Convergence

So yeah, there's no question that season 2 failed to live up to season 1. While those who played the game were likely expecting this and tempered expectations, those who didn't had a much further distance to fall on the rather big letdown.

I won't waste any time talking about the various controversies in casting choices, agendas and messages that many are busy arguing over in every corner of the internet. So with all that aside, this whole season felt like one big checklist of major plot points which simply weren't significant enough for me to remember or care about 2 years from now when we get the next 10ish episodes that have been teased a bit by the show runners. This season had its share of low points and cringe worthy moments which will be what stick around in my mind and I suspect the same will be for many others.

The really frustrating part is that the show still did have its moments of greatness pop up here and there. 2/7 episodes this season were up there with the prime quality of the first season but all in all, the squeeze isn't worth the juice we get from this kind of setup.

6/10 watchable and skip-able.

I expected a lot more to this season finale, and while I hate to mention other shows in my review, this season feels similiar to Squid Game S2 where you end in the middle rather than leaving it with a cliffhanger, but unlike Squid Game S2, TLOU's second season didn't give me anything where I wanted to scream "WHERE IS THE THIRD SEASON?" even though I know what's coming, and I really want to see that part being adapted.

My problem with the Season despite having up and downs is that that the creators are so lost. They are rushing, yet again, trying to adapt as many stuff as they can, being two episode short with S2 was a bad decision, atleast one more could've been good, but after watching the finale, I realised that they barely have a story for this finale.

Sometimes they want to adapt the game word for word, sometimes they want to adapt it so they are uncomperable, and these two mindsets just doesn't work, they understood how big is Part 2, that's why they sliced it up to 2 seasons more, but the way I see it, is that it felt short. It felt like an anthology, rather than a consecutive plot that tries to reach a conclusion.

All right y'all let's get to business here. This show is so boring. The plot doesn't feel like it has any guiding force, but it feels like the characters just need to do a checklist of things. It really feels like the plot is making itself up as it goes along and the entire entirety of the show is just trying to get characters from place A to place B. While this might work for a video game, this is so unbelievably boring to watch like I was not even enjoying watching any of this. And the idea that Abby's character gets an entire season potentially to herself in season three is just laughable at best who is even gonna watch this show in the next season? Im feeling silly for even watching it now!

Keeping it brief. Super disappointed of the writing this season. Everything from the plot, the emotional parts and the dialogue came from episode 1 too feel more and more like something to just fill out the season with.

The two parts that the game was divided into would absolutely fit into a single season. You can clearly see where the series uses parts from the game. Thinks like, smart clickers, WLF and "the war about something" feels like they just get introduced. 6 hours is a looong time, but I cant even remember the plot in any of these episodes, it is far away from the chapter like storytelling in season 1.

How season 3 will decent is something that probably will be the downfall from a lower height.

The Last of Us, the last episode of the 2nd season, was totally disappointing. In fact, the series is slowly starting to look very similar to the decline of The Walking Dead, which lost quality from the 6th season onwards until it turned to dust. TLOU is already starting to slip in its second season alone. And this touches on a point that many fans are starting to notice with increasing discomfort: the second season of The Last of Us seems to be moving away from the emotional intensity, brutality and moral rawness that made the game and the first season so impactful.

The parallel with The Walking Dead is very apt. Both began with a more realistic and character-centered focus, but gradually gave in to the temptation to prolong the drama with exaggerated sentimental insertions, forced speeches and loss of narrative focus. In the case of TLOU, the strength of the original story was precisely in the tension between love and violence, affection and despair, humanity and survival. When you replace this with jokes, stretched-out romantic scenes, and character developments that no longer reflect the weight of the apocalyptic world in which they live, something essential is lost.

The Ellie of the games - especially in Part II - is a character marked by pain, anger, and an emotional complexity that makes her actions uncomfortable but understandable. Suppressing this fury and diluting it in moments of excessive tenderness may even please some of the general public, but it betrays the heart of the original work.

In addition, this excess of stylized emotion and idealized relationships seems to try to soften a reality that should be brutal, morally ambiguous, and emotionally heavy. In a world where any distraction can be fatal, where violence shapes who you are, there is not much room for Love is in the Air.

If the series continues along this line, the risk of repeating the decline of The Walking Dead is real: a powerful beginning, followed by emotional exhaustion and loss of identity. If The Last of Us wants to remain relevant, it will need to regain its narrative courage - and that means showing that in the apocalypse, beauty lies in the scars, not the frills.