by The last of us
While it was heavily, heavily implied, The Last of Us didn’t want to make it official until after the finale, where we know Ellie survives. Bella Ramsey will return as Ellie in Season 2 of the show and will not be cast with an older actress.
Ramsey (who identifies as non-binary and told the New York Times that she doesn’t care what pronouns people use to identify her) previously celebrated the news of the series being renewed for Season 2, excited that the adventure would continue, but there has never been any official news about the continued casting until now. And it was never really a conversation, according to the presenters.
“We’re extremely lucky to have Bella … and the only way we would ever consider renewing Bella is if she said, ‘I don’t want to work with you anymore,'” showrunner Neil Druckmann told The Wrap. “And even then we’re not sure we’d grant it to her. Maybe we’ll make her come back this season.”
Ramsey previously said she would like to play Ellie forever:
“There are no boundaries for me,” Ramsey said. “They can play as many games as they want, as many series as they want, and I’ll be here and fly back to Canada.”
The debate among a subset of fans was twofold, firstly that Ramsey looked too young to play an older Ellie, who will be five years older next season when the second game is adapted. And that Ramsay wouldn’t be able to pull off Ellie’s extreme violence afterwards.
The last of us
Both of these arguments never made sense. Ramsay is already 19, Ellie’s age in the second game, she’s playing a 14 year old, so she’s the right age and with hair and makeup changes, she can easily look her real age next season where she actually is. Earlier than Ellie was in the game.
Second, by the time Season 1 comes to a close, we’ve seen the brutal lengths Ramsay’s Ellie has gone to in order to survive, and it’s easy to imagine her stepping it up next season as she becomes a more hardened killer. Ramsey’s Ellie was one of the most laudable elements of a highly praised series, and I think it was clear to everyone whose opinion mattered that there was zero percent chance of her being recast in future seasons.
The series will place even more weight on Ramsey moving forward, as she takes on an even bigger role opposite her foil, Abby, who has yet to be cast, despite fan wishlist picks. Abby, like Joel and Ellie, is an extremely important, difficult role, as the game was a combination of three different women, a face model, a body model, and a voice actor capturing the performance. Now, they must find someone to embody elements of all three.
But given the casting decisions for Joel and Ellie, I think we can trust that they’ll make the right call. And I can’t wait to see what Bella does next season, even if we have to wait a while to see her again.
The last of us
Update (3/14): Okay, I’ve written about this a few times now, and it seems like a lot of people are confused by the term “recast” and seem to think I’m saying the exact opposite of what actually happens in season 2. I’m really trying to be as as clear as possible and I am absolutely not trying to orchestrate a clickbait title here, although I have been accused of exactly that.
When I say an actor, in this case Bella Ramsey, “isn’t recast,” that means she is not replacing her with another actor. I made this case in an article last week where I talked about her being incredible in the role when calling for extreme violence a key part of season 2, and I said she made the case that it shouldn’t be recast next season, what they were saying some.
“The show has built up Ellie’s penchant for violence even more than the games, I would say, which I don’t think she actually had a full plan for the second game when the original was made, so they didn’t know. where they would take Ellie. But they’ve absolutely planted the seeds for Ellie to become a hardened assassin (albeit one you still root for) in future seasons of the show, where we’ve heard that the second game will be split into Season 2 and Season 3.”
It seems the confusion is people reading this as “re-cast” as in Bella Ramsey won’t be recast in the same role next season or she won’t be recast in the same role. If I were to say that, I’d say either Bella Ramsey is restated, or more accurately, that Bella Ramsey wouldn’t repetition her role. Or return for her role. Or something like this.
I guess part of it is for me, as I guess if I did this all over again I would say “Bella Ramsey is 100% confirmed to be back as Ellie next season” so a large portion of people don’t misinterpret or you are misinterpreting the phrase “not restated”. Although quite a few people seem to understand exactly what I mean, and just know that when you see the term rephrased in stories like this in the future, this is what is being referred to.
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