The third episode of “The Last of Us” was longer and more tragic in its original version

The story between Bill and Frank in the third episode of ‘The Last of Us’ was the moment for which the series was widely acclaimed by viewers and specialized critics. However, both characters’ story could have been much more tragic, since it’s revealed that there is a much longer and more emotional cut that was never released.

In an interview with Deadline, series showrunner Craig Mazin confirmed this there is a longer cut of the third episode of ‘The Last of Us’, directed by Peter Hoar, a director who has worked on other series such as ‘Altered Carbon’, ‘The Umbrella Academy’, ‘Daredevil’ among other titles for Netflix. Even so, the version that hit HBO is already billed as season one’s longest running.

Mazin commented, “Peter Hoar did his directorial cut with our editor, Tim Good, which was quite a long time. When they sent it to me I think it’s been almost two hours […] I sat down to watch it and said, “Okay, I’ll watch the two-hour version of this episode.” And I cried so much that, at one point, I said out loud, ‘Ouch. I mean, he hurt. I cried so much; he hurts”.

Finally, Mazin states that the third episode of ‘The Last of Us’ it was much more tragic in its original version: “I thought, well, if these guys can do this to me and I wrote this damn thing, then I think it might work pretty well on other people,” said showrunner of the starring story Pedro Pascal.

• It may interest you: They rate the third episode of The Last of Us as the best on TV
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Episode 3 of “The Last of Us” receives praise

Despite the fact that Joel and Ellie took a back seat to the story of the most recent chapter of ‘The Last of Us’, it was the story of Bill and Frank that managed to earn the chapter acclaim from critics and fans alike. On sites like Rotten Tomatoes or IMDb, ‘Long Long Time’ achieved a near-perfect rating of 96% average scores.

Although its original duration was almost two hours, the third episode remains the longest of the entire season, at 76 minutes, already enough for a television series. There are currently no details as to why Mazin and the entire team decided to cut the episode, but it was definitely because it wasn’t allowed to run that long.

Anyway, ‘The Last of Us’ is one of the best series of recent years and the program of the moment. The following Sunday, February 5, the fourth episode of the program airs, in which Joel and Ellie are seen to continue their journey until they find Tommy, and on the way they find an ambush.