The Last of Us’s gay love story breaks new ground for an entire genre

Contents:

• HBO’S THE LAST OF US IMPROV ON THE GAME’S IMPLIED GAY ROMANCE
• THE LAST OF US’ GEO GAY LOVE STORY COULD NOT BE MORE TIMELY
• Y, ELLIE HAS ALWAYS BEEN GAY ‘THE LAST OF US’
• ‘THE LAST OF US’ CONFIRMED THAT BILL WAS GAY YEARS AGO
• HBO’S ‘THE LAST OF US’ DIRECTOR SAYS YOU NEED TO ‘TRICK’ VIEWERS TO WATCHG A GAY LOVE STORY
• THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE
• THE LAST OF US EPISO 3 REVIEW BOMBED BEE GAYS EXIST
• WAS BILL GAY THE LAST OF US GAME? RELATNSHIP WH FRANK EXPLAED
• THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE
• THAT ‘THE LAST OF US’ GAY LOVE STORY IS GROUNDBREAKG
• THE LAST OF US LETS GAY LOVE FLOURISH THE APOLYPSE
• GAY REPRENTATN ‘THE LAST OF US’ EMPOWERS LGBTQ+ GAMG MUNY

HBO’S THE LAST OF US IMPROV ON THE GAME’S IMPLIED GAY ROMANCE

“It was geo, and I was so not expectg , ” said Darn Lowenste, 41, a vio game nsultant, who is gay.

“Obvly, I’ve played the gam religly and I know there’s gay characters there, but I was not expectg an 80-mute … tearworthy piece of art. ” Queer-themed gam date as far back as 1992’s “Gay Bla, ” acrdg to the LGBTQ media advocy group GLAAD. Though Bill’s role the game is small, and his mentn of beg gay brief, did not go unnoticed by LGBTQ gamers like then, he was his early 20s and still the closet about his sexualy.

”Adaptatn giv gamers hope for more reprentatnSome queer viewers exprsed excement that Sunday's episo would expose even more people to gay vio game characters. Bill is gay the game, but ’s referenced so vaguely that plenty of players missed . The cisn to keep muted, hted at a sgle le of dialogue and a hidn letter, was both praised and cricized — was easy to overlook, but also avoid a lot of gay-character trop, and allowed Bill to be a human and not “a maniftatn of sexualy, ” as Polygon’s Danielle Rien put at the time.

THE LAST OF US’ GEO GAY LOVE STORY COULD NOT BE MORE TIMELY

The game’s storyle don’t avoid trop altogether, though: It was cricized for “buryg s gays. What we got stead was a psule episo, and a particularly bracg one, given the show’s opprsively bleak mood th far: The hour is dited to the love story of Bill and Frank, a gay uple who—due ially to Bill’s skills as a bunker-stockg, booby-trappg, Don’t Tread on Me survivalist—manage to build a largely happy existence together an abandoned and eventually fortified ral hamlet for almost 20 years.

Wh Bill and Frank, we were given a portra of love—specifilly gay love—that feels surprisg and urgent. In our own 2023, we are not exactly lackg for media imag of whe gay men. For one thg, we see gay sire portrayed all s plexy, but wh a touch as light as a breeze playg through curtas.

Bill’s is not a “type” of gay man I n say I’ve ever seen mastream media before, and watchg him slowly reveal and epen that aspect of himself wh Frank’s help—sexually, y (Hollywood: more hairy bear love scen please! But Bill and Frank create somethg else, a ltle oasis of their own that’s regnizably gay, full of quiet bety and joys the size of new strawberri. Frank wants to fix up the block and some of the “not stupid” shops—the we and furnure stor, the clothg boutique—bee he hop they might one day have unfected guts (which they eventually do, the form of Joel and Ts), but really bee makg thgs nice, pecially when nicens isn’t valued, is one of the great gay llgs.

Y, ELLIE HAS ALWAYS BEEN GAY ‘THE LAST OF US’

As an echo of the gay experience wh AIDS, is, as veteran activist Peter Staley put a Facebook post, a ftg tribute to the “tenr love & bravery gay men summoned when facg ath durg the plague years, cludg those who did so on their own terms. How powerful, then, to see not only a gay uple given an entire hour of a marquee show, but a gay uple who are held up as the keepers of civilizatn, as stewards of bety, as emblems of human digny and possibily. The show is already garnerg high praise for s third episo, which lved ep to a si story wh two gay characters at s re.

Several more gay characters are sttered among the game’s st, and future episos — and seasons — will see the h characters realized live-actn for the first time.

‘THE LAST OF US’ CONFIRMED THAT BILL WAS GAY YEARS AGO

Ellie Image via Nghty Dog That’s right, the lead character The Last of Us is part of the gay muny. The character’s sexualy is hted at the Last of Us gam, and many players termed that he was gay, but players didn’t get nearly the romance the origal that HBO livered wh “Long Long Time. Ne years before the episo of the same name, Left Behd revealed that Ellie is gay.

