Production is underway on season 2 of the HBO series adaptation of the video game The Last of Us, and Deadline has just revealed the name of a cast member who will be joining the show in this new batch of episodes: Jeffrey Wright, whose credits include American Fiction, Westworld, Basquiat, Shaft, The Batman, and multiple James Bond and Hunger Games movies. Also on Wright’s list of credits is the video game The Last of Us Part II, where he provided the vocal performance for the character Isaac – and that’s the same character he’ll be playing on the HBO series.
Wright’s character Isaac is “the quietly powerful leader of a large militia group, known in the video game as the Washington Liberation Front, who sought liberty but instead has become mired in an endless war against a surprisingly resourceful enemy.“
The story of the The Last of Us video game is set years after a fungal plague wiped out much of humanity, transforming most into vicious zombie-like monsters, the story follows Joel, who’s living in a militarized quarantine zone. He has a close relationship with Tess, who operates in the black market of this community. Together, they’ve become known by the local criminal underworld for their ruthlessness. On a mission to reclaim their stolen guns, they run into the leader of the Fireflies, a resistance group, who tasks them with smuggling a young girl named Ellie out of the zone. This mission soon becomes much more than they were prepared for.
For the HBO series, Pedro Pascal plays Joel, who is “tormented by past trauma and failure. He must trek across a pandemic-ravaged America, all the while protecting a girl who represents the last hope of humanity”. He is joined in the cast by Bella Ramsey as Ellie, “an orphan who has never known anything but a ravaged planet and who struggles to balance her instinct for anger and defiance with her need for connection and belonging… as well as the newfound reality that she may be the key to saving the world”; Anna Torv as Tess, “a smuggler and hardened survivor in a post-pandemic world”; Gabriel Luna as Joel’s brother Tommy, “a former soldier who hasn’t lost his sense of idealism and hope for a better world”; Merle Dandridge as Marlene, “the head of the Fireflies, a resistance movement struggling for freedom against an oppressive military regime”; Nico Parker as Joel’s daughter Sarah; Jeffrey Pierce as Perry, “a rebel in a quarantine zone”; Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett as Bill and Frank, “two post-pandemic survivalists living alone in their own isolated town”; and Storm Reid as Ellie’s best friend Riley.
Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson, who did the motion-capture performances for Joel and Ellie in the video game, are also in the cast of the show. Baker plays James, “a senior member of a group of settlers who must fight to keep their community alive in the face of increasingly brutal odds.” Baker also hosts a podcast that serves as a companion to the TV series. Johnson’s character is Anna, “a pregnant woman, alone and on the run, who must give birth under the most terrifying of circumstances.”
Wright’s fellow new season 2 cast members include Isabela Merced (Madame Web) as Dina, a romantic love interest for the Ellie character; Kaitlyn Dever (Booksmart and No One Will Save You) as Abby Anderson, a major character from the video game who is described as being “a skilled soldier whose black-and-white view of the world is challenged as she seeks vengeance for those she loved”; Danny Ramirez (Top Gun: Maverick) as soldier named Manny, Ariela Barer (How To Blow Up a Pipeline) as young doctor Mel, Tati Gabrielle (You) as military medic Nora, Spencer Lord (Riverdale) as Owen, “a gentle soul trapped in a warrior’s body,” and Young Mazino of Beef as Jesse, “a pillar of his community who puts everyone else’s needs before his own, sometimes at terrible cost.” (Jesse also happens to be Dina’s ex.) Schitt’s Creek Emmy winner Catherine O’Hara is also in there, in an unspecified role. Merced said Dever is “one of the most talented actors I’ve ever worked with.”
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