Who Is Abby, Kaitlyn Dever’s Character in 'The Last of Us'?
With The Last of Us Season 2 finally setting a release window, we finally got a better glimpse at the series’ newest character in the first teaser trailer for the second season: Abby Anderson, played by Kaitlyn Dever. Abby is one of the best characters in the original games and has the potential to become one of the best antagonists in pop culture once a broader audience gets to know her through the HBO series. In the games, people tend to see Abby as pretty much the opposite of Ellie (Bella Ramsey) at first, being tall and muscular while Ellie is short and slender, but as we delve into her backstory, we learn that these two are not as different as they seem and that it’s their similarities that give them so much chemistry. The trailer gives us a shot of Abby and we hear her voice narrating over the teaser trailer emphasizing her presence in the series moving forward. So let's take a look at the role Abby will take in the future of the game. Before we go on, though, there are massive spoilers for The Last of Us — Part II ahead, so be warned!
Abby Is Introduced as the Direct Antagonist to Ellie in ‘The Last of Us — Part II'
Four years have passed after the events of the first game, and Ellie and Joel (Pedro Pascal) are living in the Jackson commune, having settled into the community pretty well. Not able to live with the guilt of his actions at the end of the previous game, Joel has confessed to his brother Tommy (Gabriel Luna) that he prevented a cure for the cordyceps from potentially being developed when he saved Ellie. His relationship with Ellie has also strained over the last few years, as she's been weary of his over-protectiveness, especially after she started dating Dina (who will be played by Isabela Merced in Season 2) and finding out about what happened in Salt Lake City as well. But they are still fond of each other and continue behaving pretty much like father and daughter.
On a snowy winter's day, however, Joel leaves Jackson for the last time. He goes out with Tommy to patrol the woods around the community and ends up rescuing Abby, who takes them to where her group is stationed close by. When they arrive, we learn what's really going on — Abby is the daughter of the Firefly neurosurgeon who was about to operate on Ellie in Salt Lake City, before he was killed by Joel. We see in the trailer that we will get the flashback scene of seeing Abby as she returns back to the hospital after Joel has gone through and killed everyone. And we see her crying in front of her father's grave in a short scene that emphasizes to us that revenge will be the name of the game. After the Fireflies, Abby joins up with the Washington Liberation Front (WLF), an armed militia group based in Seattle. Abby takes her time torturing Joel, and Ellie only arrives at the place in time to witness her surrogate father being killed by Abby. Ellie swears revenge but, back in Jackson, she is stopped by Tommy, who was incapacitated by the WLF and couldn’t protect his brother. Also angry, he forbids Ellie from leaving Jackson and sets off to Seattle by himself.
Of course, that doesn't stop Ellie, who goes after him with Dina and her ex-boyfriend Jesse (Young Mazino). There are many things going on simultaneously in the background. For example, Dina is pregnant with Jesse's child, and Abby's group comprises her boyfriend Owen (Spencer Lord) and many friends, including Mel (Ariela Barer), who's also pregnant. When Ellie arrives in Seattle, she tracks down Abby, but, before she is able to get to her, she confronts and kills Mel and Owen, becoming traumatized herself afterward. Later, Abby tracks down Ellie's group to their hideout at an old theater, where she kills Jesse, neutralizes Tommy, and tortures Dina before confronting Ellie herself. This is their first fight in the game, which Abby wins and decides to spare Ellie, Dina, and Tommy, hoping that her mercy would end their beef.
Abby Sets Off a Chain of Revenge That Is the Main Subject of ‘The Last of Us — Part II’
The Last of Us — Part II is filled with emotional flashbacks and twists, but one of the smartest things it does is make Abby a playable character when the story reaches Seattle. This puts the player right in her shoes as her character is fully fleshed out. Before this point, it was teased that, despite her dark deeds, she actually had shades of grey, but in Seattle we learn that there is way more light than darkness in her. When she arrives at the WLF headquarters at Seattle's Lumen Field, for example, we find out that she is a respected part of their community, someone who inspires others and helps them thrive.
We also learn that the Fireflies disbanded after Joel's rampage in Salt Lake City, and that most Quarantine Zones initially set up by FEDRA in the first game are now in ruins, with local militias fighting for control among themselves and the clickers. In Seattle, the WLF (who are also referred to as "Wolves" because of their initials) are fighting the Seraphites, a religious cult that is rapidly growing, and Abby gets tangled up in this conflict. Owen goes missing while investigating Seraphite activity in the city, so Abby goes looking for him, getting captured in the process. She is subsequently rescued by siblings Lev and Yara, two former Seraphites who are now deemed apostates by the cult. As the WLF starts an attack on the Seraphite headquarters, now it's Abby who rescues Lev after Yara sacrifices herself to buy them some time to flee. Just like Lev is an apostate to the Seraphites, now Abby is a traitor to the WLF.
