Pedro Pascal became an international star as Joel Miller and returns to the role in Season 2 of HBO-MAX’s post-apocalyptic hit series “The Last of Us.” Now the pressure is on to sustain the momentum.

“There’s something really exciting about basically giving everyone another season of a show that everyone loved and that everyone has worked so hard on,” Pascal, 50, said in a virtual press conference.

S2 begins five years later. New to the series is Kaitlyn Deaver, an Emmy nominee for the “Dopesick” miniseries.  In “Last” her character Abby Anderson, a notable figure in the video game, is on a mission to avenge her father’s death by killing Miller.

“I’ve been a huge fan for a very long time,” Deaver said. “The world of ‘The Last of Us’ is so large. But I felt less nervous once I got onto set, just because of this wonderful group of people.”

“I was grateful to be back,” Pascal allowed. “Yet at the same time, this experience, more than any other I’ve had, is hard for me to separate what the characters are going through and how it makes me feel in a way that isn’t very healthy: I feel their pain.”

Is that because this futuristic, post-apocalyptic terrain seems not so much an escape but a view of what’s happening?

“Storytelling is cathartic in so many ways, it always has been. It’s the way that human beings have made testimony to life. Whether it was handprints on the walls inside of a cave to a television show that you can stream on MAX starting April 13.

“So, for me growing up, all of my development is based on books I’ve read, movies I’ve seen and television that I’ve watched. So, it’s very much going to reflect the human experience.

“Under such extreme circumstances, there’s a very healthy (and sometimes sick) pleasure in that kind of catharsis. To be in a safe space and see human relationships under crisis and in pain. To intelligently draw political allegory, societal allegory based off of the world that we’re living in — and doing it very beautifully and very intelligently.”

Born into Chilean aristocracy, Pascal acted for decades before stardom loomed, beginning with a key role in “Game of Thrones” and continuing with the Disney+ science fiction series “The Mandalorian” and “Last.”

“How is it being famous?  I’m not sure,” he said. “This job definitely created a new chapter in my life in a profound way. That it should be received in a way that is in measure with how deeply important it means to all of us is a rare thing.

“It will,” he said with a laugh, “never happen again.”

“The Last of Us” S2 streams on HBO/MAX Sunday

Ezra Agbonkhese and Pedro Pascal in a scene from “The Last of Us.” (Photo by Liane Hentscher/HBO)