A Twitter exchange between The Last of Us 2 director Neil Druckmann and writer Halley Gross revealed that Gross originally played a character in the game.
In a hilarious – and at times disturbing – Twitter thread (opens in new tab), Neil Druckmann and Halley Gross banter with one another which results in Druckmann revealing that Gross originally played a character in The Last of Us 2, however, that she got cut from the final version of the game.
In his tweet, Druckmann shared a photo of Gross in mocap attire – complete with all the dots drawn on her face for facial motion capture – with the caption: “Now I want to put your character back in the game… JUST SO WE CAN CUT HER OUT AGAIN!”
Gross then replied to this with a short video of herself in the mocap studio with the caption: “Last of Us Part III: Leah’s Revenge.” Thanks to Gross’ reply, we can now assume that the character she is talking about is possibly the Leah in the polaroid Ellie and Dina find in one of the Washington Liberation Front’s bases.
Last of Us Part III: Leah’s Revenge pic.twitter.com/iyjlgjc2vxOctober 10, 2021
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In order to survive an ambush by the WLF, Ellie and Dina end up killing two of their fighters, one of which is found with the polaroid of Leah and a letter from her in their pocket.
Once Ellie and Dina have reached a safe space, they look more into the letter and discover that Leah is based at the TV station so they decide to go and find her there. Unfortunately, once the pair arrive Leah is already dead – which makes sense since we now know that the character was mostly cut from the game.
To find out more hidden details in Naughty Dog’s post-apocalyptic game, take a look at our The Last of Us 2 Easter eggs guide.