There’s a reason The Last of Us has been a favourite of LGBT+ gamers for a decade. When it comes to queer representation in mainstream video games – a sexually conservative branch of the arts, admittedly – The Last of Us stood head and shoulders above all its major rivals. In adapting the acclaimed post-apocaylptic story for HBO, showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann have, thankfully, left its queer storylines intact.
Well, “intact” may be the wrong word. Four weeks ago, the series stunned viewers with a tearjerking episode called “Long, Long Time”, in which the story pivoted away from wandering protagonists Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) to focus on a 20-year love story between two middle aged men, Bill and Frank. The episode was deeply moving, and well put-together, but ended in the characters’ deaths. (This is the apocalypse after all.) Those fearing that this would be the end of the series’ investment in LGBT+ storylines, however, have had their doubts assuaged. The latest episode, titled “Left Behind”, is set before the bulk of The Last of Us’s storyline. We see Ellie’s life before Joel, in the Quarantine Zone. Her friendship with Riley (Storm Reid), which turns into the beginnings of a romance. Before anything really develops, they are bitten by an “Infected”. And the episode ends.
