The Last of Us creator teases a change from the game coming in season 2

HBO’s post-apocalyptic series The Last of Us was a runaway success, so much that the series was promptly green-lit for another season after just three episodes had released. Now, creator Neil Druckmann — who directed the Naughty Dog videos games and is co-showrunner with Craig Mazin for the HBO series — is hard at work developing season 2, which could begin filming as early as later this year.

Season 2 will adapt The Last of Us: Part II, and apparently Druckmann is going to change something from the game. Don’t worry, it’s nothing major. It involves a slight continuity issue regarding one of the most emotional scenes from the second game.

In the first act of The Last of Us: Part II, Joel enters Ellie’s room with his guitar and plays her a song: Pearl Jam’s “Future Days.” It’s a hard hitting scene. The lyrics speak volumes about Joel’s love of Ellie.

So what’s the problem? Well, “Future Days” was released in 2013. But on the show, the zombie apocalypse happened in 2003, so there’s no way Joel or anybody else would know. We’re not sure but it’s very possible that, in this reality, the members of Pearl Jam were turned into fungus zombies long before they could think to write it.

The Last of Us may have to cut Pearl Jam from season 2

Appearing on the Kinda Funny podcast, Druckmann mused over what to do about the song. “I could tell you we haven’t made a decision,” he said. “We have talked about it for those exact reasons that you mentioned, that now it makes no sense for Joel to know that song.”

In the video game, the zombie outbreak takes place a decade later than it does in the show, in a world where Pearl Jam was still making music and not stalking the streets hungry for human flesh. Still, the show could always ignore that and just include the song anyway. “Now we could say, ‘Okay, it’s a parallel dimension and the song came out earlier.’ There’s ways, but that feels a little bit like a cheat,” Druckmann said.

At this point, “Future Days” has become synonymous with The Last of Us. “I will say that Pearl Jam specifically has now like even more so been engrained into the world of ‘The Last of Us,’ that if we don’t do that song, well, there’s other songs we could play with.”

Fans are very keen to see Pedro Pascal pick up the guitar and play Future Days, regardless of any continuity error it might cause. Look no further than Twitter for proof:

Do you think Joel should play “Future Days” in the show? If not, which song would you choose?

The Last of Us season 1 is currently streaming on HBO Max.

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