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
• ‘THE LAST OF US’ CONFIRMED THAT BILL WAS GAY YEARS AGO
• ‘THE LAST OF US’ CREATOR REVEALS HOW HE CRAFTED THE GAY LOVE STORY THAT HAS FANS TEARS
• THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE
• IS NICK OFFERMAN GAY? HIS LAST OF US ROLE EXPLAED
• WAS BILL GAY THE LAST OF US GAME? RELATNSHIP WH FRANK EXPLAED
• Y, ELLIE HAS ALWAYS BEEN GAY ‘THE LAST OF US’
• VIEWERS SAY NICK OFFERMAN HAS ‘CHANGED THEIR MDS’ ABOUT STRAIGHT ACTORS PLAYG GAY CHARACTERS

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

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.

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. Bill is gay the game, but ’s referenced so vaguely that plenty of players missed .

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

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 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.

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

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!

‘THE LAST OF US’ CREATOR REVEALS HOW HE CRAFTED THE GAY LOVE STORY THAT HAS FANS TEARS

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.

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. Acrdg to crics who have seen the show, we're gettg a whole lot more of The Last of Us' gay characters than we thought.The 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.

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

IS NICK OFFERMAN GAY? HIS LAST OF US ROLE EXPLAED

So yeah, Bill has always been gay. "[Their] story was ls about their homosexualy, and more about the fact that 's a middle-aged romance, " says the wrer. As happens, there are gay people, there are Black people, there are whe people, there are disabled people and there are af people.

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

All of those thgs happen whether you're gay or straight or anythg. 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. Here, y, are two gay characters who die. The actor’s role as Bill HBO’s The Last of Us adaptatn is part of a larger discsn that rais the qutn as to whether Nick Offerman is gay.

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

Nick Offerman Is Not Gay, But He Believ Strongly In Reprentatn. While The Last of Us’ Bill is gay, Nick Offerman himself is not, and is married to Megan Mullally.

VIEWERS SAY NICK OFFERMAN HAS ‘CHANGED THEIR MDS’ ABOUT STRAIGHT ACTORS PLAYG GAY CHARACTERS

When I read scripts, if there’s any kd of humor that’s misogynistic or homophobic or racist, that is jt a red flag.