HBO’S ‘THE LAST OF US’ DIRECTOR SAYS YOU NEED TO ‘TRICK’ VIEWERS TO WATCHG A GAY LOVE STORY

Those are the qutns plagug Ellie, not the far more played out”Am I gay? Though this storyle ends wh a ad LGBTQ+ character, don’t necsarily follow the Bury Your Gays trope. But The Last of Us Part II -wrer Halley Gross nfirmed no uncerta terms that Ellie is gay.

While Jackson, Ellie is harassed by a homophobic man for kissg her iend Da. And yet The Last of Us was there 2014, nfirmg that one of the bt known characters gamg history was gay all along and handlg her first love as serly as this anchise handled the ath of Joel’s child.

Acrdg to crics who have seen the show, we're gettg a whole lot more of The Last of Us' gay characters than we Last of Us follows Joel and Ellie as they travel across a post-apolyptic Ameri tryg to avoid fung-fected zombi.

THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE

LGBTQ+ them are not somethg entirely new to The Last of Us anchise, as the first stallment of the seri also showsed a gay NPC and then a very graceful lbian kiss the Left Behd DLC.

Bill is gay and had a relatnship wh a man lled Frank, who is later found ad the game, much to Bill's dismay.

Unlike Da, Bill tri to hi his homosexualy and ially only refers to Frank as someone he had red for.

THE LAST OF US EPISO 3 REVIEW BOMBED BEE GAYS EXIST

“Long Long Time” has sparked several plats om the worst si of Twter about how The Last of Us allegedly shoehorned a gay relatnship.

WAS BILL GAY THE LAST OF US GAME? RELATNSHIP WH FRANK EXPLAED

But the fact is Bill has always been gay. So yeah, Bill has always been gay.

HBO’s h vio-game adaptatn seri The Last of Us took an unexpected tour to gay terrory s most recent episo, focg on a buddg romance between the characters played by actors Nick Offerman and Murry Bartlett. In a recent terview, the episo director said viewers sometim need to be tricked to watchg a gay love story. Director Peter Hoar, who is openly gay, spoke to the science-foced se Inverse about makg the show.

THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE

Hoar directed the recent Brish miseri It’s a S, which followed the liv of a group of gay men at the height of the AIDS epimic.

MORE FROM FORBES'The Last Of Us' Season 1, Episo 3 Rep And Review: Bill And FrankBy Erik KaI’ve seen every possible reactn to this episo om rears, rangg om the same enthiasm I felt about to blatant homophobia, plag that ‘the gay agenda’ is beg ‘shoved down our throats’ (or the ‘woke agenda’ etc.

Another important pot: Bill and Frank were always prented as beg gay. After wng turns Lookg, Tal of the Cy and The Whe Lot, he’s fast beg one of the medium’s most proment gay the episo nears s end, and Frank be curably sick, the uple’s last scen together are profoundly movg. The episo is, among other thgs, a subversn of the much-cricised “bury your gays” trope.

THAT ‘THE LAST OF US’ GAY LOVE STORY IS GROUNDBREAKG

Here, y, are two gay characters who die. Episo three was review-bombed after highlighted a gay relatnship. If you don't want to watch the show bee has gay storyl, bee has a trans character, that's on you, and you're missg out.

THE LAST OF US LETS GAY LOVE FLOURISH THE APOLYPSE

When lookg closer at the one-star ratgs, many brg up the fact that Bill is gay, dubbg the episo a "borg" romance.

Other one-star reviews are angry that a gay man met a gay man, dubbg pletely unlikely, while the same breath mentng a girl who is somehow immune to a vis that has torn down the walls of society as we know .

It's fairly obv what the mon thread is across this sudn flux of negative reviews - a gay uple dared exist. Another tertg plat levied at this episo is that 's a disservice to the game, spe beg an episo that revolv entirely around buildg on clu given the game while also makg up for s pfalls reprentatn, namely fallg to the Bury Your Gays trope. Bury Your Gays, if you're unaware, is a trope which gay upl disproportnately break apart due to ath.

GAY REPRENTATN ‘THE LAST OF US’ EMPOWERS LGBTQ+ GAMG MUNY

It was a gay story that wasn't mired trma, but bee of the "lack of actn", apparently wasn't worth tellg. Gay people existg is polil, apparently, and so TLOU even darg to show two gay people livg their liv together is to make some grand statement, spe the show already beg heavily polil given that the US ernment turn to psdo-Nazis that fd easier to burn people alive than take re of them.

Gay people exist, the ter gets mad, review bomb ensu.

*WARNING: Spoilers ahead for The Last Of Us*The story of Bill and Frank is only briefly touched upon The Last Of Us vio game, but episo 3 of HBO’s adaptatn has dramatilly expand on their relatnship what is a notable viatn om the source enthrallg episo is filled wh tensn, joy and heartbreak as tells the pair’s story over almost two s, begng wh their first meetg after Frank fell to one of Bill’s follows is a betiful love story that has left fans wh a number of qutns, wh some askg whether Bill was gay The Last Of Us game self. TERMINAL ILLNESS: FRANK’S FATE IN THE LAST OF US SERIES IS A HUGE DEPARTURE FROM ORIGINAL GAME© HBO | Liane HentscherWas Bill gay The Last Of Us game? Y, Bill is nfirmed to be gay The Last Of Us vio game.