The end of the first season of The Last of Us is approaching and Bella Ramsey (Ellie in the hit HBO series) already anticipates that the last episode will be divisive. “She’s going to divide people massively,” she said. Find out more details in this note!
We are just about to see the penultimate episode of the first season of The Last of Us, which will come to HBO and HBO Max on Sunday March 5, and the excitement rises more and more. However, with a weekend in between, Bella Ramsey (Ellie in the popular series) has already begun to anticipate things from the final chapter and assured that it will be divisive for the audience.
During an interview, Ramsey said that the penultimate episode of the first season of The Last of Us, in particular, is brutally violent. “It was exhausting, but those were some of my favorite days on set. It sounds really masochistic, but it’s the scenes that break me that I love the most, in a way.“, said. However, when asked what he thinks people will think of chapter 9, he called Look for the Light, Ramsey assured: “It’s gonna divide people massively, massively”.

If the prediction of Ramsey becomes reality, we should not forget that this would not be the first time that The Last of Us It generates controversy, mostly on social media. In addition to the typical criticism that adaptations often receive for certain changes with the original material, the series was also criticized for the inclusion of LGBTQ+ characters and themes (which are part of video games).
In a recent interview, Ramsey talked about this and said that “not particularly anxious” by fans who take issue with the LGBTQ+ content seen on the show. “I know that people will think what they want to think, but they will have to get used to it. If you don’t want to watch the show because it has gay stories, because it has a trans character, that’s up to you and you’re missing out.“, had said.

Ramsey praised the episode Long, Long Time, that he was the target of both positive and negative reviews, recalling how he cried during a montage sequence late in the process. However, that was not the only chapter that received attacks from fans unhappy with LGBTQ + content.
After episode 7, called left behindwhere we see Ellie kiss Riley (Storm Reid) that scene was censored in North Africa and the Middle East. Once the Dubai-based streaming platform NSO+ removed that moment, viewers of the series denounced that decision on social media. Let’s remember that that kiss is an important moment in the backstory of Ellie and that, more than anything, appears in the Left Behind DLC from the video game The Last of Uson which the series is based.

Yes ok HBO has yet to comment publicly on the censorship of NSO+the co-creator of The Last of Us, Neil Druckmann, he did speak about the criticism against the LGBTQ+ content of the series. According to Druckmann, the regressive attitudes towards the LGBTQ+ community in the show are intended to show how the development of society stalled after the Cordyceps pandemic. “The revolution that we have gone through as a culture in accepting homosexuality and what we would call non-heteronormative sexualities has not happened…in this world, those things are still ‘problematic’ as they say“, had said.
The penultimate episode of The Last of Us arrives on Sunday March 5th at HBO and HBO Maxwhile the last one will land on the same platforms on March 12, the day that the Oscars.