Confirmed: The Last of Us season 2 will air in 2025

As the year winds down, we’re looking back on all the good shows we’ve enjoyed and forward to all those still to come. HBO’s The Last of Us was the surprise smash hit that kicked off 2023’s genre TV slate in style. We’d all seen video game adaptations go awry in the past. The Last of Us exceeded expectations across the board and set a new gold standard for live-action TV adaptations of video games. It was no surprise when HBO quickly greenlit the show for season 2.

But then, alas, came a long pause on production due to studios dragging their feet to resolve the Hollywood writers and actors strikes. The dual strikes stretched on for most of 2023, with deals finally being reached for the writers in later September and the actors in early November. During that time, The Last of Us was one of many shows put on pause.

Now that the strikes are behind us, the show is set to begin filming season 2 in February of 2024. Seeking to set expectations early, HBO has confirmed in a new sizzle reel that The Last of Us season 2 will air sometime in 2025:

The Last of Us, The Penguin, and House of the Dragon feature in new HBO sizzle reel

The Last of Us is a big budget production with lots of special effects, so it’s no surprise that HBO is leaving a healthy amount of lead time ahead of its second season. No one likes to wait a long time for their favorite shows to return, but personally I’d rather showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann take their time to do the story right. Season 2 of The Last of Us will be adapting the first part of The Last of Us Part II video game, which takes place several years after the first and features an adult Ellie going on a quest for bloody revenge against another group of survivors. It’s a complicated, meaty story that has the potential to make for excellent television.

The Last of Us isn’t the only genre show of note to pop up in the sizzle reel; both House of the Dragon season 2 and The Batman spinoff The Penguin feature prominently. Those two shows will both air in 2024, so we’ll have plenty to keep us busy. There’s also a glimpse of another 2024 show called Industry which stars Game of Thrones veteran Kit Harington. “I invited you here to seduce you,” says Harington with a charming furrow of his brow. Consider us seduced, Jon Snow.

2025 also has the new horror series Welcome to Derry, which is a prequel to Stephen King’s It, as well as a new season of The White Lotus. One show which is notably absent from this sizzle reel is Dune: Prophecy, which is the new title for the Dune prequel series about the rise of the Bene Gesserit. That show is expected to wrap production in late 2024, so it will probably be out in 2025 as well. I imagine it didn’t show up in the sizzle reel because there’s no actual footage to show off yet.

There’s plenty to watch on

HBO

Max in the next few years! I’m starting to remember why I liked it so much in the first place.

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