HBO has helped The Last of Us secure a parade of big-name actors. Aside from Pedro Pascal as Joel, we’ve seen Jeffrey Wright as Isaac, Catherine O’Hara as Gail, and Nick Offerman as Frank, all while original game actors popped up in different roles. With Season 3 coming up, fans are wondering how the series can up the ante, and we may now have an answer.
According to leaker Jeff Sneider, The Last of Us Season 3 has added Watchmen and Aquaman actor Patrick Wilson in an undisclosed role. What could that role be? Considering that The Last of Us Season 3 is poised to cover one specific part of the game it’s based on, there’s an obvious choice.
Season 2 of The Last of Us focused on Ellie (Bella Ramsey) losing her father figure, Joel (Pedro Pascal), and setting out to find his murderer, Abby (Kaitlyn Dever). Considering the season’s source material, The Last of Us Part II, splits its viewpoint between Ellie and Abby, it seems safe to assume that Season 3 will be focused on Abby and her backstory.
A key part of that backstory — in fact, the sole motivator for Abby’s hatred of Joel — is her dad Jerry, who was a surgeon for the Fireflies when Ellie was put on the operating table to be sacrificed for the sake of studying her immunity to the cordyceps plague. In his effort to rescue Ellie, Joel shot the surgeons in the operating room, leaving Abby fatherless and hell-bent on revenge.
Could this be Patrick Wilson’s role? It’s a key part of Abby’s backstory that’s worthy of Wilson’s long and storied career, and he resembles Kaitlyn Dever. The Last of Us has always been a terrific vehicle for supporting performances — Nick Offerman even won an Emmy for his one-episode stint in Season 1 — and Wilson could very well help that trend continue.
