The Last of Us showed exactly how LGBTQ+ romances should be portrayed on TV
metro.co.ukBill and Frank find each other, miles away from civilisation, fall in love and create a life free of hate, prejudice and LGBTQ+ trauma.The Last of Us launched last month, the first big TV moment of 2023, and has already rightly been lauded as the greatest adaptation of a video game ever.In it, most of the human population has been very swiftly wiped out by a Cordyceps outbreak, a fungus that lives in other organisms and essentially turns them into monsters.So, on paper it’s not obviously the show that would essentially launch with such a profoundly moving and innovative gay love story, but I can’t remember another episode of TV that had such an immediate and enormous impact on everyone who watched it, LGBTQ+ or otherwise.
Breaking away from the core action between The Last of Us’s main characters Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey), Long Long Time flashed back to the early days of the pandemic where we found Bill (Nick Offerman) a solitary lost soul who hated people and seemed actually quite delighted when all his neighbours were carted off in the back of a truck thinking they’d be taken to a safety zone, isolated from the spread of the fungus.Essentially, he had free reign over his once bustling town, and wouldn’t have to talk to anyone ever again.Sorry, this video isn't available any more.The world was on fire, but Bill had made his own paradise.
And then he found Frank (Murray Bartlett) stuck in a trap. Instead of shooting Frank on the spot, he brought him home, let him shower and treated him to the meal of a lifetime, a home cooked gourmet dinner partnered with the perfect wine.Spotting Bill’s piano, Frank rushed over, desperate to play, until Bill took over and tenderly serenaded him with Linda Ronstadt’s.
