Will Ellie be in The Last of Us Season 3? Details revealed

The Last of Us Season 3 is not going to arrive anytime soon, but as season two wrapped up on 25th May 2025, many questions remained. The season finale showed Abby pointing her gun at Ellie, followed by the sound of a gunshot and the screen going black.

We do not know if Ellie is alive or dead. Besides, if the show follows the story of the games, The Last of Us Season 3 will show us events from Abby's perspective during the days leading up to her and Ellie's confrontation. Thus, we might not see much of Ellie in The Last of Us Season 3.

Ellie's presence in The Last of Us Season 3

In the last episode of season two, we see Ellie kill Abby's companions, Owen and Mel. While she initially kills them as she is consumed by vengeance, finding out Mel was pregnant and Ellie has murdered a fetus too, she breaks down. The weight of everything she has done to avenge Joel's death finally hits her, and she no longer wants to cause more harm.

However, by this point, Abby has Tommy at gunpoint, and when Ellie offers her life for Tommy, we do not know who lives and who dies. All we hear is a gunshot, and the scene goes dark. We know what happens in the game after the scene goes dark, right after the gunshot.

Neil Druckmann, one of the showrunners, who also co-created the game, has ensured that the show follows the game closely. There haven't been too many plot changes until now, and if they don't change anything in The Last of Us Season 3, we will see Ellie in the upcoming season.

However, how much of her we will get to see is unknown. In an interview with Variety, Bella Ramsey was asked if they expect to be less seen on screen in The Last of Us Season 3. In response, they said,

“I haven’t seen any scripts, but yes, I do expect that,”

They continued,

“I think that I’m going to be there, but not a whole bunch. We’ve had conversations about that. I sort of have a rough idea of what it’s going to be, but I can’t tell you.”

If the show continues to closely follow the game in The Last of Us Season 3, we will get to see more of Abby, the WLF, and the Seraphites. After the screen goes black at the end of season two, we cut to three days before the confrontation between Ellie and Abby. The scene cuts to Abby waking in the WLF headquarters.

In the game, from this point, players switch from playing as Ellie to playing as Abby. They explore Abby's life in the post-apocalyptic world, the WLF, and the Seraphites. Only at the end of the game, players go back to the last seconds of Abby and Ellie's conversation. Thus, the same will likely happen in the upcoming season.

As Variety reports, in a recent press conference, co-creator Craig Mazin said,

“All I can say is we haven’t seen the last of Kaitlyn Dever and we haven’t seen the last of Bella Ramsey, and we haven’t seen the last of Isabela Merced, and we haven’t seen the last of a lot of people who are currently dead in the story.”

Neil Druckmann added to Mazin's words,

“Whether you will see them on screen or not, their presence will be there throughout.”

While neither Bella Ramsey nor the creators have confirmed how much of Ellie we will see in The Last of Us Season 3, it looks like we will see much less of her than we are used to. Joel most likely will not be seen in the upcoming season, even in flashbacks. However, we cannot rule it out completely, because Neil Druckmann hasn't either.

According to Variety, Druckmann referenced episode six of The Last of Us season two, saying,