“The Last of Us” Season 2: What happened in the nail-biter finale

By Alli Rosenbloom, CNN

(CNN) — “The Last of Us” concluded its emotional second season with a major cliffhanger.

In Sunday’s action-packed Season 2 finale, a deadly reunion between Ellie (Bella Ramsey) and Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) culminated in Seattle and resulted in the shocking death of Jesse (Young Mazino) during a confrontation inside the theater.

Here’s how it played out: After a tense exchange with Jesse, he and Ellie split up. Ellie went to find a boat to get herself to the aquarium, where she believed Abby was hiding. Jesse, meanwhile, trucked on to find Tommy (Gabriel Luna), which was their original mission. Ellie eventually made it to the aquarium – after a stressful close encounter with some Seraphites – and found Abby’s friends Owen (Spencer Lord) and Mel (Ariela Barer), both of whom were there when Abby killed Joel (Pedro Pascal) earlier this season.

When they refused to tell Ellie where Abby was, Ellie shot Owen through the neck, grazing Mel in the process. What she hadn’t known until Mel was injured was that Mel was pregnant. With her last breaths, Mel begged Ellie to cut out her baby, but, clearly affected by the reality of Dina’s (Isabela Merced) ongoing pregnancy, Ellie could not do it.

Jesse and Tommy eventually found Ellie crying over Mel’s body.

Back at the theater, Ellie, Tommy and Jesse were plotting their route home and Tommy tried to comfort Ellie about killing Mel and Owen to no avail. Ellie was upset that Abby got to live.

Moments after Tommy left the theater to start packing, Ellie and Jesse heard a commotion in the lobby. As they burst through the doors, Jesse got shot square in the face and Ellie hid behind a bar.

Abby stood over Tommy, holding him at gunpoint, when Ellie revealed herself and asked Abby to “let him go.” Ellie told Abby that she was the one who killed her friends because “I was looking for you… I didn’t mean to hurt them.”

“I let you live and you wasted it,” Abby said to Ellie.

The screen went black as Abby raised her gun up to Ellie and a gunshot rang out, the victim – or whether there is one at all – left unknown.

In the next scene, Abby is woken up by Manny, the timeline of when this interaction is taking place unclear. The episode ends with Abby walking out onto a balcony that overlooks a stadium in Seattle that appears to show a flourishing farm base.

“Seattle day one,” text across the screen read just before the end credits rolled.

Executive producers Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann spoke at press conference with several media outlets, who were provided a screener of the finale, ahead of the episode’s airing.

They teased that in Season 3, like the video game on which the show is based, Abby’s perspective will be bolstered and make viewers question if she really is a villain.

They also said that moving forward, the central relationship in the show will naturally shift from Joel and Ellie to Dina and Ellie, which could mean the finale confrontation has a less grim conclusion than what some might fear. Or they’re toying with us all. Time will tell.

Here’s what else happened in the finale:

• Ellie told Dina about what happened at the hospital last season so that Dina could understand why Abby came after Joel in the first place. Ellie admitted to Dina that she knew what Joel did to Abby’s dad and then apologized for it. The revelation prompted an emotional shift in Dina, who said she wanted to go home and Ellie agreed.
• Before he died, Jesse figured out that Dina is pregnant because Dina refused to drink the whiskey he offered her to numb the pain when he fixed her wounded leg. When he revealed his suspicion to Ellie later on, she confirmed his hunch was correct.
• Jesse revealed to Ellie that he voted against her coming to Seattle, saying he voted that way because “it wasn’t in the best interest of the community.” He said he felt she was being selfish in her pursuit to avenge Joel.
• Back at the Wolves base, Isaac (Jeffrey Wright) was busy planning a major military operation with Elise (Hettienne Park) but wondered where Abby was. Elise told Isaac that Abby, Owen and Mel were missing but was annoyed he was worried about one person’s absence when they had a whole army preparing for battle. Isaac revealed that he had chosen Abby to lead the Wolves after that night’s operation in case he and Elise were killed.
• When Ellie’s boat got overcome by a wave on her way to the aquarium, she washed ashore an island inhabited by Seraphites, who found her and assumed she was a Wolf. She was nearly killed until they let her go after the island came under siege, presumably by Isaac and the Wolves.

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