The cast and crew of HBO's The Last of Us recently celebrated the show's 16 Emmy nominations at HBO Max's Nominee Celebration.
The event brought together stars Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, Kaitlyn Dever, Joe Pantoliano, and editor Timothy Good, along with co-creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann.
During the celebration, Pascal reflected on the emotional impact of season 2, particularly episode 2, where his character Joel is brutally murdered by Abby, played by Kaitlyn Dever.
"You're so inside of it that you really kind of lose sight of what it will mean when a TV audience experiences episode two of season two," Pascal said.
Despite knowing Joel's fate from the video game, Pascal admitted that the cast and crew were fully immersed in the story during filming.
The scene where Abby kills Joel was a pivotal moment in the series, and Dever's performance was widely praised.
"Kaitlyn just came in, I had no doubt in my mind that she was going to knock it out of the park, because I'd seen her knock everything out of the park that she'd ever done up to that point," Pascal said.
Dever's portrayal of Abby's grief and pain was a key aspect of her performance. "The most important thing to me when I was going to play Abby and doing the prep for her is just really focusing on her grief," she explained.
"I wanted people to be able to really see that and feel that and really understand just how deep her pain is."
Pascal also spoke about the emotional challenge of filming the scene where Joel dies, particularly given his character's complicated relationship with Ellie, played by Bella Ramsey.
"It was really fun... to just be scene partners for something as intense as that, and right away just be in it together," he said.
However, he also noted that the experience was "strangely painful" due to the characters' complicated dynamic and the fact that he and Ramsey had been apart for a while between seasons.
