There’s a moment in The Last of Us Season 2 finale where I truly felt like co-showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann were playing a clever game with me, a television critic questioning the essence of this intense HBO drama. Amidst a rare tranquil scene, the camera focuses on a mural in an abandoned library that states: “Everything’s got a moral if only you can find it.”

During some points in The Last of Us Season 2, I thought I knew exactly what that moral was. Perhaps the HBO sensation wasn’t just about battling zombies, but rather about confronting and overcoming generational trauma. Life might be a losing battle, but if you can improve it just a bit for your loved ones and the next generation, then you’ve won. Yet, at other moments, I found myself oddly uninterested amidst the beautifully crafted landscapes, consistently toxic character decisions, and strangely superficial drama.

The Last of Us Season 2 is an impressive display of the skills of all the craftspeople involved, but it lacks a certain human element. As someone unfamiliar with the show’s video game origins, I often experienced a sense of detachment from what appeared to be a straightforward revenge tale. I felt like I was observing a stunning re-creation of video game cut scenes, unable to connect with the show on a more profound, personal level.

Ultimately, after watching all seven episodes of The Last of Us Season 2, I wasn’t feeling all that jazzed about Joel (Pedro Pascal), Ellie (Bella Ramsey), or even new character Abby (Kaitlyn Dever). Instead, my biggest takeaway from the season was that Isabela Merced is destined to be a huge freaking star.

The Last of Us is HBO’s epic adaptation of Naughty Dog’s beloved video game series of the same name. Co-created by Chernobyl mastermind Craig Mazin and game guru Neil Druckmann, the show is mostly set twenty years after a mass pandemic. An out-of-control fungal infection has transformed all it touches into (essentially) zombies, crippling society and leaving the survivors to fend for themselves in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

The Last of Us Season 1 followed Joel, a cynical smuggler who lost his daughter in the early hours of the pandemic, as he shepherded 14-year-old Ellie across the country to Salt Lake City. Ellie’s mother was bitten on the cusp of delivering her child, rendering the girl immune to the fungus. When Joel realizes that his mission is to deliver Ellie to her death — a doctor will use Ellie’s body to create a cure for everyone — he makes an impossible decision. He murders everyone holding Ellie, including the unarmed doctor, and lies about what happened to the girl he’s adopted as his own.

The Last of Us Season 2 mostly takes place five years after this. A now 19-year-old Ellie has been raised in the relative comfort of a community headed up by Joel’s sister-in-law Maria (Rutina Wesley) in Jackson, Wyoming. She’s been taught to fight and hunt. She’s got friends in Jesse (Young Mazino) and Dina (Isabel Merced). Oh, and Ellie fully hates Joel now for some mysterious reason.

Against this backdrop, we’re introduced to a quintet of new characters, headed up by Kaitlyn Dever’s Abby. As it happens, the doctor that Joel killed was Abby’s father. Now, she and her pals are gunning for this horrible killer named Joel. The Last of Us Season 2 isn’t a zombie story at all, but a classic revenge plot.

Maybe this is just me, but there’s something deeply frustrating about watching a cast of characters manage survival against all odds only to turn on each other for the basest, darkest human urges. Namely, vengeance. For some, I’m sure this makes The Last of Us compelling television. The real monster was humanity all along, or something. As good as Pascal, Ramsey, and Dever are, there’s a lack of specificity to their three characters that raised a wall between me and them. It was almost as if their characters weren’t characters, but — oh, I don’t know — archetypes designed for gamers to project themselves onto while hunting zombies.

On the flip side, I found myself utterly charmed by the supporting cast. Gabriel Luna’s Tommy gets to step into leading man duties thanks to a number of tense plot developments. Young Mazino continues his steady climb to stardom playing Jesse, Jackson’s de facto leader-in-waiting. Finally, the real supernova of The Last of Us Season 2 is Isabel Merced’s effervescent Dina. As Ellie’s best friend/crush, Dina offers light, levity, and hidden layers of trauma to a show that otherwise likes to wear its broken heart on its plaid fleece sleeve. Every scene Dina is in crackles with energy that feels both infectious and real.

In fact, if I had to recommend The Last of Us Season 2 for any specific reason, it would be to watch Isabel Merced in a stunner of a breakthrough performance. Sure, there’s incredible action sequences and tons of narrative twists built for water cooler chatter, but Dina is why you want to watch this show. Merced has stood out for years in various projects, but The Last of Us Season 2 will likely be the thing that properly anoints her as a star.

The Last of Us Season 2 is a mixed bag, full of gorgeous craftsmanship, from riveting turns from celebrity guest stars to carefully-concocted faux fungus. However, it ultimately feels a bit unsure of its own reason for being. If there’s a moral beyond the measly, “Hey, maybe we should be nicer to each other,” I’m still on the search for it.