How Did Tess Die in HBO's The Last of Us?

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*Spoilers for The Last of Us below!*

HBO's latest hit series, The Last of Us, has already broken records thanks to its dedicated fanbase from the PlayStation video game of the same name. According to HBO, 4.7 million viewers tuned into the series when it premiered on January 15 — which was "nearly double" the number of viewers who watched the season two premiere of Euphoria. The series — which stars Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, and Storm Reid — is based in a post-apocalyptic society 20 years into the future. One of the remaining survivors, Joel (Pascal), is hired to smuggle 14-year-old Ellie (Ramsey) to safety while fighting off deadly zombies, otherwise known as the infected. As they make their way across the U.S. to get Ellie out of the oppressive quarantine zone, they make friends and allies, like Tess, during their journey.

In the second episode of the series, Tess, unfortunately, faces her demise while trying to protect her friends. So, how did Tess die on The Last of Us, and is the show's depiction of Tess' death accurate to the best-selling video game it's based on? Here's what we know.

How did Tess die in The Last of Us TV show?

Early on in the second episode, Tess confronts one of the infected and gets bitten by them, thus becoming infected herself. She later tells Joel and Ellie about her condition, using her bite as proof that Ellie isn't infected. She then encourages them to continue their journey without her, but the trio ultimately ends up sticking together and gets swarmed by a large group of the infected in the capitol building.

Tess decides to stay behind as a distraction for the infected while Joel and Ellie attempt to escape. While they run off, she gets ambushed by the infected and one of them kisses her, which lets the remnants of their disease make their way into her mouth. Tess then turns her lighter on and sets the building on fire with her and the infected inside after Joel and Ellie escape to safety.

How did Tess die in The Last of Us game?

In the video game, Tess tells Joel and Ellie that she's infected and shows them her bite as she did in the second episode of the TV series. However, she dies at the hands of the Federal Disaster Response Agency (FEDRA) instead of facing the infected and blowing up the building she was in.

In the game, FEDRA finds Joel and Tess as they believe Ellie is infected and attempt to take her from them. Like she did on the show, Tess stays behind to distract them while Joel and Ellie escape. She tried killing most of the FEDRA employees but ends up getting killed by one of them off-screen.

Why was Tess' death different in the show?

In HBO's official The Last of Us podcast, series co-creator Craig Mazin said he and the writers changed Tess' death in the show because they figured it wouldn't make sense for FEDRA to be at the capitol building while Joel, Ellie, and Tess are there.

"Why would FEDRA even be here? What are they doing? There's nothing there for them to police, really. It didn't make much sense to me to have FEDRA all the way out there," Mazin said. "We wanted a chance to show a different result of being infected, which was not one of mere violence or horror, but rather a sick kind of community. Now, at the end, we had an opportunity to show how connected they were," he continued.

Co-creator Neil Druckmann — who also wrote the story for the video game — also told Entertainment Weekly that the infected "don't have to get violent unless you're fighting them from spreading [the infection] further."

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