The Last Of Us Trailer: Pedro Pascal And Bella Ramsey Take On Post-Apocalyptic America

The full trailer for "The Last of Us" is here, and HBO's adaptation of the beloved game still looks just as fantastic as all the teasers and first looks so far have indicated. While the moody first teaser for the show did well to pique the attention of non-game fans by introducing us to the story's post-apocalyptic world with very few words (it instead featured a Hank Williams song playing over thrilling imagery), the new trailer gives us a more detailed look at Joel (Pedro Pascal), Ellie (Bella Ramsey), and the bleak world they're trying to survive.

Take a look at the new trailer for Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann's series below (and keep an eye out for appearances by Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson, who played Joel and Ellie in the video game).

As with much of the show's marketing to date, "The Last of Us" trailer seems like it'll please both longtime fans of the 2013 game and newcomers to the series. For the uninitiated, the trailer gives a bit more info about the premise: in a world overrun by zombie-like infected people, a man named Joel is headed west with Ellie, a kid who was bitten but showed no symptoms of illness. He calls her cargo, not family, but it's clear that as they face danger after danger, they will start to have one another's backs in a pretty profound way.

It's also abundantly clear that in this world, live people are as dangerous as the infected. We only get a brief look at a horde of clickers, and it looks great, but there's just as much anguish and violence in shots of fellow survivors played by Nick Offerman, Anna Torv, and more. As for the level of danger Joel and Ellie will face? Graham Greene's character pretty much sums it up when Joel asks him advice for the best way to go west. "Yeah, go east," he replies ominously. Sorry to A-ha, but "Take Me On" simply isn't enough to soothe my nerves.

Game-players will recognize shots from a wintry landscape as being close to the climax of the first game, meaning "The Last Of Us" is ready to break our hearts in its very first season. The trailer also introduces several key characters from the first game in the series, including Merle Dandridge's Marlene, Murray Bartlett's Bill, and Keivonn Woodard and Lamar Johnson's Sam and Henry. There's also a glimpse of Storm Reid's Riley, a character who appears in "The Last of Us: Left Behind."

"The Last of Us" hits HBO on January 15, 2023.