“The Last of Us” season 1, for the most part, felt like a walkthrough version of the original video game. Indeed, the HBO series was often faithful to a fault in its early going. As a result, its first season frequently offered little in the way of new material for people who’d already experienced the best version of this story — the one you play yourself.

At times, however, the show did make big changes. Season 1, episode 3, most notably, told a mostly original story that was only hinted at in the source material, and it’s easily the best thing the show has done so far. There were also scenes in the first two episodes showing how the series’ pandemic began. This allowed the show to expand the world of “The Last of Us” beyond its two main characters and make it feel bigger and more lived-in. 

Now, for season 2, the show is making another major alteration. Except, rather than tweaking the lore of the original game and its sequel, the series is retconning a season 1 detail that was itself a significant deviation from the games’ mythology.

“Season 1, we had this new thing that wasn’t in the game, these tendrils that spread. And that was one form,” co-creator and showrunner Neil Druckmann revealed at a SXSW panel. “And then one shot you see in this trailer, there are things in the air.”

That’s right: the spores are back, baby! Delicious, delirious, deadly spores, they are the invisible enemies that arrive before the Infected. While “The Last of Us” season 1 elected to discard this aspect of the original games, Druckmann and his fellow creator and showrunner have confirmed that season 2 will introduce spores to the TV series.

“We really wanted to figure it out, and again, everything has to be drama,” Mazin added. “There had to be a dramatic reason of introducing it now. And there is.”