HBO’s The Last of Us is looking at a shake-up for its third (and potentially final) season – not only on screen, where the focus expected to shift from Bella Ramsey’s Ellie to Kaitlyn Dever’s Abby, but also behind-the-scenes with Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann announcing that he is stepping down as co-showrunner on the series.
“I’ve made the difficult decision to step away from my creative involvement in The Last of Us on HBO,” said Druckmann, co-creator and director of the original video games, as well as co-creator of the TV adaptation alongside Craig Mazin (Chernobyl). “With work completed on season 2 and before any meaningful work starts on season 3, now is the right time for me to transition my complete focus to Naughty Dog and its future projects, including writing and directing our exciting next game, Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, along with my responsibilities as Studio Head and Head of Creative.”
“Co-creating the show has been a career highlight,” he continued. “It’s been an honor to work alongside Craig Mazin to executive produce, direct and write on the last two seasons. I’m deeply thankful of the thoughtful approach and dedication the talented cast and crew took to adapting The Last of Us Part I and their continued adaptation of The Last of Us Part II.”
“It’s been a creative dream to work with Neil and bring an adaptation of his brilliant work to life on HBO,” added Craig Mazin. “I couldn’t have asked for a more generous creative partner. As a true fan of Naughty Dog and Neil’s work in video games, I’m beyond excited to play his next game. While he focuses on that, I’ll continue to work with our brilliant cast and crew to deliver the show our audience has come to expect. We are so grateful to Neil and Halley Gross for entrusting the incredible story of The Last of Us Part II to us, and we’re just as grateful to the millions of people around the world who tune in.”
The Last of Us has proven to be a huge hit for HBO with both audiences and critics alike, and while the second season didn’t quite manage to match the near-universal acclaim of the first, it still managed to average some 37 million global viewers per episode.
