Summary
FromGame of Thrones’ Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey toThe White Lotus’ Murray Bartlett, pretty much every major actor fromThe Last of Ushad worked with HBO before.Once an actor is in the HBO family, the network tends to keep bringing them back.The Leftovers’ Carrie Coon was cast inThe Gilded Age.The Wire’s Robert Wisdom was cast inBarry.Sharp Objects’ Sydney Sweeney was brought back forEuphoriaandThe White Lotus. Danny McBride has created and starred inEastbound & Down,Vice Principals, andThe Righteous Gemstones. HBO is very loyal to its actors.
For just about every key role inThe Last of Us, HBO’s casting team brought back someone they’d worked with before.Both lead characters, Joel and Ellie, were played byGame of Thronesalums. Before playing Bill inThe Last of Us’ most touching episode – season 1, episode 3, “Long, Long Time” – Nick Offerman had made guest appearances on HBO shows ranging fromArlisstoDeadwoodtoCurb Your Enthusiasm. The show brought back iconic voice actors from the games, like Troy Baker, Ashley Johnson, and Jeffrey Pierce, but it also has plenty of familiar faces for long-time HBO viewers.
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10Pedro Pascal
Oberyn Martell, Game of Thrones
Pedro Pascal plays the lead role of Joel Miller in HBO’sThe Last of Us. In the game, Joel is a hardened killer who’s capable of unspeakable brutality. This works well for the main playable character in an action-adventure video game, but it wouldn’t make him a very sympathetic lead in a TV show. So, showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann made the TV version of Joel much softer and more sensitive. He’s worried he won’t be able to keep Ellie safe, and it’s giving him regular panic attacks.
Pascal was a perfect casting choice to play this version of Joel, because he projects Joel’s badassness, but also brings a real emotionality and vulnerability to the role. After nearly two decades of playing small parts,Pascal began the path to superstardom with his breakout role as Oberyn Martell, “The Red Viper of Dorne,” inGame of Thronesseason 4.Rather than using guns and shivs like Joel, Oberyn’s weapon of choice is poison, hence his nickname.
9Bella Ramsey
Lyanna Mormont, Game of Thrones
Bella Ramsey co-stars with Pascal as Ellie, the immune girl that Joel takes to the Fireflies in the hope of developing a cure for the Cordyceps infection.Ramsey plays Ellie totally differently than her original voice actor, Ashley Johnson, with more of an acid-tongued wit and a morbid curiosity about violence. But Ramsey captures the spirit of Ellie just as effectively as Johnson did.
In both the game and the show, Ellie is a symbol of hope and childhood innocence in this bleak, dystopian world. Much like Pascal,Ramsey also appeared onGame of Thronesbefore landing theirLast of Usrole.Ramsey played Lyanna Mormont, the head of House Mormont. Despite being just 10 years old, Lyanna is a ruthless and tyrannical ruler.Like Ellie, Lyanna might be much younger than her peers, but she makes her opinions known.
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8Gabriel Luna
Miguel Gilb, True Detective
Gabriel Luna plays Joel’s younger brother Tommy in HBO’sThe Last of Us. He didn’t have a huge role in season 1; he appeared in the opening prologue and reappeared in the Jackson-set scenes of episode 6, “Kin.” ButThe Last of Usseason 1’s ending, in which Joel and Ellie moved back to Jackson, set up Tommy for a much larger role in season 2.
Tommy’s uncle-niece relationship with Ellie is a major factor inThe Last of Us Part II, and it’ll be great to see Luna play those scenes with Ramsey. Before appearing inThe Last of Us,Luna had a three-episode arc inTrue Detectiveseason 2.Luna played Miguel Gilb, a former colleague of Taylor Kitsch’s character, Officer Paul Woodrugh. While season 2 was arguablyTrue Detective’s weakest season, Luna gave a memorable performance.
7Nico Parker
Ellie, The Third Day
Nico Parker only appeared in the first episode ofThe Last of Us, “When You’re Lost in the Darkness,” butshe was the focal point of the opening prologue and her character loomed large over the rest of the season.Parker plays Joel’s daughter Sarah, who dies tragically in his arms on outbreak day. Whereas the game opens in the middle of the night, the TV series goes through Sarah’s entire day – eating breakfast, going to school, buying Joel’s birthday present, etc. – so the audience can get to know her better.
This made Sarah’s untimely passing even more devastating than it is in the game. Parker nailed the pain and fear of the death scene just as effectively as her video game counterpart, Hana Hayes. Prior to her work inThe Last of Us,Parker had played a character coincidentally named Ellie in the HBO miniseriesThe Third Day.
