the last of us showrunners craig mazin and neil druckmann have revealed that the premiere episode was originally much shorter until hbo stepped inepisode one used to be episode one and two it used to just end on the 20 years later and seeing joel throw the kid in the fire druckmann said on hbos the last of us podcastmazin explained it was their bosses at hbo who suggested a change from the original ending so they could entice audiences back for the next episodein this case our proxies at hbo were saying its not necessarily going to want to make me come back mazin said the whole story of the last of us is about joel and ellie if we get a little glimpse of her at the end of episode one and we dont bring them together and it just ends with a kid dying then credits people may not want to come backdruckmann added in hindsight the feedback makes complete sense we had a version where we ended on ellie looking out the window theres a mystery here but we havent established why we should care about the kid we have to get to that moment where joel meets ellie thats the start of this journey the episode is so much better for itthe last of us airs sundays on hbo in the us and mondays on sky atlantic and now tv in the uk for more from the hbo series check out our guide to the major last of us episode 1 changes from the games and a terrifying look at the cordyceps fungus discover when the next episode is dropping with our last of us release schedule