Kaitlyn Dever Is Being Eyed For The Role Of Abby In 'The Last of Us' Season 2 And I'm Begging Her Not To Do It

Back in August, The Last of Us showrunner Craig Mazin told the L.A. Times that he had found an actress to play Abby Anderson in Season 2. To that end, I hear that Kaitlyn Dever is in talks to tackle the role.

Should a deal make, Dever would join Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey in Season 2, which is expected to premiere on HBO in 2025. In the game, Abby is positioned as a rival to Ramsey’s Ellie — a role that Dever herself was once eyed for, having done a table read as that character.

NOTE: This will be spoiler free. 

I want to start by saying the obvious: Kaitlyn Dever is an incredible actress. Anyone who has seen a movie she was in can tell you that. Personally, I'd point to her performance in the incredible 'Dopesick' as an example of how great she can be. On top of that, Dever actually resembles (facially) the character Abby quite a bit. 

Granted, Dever would need legitimately over a year of training to get even close to the Abby's absurdly yoked muscles. But the face is there! 

In a perfect world, I'd love for her to take a role in a critically acclaimed adaptation of a critically acclaimed game. It should be a no brainer! However, this is not a perfect world and, for those of you that are not aware of this, taking the role of Abby is essentially stepping into a minefield. 

Without spoiling anything, a very large portion of TLOU fans despise this character. Part of that is because of the storyline of the game, part of it is because the sort of performative feminism stuff she represents which is not appreciated in the gaming world. Personally, I see a bit on both sides. Hating her because "wahhhh they're shoving female characters down our throats" is broken-brain stupid shit. If was killing dudes by the truckload, nobody would care as long as it works within the reality that world established(See ELLIE). However, making seemingly the only muscular character in the game a woman who is somehow maintaining a professional bodybuilder physique in a post-apocalyptic world feels very performative and it hurts the grounded reality of that world.

Fair or not, the fact is that this role is essentially radioactive. ANYONE who takes it is signing up for a world of non-stop harassment from pissy fans of the game and presumably pissy non-gamer fans of the series. There is also a possibility showrunner Craig Mazin uses some of the criticisms of the game to change the character, story etc to curb that reaction but as it stands, this role is radioactive. 

With all that in mind I have to plead. Kaitlyn, please god do not accept this role unless major changes are made.