There are many flashbacks in The Last of Us — Part II showing Abby's past in the middle of her playable arc, like when she and Owen discover the Seattle Aquarium shortly after arriving in Seattle and make it their secret spot, and, before that, she and her father, Jerry, helping a zebra give birth in Salt Lake City when Owen finds them to tell them that "the girl" has arrived — the girl being Ellie, of course. By this point in the story, we already empathize with Abby, and we see how much her revenge against Joel is eating away at her. So, once she and Lev leave the battle between the WLF and the Seraphites, and find that Owen and Mel have been killed by Ellie, it's understandable that she's justified in wanting another round of revenge against Ellie. This time, though, Lev convinces her to spare everyone and, together, they leave Seattle.
Abby’s Story With Ellie Ends Tragically, but Not How You’d Expect
A few months after the skirmish in Seattle forced Abby and Lev to run away, they are now living in Santa Barbara. There are rumors that the Fireflies are supposedly regrouping on Catalina Island, and the two of them decide to follow that lead. Before they can, though, they are captured by the Rattlers, a local group of marauders known for keeping slaves. The Rattlers torture Abby and Lev, and later tie Abby to a pillar on the beach, where she is left to starve. Because of this, most of her strength fades away, and she becomes a shadow of what she once was, barely recognizable.
Back in Jackson, Tommy goes to Ellie and Dina's with information about Abby's whereabouts. The couple are now living together, and Ellie jumps at the opportunity to finally get her revenge against Abby, but Dina, tired of the whole thing, makes it clear that, if Ellie leaves, she won't be there waiting when Ellie returns. But since Ellie can't let go of her need for vengeance, she leaves to hunt Abby again. This time, though, she finds her in Santa Barbara and rescues Abby and Lev from Rattlers captivity, both of them about to die. Still blind by her hate for Abby, Ellie forces Abby to fight her on the beach right after being rescued, malnourished and weak.
The whole sequence is the hardest in all The Last of Us, not because of its level of difficulty, but because it's simply sad. Abby and Ellie are two people who have harmed each other so much and nearly lost everything to achieve their burning revenge against one another. At that moment, Abby simply isn’t the same person whom Ellie fought so many times in the past, and can barely stand up, but is still forced to fight. Ellie is so hellbent on getting her revenge, it's like she isn't herself anymore, and is just fighting because of pure rage. Just as she's about to drown Abby, Ellie thinks about Joel and decides to spare Abby. She goes back to her now-empty house, while Abby and Lev sail to find the Fireflies.
Abby Is What Makes ‘The Last of Us — Part II’ Such a Great Game
The first The Last of Us is a great game because of its tale of paternal love and loss. It works perfectly in the context of the Cordyceps apocalypse, with Joel and Ellie being pretty much drawn to each other at first because they need to survive, and later because of their family-like bond. When The Last of Us — Part II was released, many fans had doubts that a sequel could ever live up to what the original game had accomplished, and there was a lot of backlash to it from a small, but loud, sect of people who liked the first game and felt betrayed by the fact that the new game kills Joel off so quickly to focus on two women.
Regardless of that, Abby's character is exactly what makes The Last of Us — Part II a worthy sequel to the original, if not an even better game altogether. With her, game creator and live-action series co-creator Neil Druckmann completely changed the storytelling dynamics by introducing a relatable antagonist, someone with whom the player could empathize as much as they did the protagonists. Abby is what prompts players to question their own biases and judgments when it comes to topics such as revenge, something that's ever-present in The Last of Us. Her presence contributes to the game's exploration of the human cost of survival in a post-apocalyptic world, and fosters a narrative that is emotionally resonant and morally complex.
Because of all the emotions and responses Abby invokes on the player’s part, there was also backlash against her as a character — we all love Joel, after all — so Kaitlyn Dever taking up the role in Season 2 is not only great casting, but also a brave decision on the actor’s part. In fact, before the series was developed by HBO and actors were attached to characters, Dever was most players’ top choice to play Ellie, not Abby, so her casting also subverts expectations in this sense, which will make watching Season 2 all the more interesting. In the games, Abby is the result of many artists working together, especially Jocelyn Mettler, who is the model for her face, and Laura Bailey, who performs the motion capture and voice work. All that will now be done by Dever herself in the live-action series, so we're lucky to have such a talented actor bringing such a great character to life.
Season 1 of The Last of Us is streaming exclusively on Max. Season 2 debuts in April.