Who is Isaac in ‘The Last Of Us’ and what happens to him in the video game?
HBO’s The Last Of Us is finally introducing one of the video game’s most fearsome antagonists – Isaac.
The second season of The Last Of Us has been a heartbreaking return to the post-apocalyptic universe. Newcomer Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) quickly established herself as one of the most-hated TV characters around by brutally murdering Pedro Pascal’s Joel in front of surrogate daughter Ellie (Bella Ramsey).
And just like in the hit video game The Last Of Us Part 2, Ellie wants justice. Episode three ‘The Path’ saw her and Dina (Isabela Merced) leaving the safety of Jackson and heading to Seattle to confront Abby and the Washington Liberation Front AKA The Wolves. They’re expecting a scrappy band of survivors but in the dying minutes of episode three, viewers saw just how organised the military force really is – Ellie and Dina should be worried.
Episode four introduces their formidable leader Isaac, who’ll be a familiar face for the gaming fans.
Who is Isaac in The Last Of Us?
In the video game, Isaac Dixon is a former Marine who became the ruthless leader of the Washington Liberation Front after leading a brutal rebellion against the government-backed Federal Disaster Response Agency (FEDRA) in Seattle.
Once Isaac and the WLF had taken control of the Seattle quarantine zone, they struggled with keeping the thousands of civilians alive, so resorted to extreme measures. FEDRA associates were banished, people resisting the new rules were executed and all supplies were seized. His dictatorship wasn’t popular, but it did work.
Who plays Isaac in The Last Of Us?
Jeffrey Wright voiced and did the motion capture for Isaac in The Last Of Us Part 2 and also plays him in the HBO adaptation.
“It was fun to go back and revisit that character but do it in the flesh,” Wright said in an interview last year. “We introduce the character this season, we tell a little about his history, which is a little more than we see in the game.”
What happens to Isaac in The Last Of Us Part 2?
Spoiler alert!
While a majority of The Last Of Us Part 2 deals with the battle between Abby and Ellie, the game also sees Isaac preparing to finish a war with his long-time enemies, the cult like Seraphites.
Initially Isaac’s invasion of their island was a success but things took a turn when he discovered his former protégé Abby protecting one of the Seraphites. He threatened to kill them both, but was shot in the back by another member of the cult. Abby later finds out, via a radio broadcast, that Isaac died from his injuries and the WLF’s invasion was a failure.
The HBO series has already made a big change to this storyline by having the WLF wipe-out a Seraphite-inspired cult before Ellie and Dina arrive in Seattle.
Earlier this year, HBO boss Francesca Orci said The Last Of Us will probably run for four seasons but the scrapped Part 3 game won’t be used to extend the story. “I am not going to go past the game. I’ll just say that flat out,” said showrunner Craig Mazin. “The show is so hard to make. It has to have an end.”
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Ali Shutler
NME
