‘The Last of Us’ season 2 finale live — predictions, reactions, recap and more

Nobody can fill Joel’s boots, but Dina holds her own

Joel’s death in episode 2 left a massive hole in the show that couldn’t be completely filled by any one character. Still, I have grown to appreciate Dina (Isabella Merced) as Ellie’s new primary scene partner.

In episode 1, Dina comes across as flirtatious and flighty — not a serious person. That side of Dina adds some much-needed levity and brings out a similar side to Ellie. Their burgeoning romance is a welcome spark in what can be a dark, heavy show.

Of course, kissing at the dance becomes a distant memory after Joel is brutally killed, with Dina as a witness for some of it. And when Ellie wants to go after Abby, Dina is right there with her. In fact, I don’t think Ellie would’ve gotten as far without her.

Though they are just a few years apart, Dina seems much more mature and wise — an interesting turnabout from how she comes across in episode 1. When it comes down to it, flirty, flighty Dina disappears and map-wielding, supplies-gathering, practical Dina emerges.

As the finale looms, we now know Dina is pregnant. She’s also very injured. But neither fact has stopped her from supporting Ellie in this quest for vengeance. The only question is if Dina can stop Ellie from going too far. – Kelly Woo

With Joel gone, Ellie is now truly the last of us

Ellie hasn’t exactly had an easy life, and in season 2, things have only gotten harder. Across this second season, we’ve seen her get into numerous scrapes, but the thrust of Season 2’s story revolves around her and the fallout from Joel’s death.

Despite the duo growing apart during their years together in Jackson (she’d grown skeptical and eventually challenged him for the truth of what really happened with the Fireflies), Joel still meant a lot to her.

Our story kicked into gear when Abby got her revenge on Joel and brutally beat him to death before Ellie’s very eyes. Ellie swore she’d kill Abby, and she subsequently left Jackson (with Dina in tow) to do just that.

Ellie and Dina have grown closer on that journey; Ellie’s revealed to Dina that she’s immune, and Dina, in turn, has let slip she’s pregnant, and the pair are preparing to form a family unit together. On their journey, they’ve crossed paths with WLF soldiers (locked in combat with the Seraphites), more Infected, and set up a sort of base inside a Seattle theater.

Aside from the flashback episode, we last saw her returning to the theater after heading to the Lakehill hospital on her own in search of Nora and info on Abby’s whereabouts. — Martin Shore

Welcome to ‘The Last of Us’ season 2 finale — here’s what you may have missed so far this season

Before we dive into predictions and what’s happened to the show’s most important characters, let’s do a quick recap on what’s happened in “The Last of Us” season 2 so far. Final spoiler warning — from here out, anything that’s happened in the show is on the table.

The season picks up five years after the events of season 1. Ellie (Bella Ramsey) and Joel (Pedro Pascal) are still living in Jackson, but it’s clear there’s been a division between the two. We’ll learn why later in the season, but for now, we can only speculate that it’s related to what happened at the end of season 1, where Joel massacred a hospital full of Fireflies.

One of those Fireflies was a doctor, Jerry Anderson, and it’s revealed to us that his daughter Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) wants vengeance. She gets that vengeance in the second episode, when fate and a horde of infected drive her and some of her friends straight into Joel’s path, and she drives a golf club straight into Joel’s head.

Ellie and her budding love interest Dina (Isablea Merced) both witness this horror, and so when they return to Jackson and heal from the encounter, they’re ready to get vengeance of their own. But the rest of Jackson is still reeling from an attack from the same infected horde that drove Abby and Joel together, so they do not join her.

Ellie and Dina ultimately make it to Seattle, where Abby and her friends in the Washington Liberation Front (WLF) are trying to return to their normal lives — a civil war with a band of religious fanatics known as the Seraphites.

So now, Ellie and Dina have to avoid the ongoing conflict and infected if they want to get to Abby and her friends.

That doesn’t go smoothly. Ellie gets bitten trying to protect Dina. She reveals to Dina that she’s immune, and Dina reveals that she’s pregnant with her ex, Jesse’s (Young Mazino) child. The overwhelming emotions of the moment finally allow them to realize their feelings for each other, and they hook up.

While it’s great that they can finally be a couple, there’s still the whole revenge quest to finish. They ultimately catch a break when they discover one of Abby’s friends, Nora (Tati Gabrielle), is at a nearby hospital.

Dina gets wounded on the approach to the hospital, but luckily Jesse arrives out of nowhere to save the day. That gives Ellie the chance she needs to get Nora — which she does, beating the WLF soldier mercilessly with a pipe to find Abby’s location in the city.

That’s as far as we’ve made it in Seattle, but in last week’s episode, we got some incredible flashbacks. We get an incredible moment in a science museum between Ellie and Joel, revealing that the relationship between them didn’t immediately break down after season 1.

Sadly, we also learn why the relationship between them deteriorated, because we see Joel finally forced to reveal to Ellie that he lied to her about what happened at the Firefly hospital. She then reveals she wants to try and forgive him, but we already know she’ll never get that chance.