6Anna Torv
Virginia Grey, The Pacific
Anna Torv appears in the early episodes ofThe Last of Usseason 1 asTess, Joel’s partner-in-crime in the Boston quarantine zone.While it takes Joel a long time to warm up to Ellie, Tess is kind and maternal to Ellie from the outset. The TV show makes Joel and Tess’ relationship less ambiguous than the game. In the game, the nature of their relationship is unclear, but in the TV show, it’s overtly romantic – and Torv and Pascal nailed the on-screen chemistry of an emotionally distant couple.
Torv’s best-known TV role beforeThe Last of Uswas psychology professor and serial killer profiler Wendy Carr in the Netflix crime thriller seriesMindhunter. But before that,she had a small but important role in HBO’s World War II miniseriesThe Pacific.She playedreal-life radio and television star Virginia Grey.
5Murray Bartlett
Armond, The White Lotus
In episode 3, “Long, Long Time,”The Last of Usdeviated from Joel and Ellie’s journey to tellthe heartbreaking post-apocalyptic love story of Bill and Frank.In the game, Bill mentions that he had a partner named Frank, but it never shows them together or features Frank as a character on-screen beyond showing his corpse. The TV show subverted that storyline and instead presented Bill and Frank enjoying a lifelong romance.
Murray Bartlett gave a really moving performance as Frank.Bartlett had previously bowled over HBO viewers with his brilliant performance as Armond, a hotel manager struggling to keep it together, in the first season ofThe White Lotus. According to HBO’s officialLast of Uspodcast, Mazin and Druckmann cast Bartlett as Frank before they had a chance to see his work inThe White Lotus.
4Melanie Lynskey
Michelle Pierson, Togetherness
In the video game, it’s unclear who’s chasing Sam and Henry. But the TV show introduced a whole new character to give some backstory to that feud. Melanie Lynskey first appeared in episode 4, “Please Hold to My Hand,” as Kathleen,the tyrannical resistance leader who overthrew FEDRA in Kansas City.Kathleen wants revenge against Henry for giving away information that led to her brother’s death. Her arc is in keeping withThe Last of Us’ theme of the dark side of love.
Lynskey has played a bunch of iconic TV roles throughout her storied career, from Rose inTwo and a Half Mento Shauna inYellowjackets. She previously worked with HBO whenshe played Michelle Pierson in the wonderful but short-lived dramedy seriesTogetherness.Michelle is somewhat frustrated with her life as a mother and wife, but she’s not a ruthless killer like Kathleen.
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3Rutina Wesley
Rutina Wesley first appeared in episode 6, “Kin,” asTommy’s wife and the leader of the Jackson community, Maria. Much like Tommy, Maria is being set up for a much bigger role in season 2. InThe Last of Us Part II, Maria has embraced Joel as her brother-in-law and Ellie as her niece. It seems that a strong focus on family is what brought Tommy and Maria together in the first place. Unlike in the game, Maria is pregnant in the TV series, setting upa more heartbreaking story for Tommy in season 2.
Wesley had previously worked with HBO whenshe played Tara Thornton in the main cast of the vampire-infested dramaTrue Blood.Tara is a much more troubled character than Maria. Whereas Maria was inspired by her benevolent father to lead a fair and peaceful society, Tara was raised by abusive alcoholics.
2Scott Shepherd
Harris James, True Detective
Scott Shepherd plays by far the most despicable character inThe Last of Ussaga (and that’s saying a lot). Initially, David seems like a kind, trustworthy, mild-mannered man who just wants to make sure the people under his care are safe and well-fed. However, as Ellie gets to know him better, it becomes clear that he’s much more sinister than that.He’s a murderer, a cannibal, and a pedophile. Shepherd plays David’s evil perfectly; he’s just as hateable in the TV show as in the game.
InTrue Detectiveseason 3, Shepherd played a much less abhorrent character named Harris James.Harris is a police officer who went missing, which forms the backbone of one of the season’s biggest mysteries. He later works as a security guard at Hoyt Foods. Suffice to say, he’s not as awful as David.
1Storm Reid
Gia Bennett, Euphoria
Storm Reid only appeared in one episode ofThe Last of Us, but much like Bartlett, she took over as a series lead in that one episode. Episode 7, “Left Behind,” adapted from the DLC of the same name, fills in the backstory of how Ellie got bitten. While she was still at the Boston Q.Z.,Ellie and her best friend Riley – played by Reid – snuck out to explore an abandoned mall, where they enjoyed a carousel, a photo booth, an arcade, and fell in love. But when a clicker emerged, the greatest night of Ellie’s life became the worst.
Reid and Ramsey played the romantic tension beautifully, which made the tragic end to their love story even more heartbreaking. Before playing Riley inThe Last of Us, Reid was best known for playing Rue Bennett’s younger sister Gia inEuphoria.Whereas Riley is confident, outspoken, and tough, Gia is just a vulnerable kid who’s terrified by all the yelling and tension in her house, and Reid plays both roles just as authentically.
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.
