The first season of The Last of Us was a ratings blockbuster for HBO, setting records from the moment it premiered in 2023. The adaption of the post-apocalyptic PlayStation game was the second-biggest series debut for network since 2010 and grew its audience significantly over its first few weeks.
The second season told a slightly different story, and in more ways than one.
The Last of Us season two was still an extremely popular and acclaimed success. But according to Nielsen, the seven-episode second season has been softer in the ratings overall, despite kicking off slightly higher. The season’s fourth and fifth episodes — the most recent episodes with third-party ratings available — had smaller audiences than any season one episodes. Measured on a week-by-week basis, Nielsen’s season two tracking goes from 805 million minutes streamed during premiere week to 937 to 827 to 738 to 745. Overall, season two has averaged 18 percent fewer viewers than the first five episodes of season one.
Granted, second seasons often performer lower than debut seasons, but The Last of Us is a show where potential growth seemed very possible, if not likely. The show is a heavily serialized Emmy-winning sensation that had two years to accumulate new fans. The season two trailers looked fantastic. Reviews were extremely strong (if just a tad softer than season one — 92 percent Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes vs. 96 percent for the first season). There was plenty of marketing and publicity. And several buzzy HBO dramas have grown their audiences after their debut seasons (such as Game of Thrones, Succession and The White Lotus).
So what gives?
There is, of course, the obvious: The new season’s second episode brutally killed off the show’s beloved co-lead Joel (Pedro Pascal) leaving his ward Ellie (Bella Ramsey) to embark on a quest for revenge against his killer, Abby (Kaitlyn Dever). It could be as simple as that. And, yes, there are fans who have criticized Ramsey’s portrayal of Ellie in season two, but there is actually evidence pushing back on that as being the culprit, as we’ll get to below.
Here is another point of comparison to be made with Thrones: Fans feel that epic fantasy show started to lose it’s footing, if not its ratings, late in its run. Many point out that’s around the same point in the story when showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss ran out of books to adapt from George R.R. Martin. What I find interesting is that Martin ran into enormous difficulty finishing his story around the same point that two entirely different writers began to struggle with their adaptation, despite Benioff and Weiss having previously pulled off many original deviations from the books. In other words: There is probably something inherently difficult about making A Song of Ice and Fire work — regardless of the medium or writer — after Jon Snow gets stabbed to death and Daenerys gets stuck in her Meereen pyramid.
Likewise with The Last of Us, there might be something inherently more difficult about pulling off this tale after the first game/season. Once the story stops being about a “wolf and cub” wandering the apocalypse and becomes the story of a dead wolf and an angry cub chasing a villain who is a mirror universe version of herself, something just slips for some percent of viewers. The second season’s trope-busting story is intensely clever, and has Something to Say about the nature of storytelling and heroes and how we invest in a point of view. You can respect the all artistic choices being made, but that doesn’t mean the same number of people will enjoy that kind of story. It is, admittedly, a bit of a bummer.
For more evidence, let’s look at the sales of The Last of Us games. The first game — which inspired the first season — sold more than 20 million copies. The second game (which was hugely divisive in the gaming community) sold more than 10 million copies. These numbers are out of date (and don’t account for the first game having a longer sales history). But by all reported accounts, the second game’s sales lagged the first. Given both had Ellie voiced by Ashley Johnson — who gamers loved in the role — pointing fingers at Ramsey for any slippage seems off base (particularly as the show has seemingly maintained its audience better than the sequel game).
One could argue the mission of HBO’s The Last of Us shouldn’t have been absolute fidelity to the games, but rather fidelity to telling the best possible story with the games as merely an inspiration. Of course, there is no winning that one. Even the smallest change — of which there are many in the series — gets analyzed and criticized, and major shifts would likely get blasted even more. In a way, staying close to the game is the safest route even if the story itself is more risky. If people don’t like what you’re doing, you can always say “we’re being faithful to the game.”
I suspect a key reason for the show’s ratings slippage has less to do with season two and more to do with the end of season one. The end of the first season of Thrones (yes, back to that again) left viewers bursting with questions about what happens next for a large number of compelling characters. But the end of The Last of Us season one was actually a perfect conclusion. Once Joel saved Ellie from the Fireflies and they settled into a safe and thriving survivor camp, it felt like The End. If you’re a viewer watching these two likable characters endure all sorts of grisly horrors, this was just about the best outcome for Joel and Ellie you could realistically hope for. A second season of The Last of Us can only be written as “but then more — and even worse — bad stuff happens” for a tale that felt resolved.
Indeed, the first PlayStation game was written as a complete story. The Last of Us Part II was partly inspired by the same market forces that typically result in sequels — namely, that the first game was a hit. But just imagine if Martin had ended his first Song of Ice and Fire book with all the Stark kids safely back at Winterfell and then had had to figure out a sequel. One suspects the resulting ratings for Thrones season two would have slipped as well.
From HBO’s viewpoint, a critically acclaimed, Emmy-worthy appointment television hit is still a hit. Viewers will still line up to check out season three and the recent season will continue to rack up additional viewership on Max over time (when all forms of viewing are tallied over time, both seasons will easily be over 30 million views per episode). There is a “so what?” counter-argument to be made about all this. But the audience reaction still reflects something interesting about the challenges of adaptation and how some great stories come with knots that cannot be untied.
— Rick Porter contributed to this report
