Writing on The Last of Us season 2 will resume “the second” strike ends

This week, the Hollywood writers guild and the studios of the AMPTP finally reached a tentative agreement to get screenwriters back to work after 146 days on strike. Writers were campaigning for protections against AI, increased job security in the streaming era, limitations on the use of mini-rooms and more. We still don’t know exactly what terms the groups settled on, but for now there’s a glimmer of hope that productions will be able to being moving again.

That’s pretty fortunate, because all of us nerds are waiting on the return of some great shows! Take The Last of Us. HBO’s new zombie drama premiered at the start of this year and was extremely well received by fans of the beloved video games and newcomers alike. Everyone’s been chomping at the bit for more, including The Last of Us co-showrunner Craig Mazin. But production has been at a standstill thanks to the writers strike and then the actors strike.

Mazin took to Threads this week to congratulate his fellow WGA screenwriters on reaching a tentative agreement, promising that he would resume work on The Last of Us “the second” the agreement is finalized.

The Last of Us showrunner gives update on season 2

“Very proud of the WGA and its membership, and excited to get back to work on The Last of Us season 2. The strike has not yet been officially lifted, but the second it is we will spring into action,” Mazin wrote on Threads.

This isn’t the first time Mazin has let fans know that he’s ready to get back to work on The Last of Us. For instance, we’ve gotten a lot of hints that the show has cast Abby, a major role from The Last of Us Part II video game.

The strikes are a sensitive topic; even though the WGA seems to be on the verge of an agreement, the actors guild SAG-AFTRA is still out picketing. It will also likely be a couple of weeks until the WGA deal is voted on by its membership and ratified, so regardless of any optimism on Mazin’s part, he’s isn’t writing new scripts yet. But enough people got confused and upset by Mazin saying he was ready to get to work on the season that he came back later to clarify. After all, how could he film without actors?

“The word ‘action’ in my last post seems to have been misinterpreted as ‘filming,'” he wrote on Threads. “We will resume writing! I hope to have an update for start of filming before too long.”

At this point, it seems likely that The Last of Us won’t begin filming in earnest until sometime in early 2024. But provided the WGA deal goes through, at least Mazin and his co-showrunner and The Last of Us creator Neil Druckmann can get to work on figuring out how to adapt the monstrous The Last of Us Part II game for TV.

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h/t Eurogamer