibility of Naughty Dog making a third Last of Us game considering I’m not really interested in being told what happened after the end of Part II. And as much as I’d like to believe that these “projects” Druckmann is talking about won’t include another game, unfortunately for me, the way he phrased things definitely leaves the possibility of one open.
