if you accept it as fact Last of Usis a 2013 PlayStation 3 video game from a studio called Naughty Dog and is an amazing achievement in digital storytelling. There have been all sorts of achievements, and that HBO adaptation is the long-awaited form of proof. Here’s a live-action version of Cormac’s McCarthy with a joystick, the most admired story in video games on the network that defines “prestige TV” in the minds of many viewers. Time Folds Into Itself: In 2013, the game is lightheartedly compared to the HBO series. In 2023, the ironic refrain will come true, and animated performers will give way to live performers who recreate programmed movements with dizzying realism. The content singularity looms, but it’s actually pretty entertaining.
Last of Us Joel (Pedro Pascal) is a mutated version of the world cordyceps A fungus that turns people into ferocious zombie-like creatures. This is a truly unsettling twist on the traditional zombie. the actual group of parasitic fungi that infect insects And imagine what would happen if it pounced on a human. However, much like the most successful zombie apocalypse stories in recent memory, the walking dead, Last of Us Less concerned with the characteristic monsters, more concerned with what will happen to humanity after the collapse of society.
Last of UsThe investigation into post-apocalyptic America begins when Joel gets a job he didn’t want and didn’t ask for: Ellie (Bella Ramsey), a profane teenager and a national vigilante. is smuggling into a hideout run by Firefly. The militia opposed what remained of the federal government.For reasons no one knows or understands, Ellie is immune cordyceps Infectious, and Fireflies, led by practical Marlene (Mar Dandridge, one of the only actors from a video game to reprise their role), want Ellie to be the key to curing the world. .
![Ellie and Tess squat face to face in the grass past a dilapidated building as the light shines in from above in the HBO series The Last of Us.](https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/vDyTzG1_sQyF7eywzOh74YWwKQk=/0x0:1920x1280/1200x0/filters:focal(0x0:1920x1280):no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/24347960/Bella_Ramsey__Anna_Torv___Liane_Hentscher_HBO.jpg)
Photo: Leanne Hencher/HBO
This familiar dynamic is Last of UsA grumpy older man must protect a courageous young girl, and over time their relationship turns from resentment to gratitude. As worn in the store, Pascal and Ramsey are very good together on screen.Pascal’s Joel is more ghostly than grumpy, and Ramsey brings a mean edge to Ellie, and in video games. It goes far beyond its role as a conduit for fatherly emotions that started.
yes, Last of Us It’s a video game adaptation and probably the most faithful ever committed to the screen. and 5) strictly following the blueprint laid out by the game, with entire scenes and dialogue lines being lifted verbatim. It’s the digital acting made flesh again. , where Joel shows viewers what other people’s lives are like.Ellie has not passed.
These moments are easily the best Last of Us As they are, it should be provided. (The show’s best episode is his hour devoted almost entirely to off-screen relationships that are barely hinted at in video games.) It describes the people who fill this faithfully recreated world. That’s it. Last of Us Keep calm and you can be a good TV show. But showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann (who also co-directed the original game) are in a hurry to move on and get to the next adapted set piece, provided by the story’s new medium. Keep passing characters eager to fill the space.
![Marlene and Kim, two injured fireflies in a dimly lit hallway facing the camera in the HBO series The Last of Us](https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/0PYkXaO-13ZaSnN-gSBCcXtNttc=/0x0:1920x1080/1200x0/filters:focal(0x0:1920x1080):no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/24347971/Merle_Dandridge__Natasha_Mumba___Courtesy_of_HBO.jpg)
Photo: Leanne Hencher/HBO
What’s frustrating about this is that it’s due to the addition of the HBO series to the story Last of Us Ten years after video games made waves for prestige TV aesthetic reception, it still feels worth it in 2023. Last of Usas recreated in the series, is as dark as you’d expect — a series of encounters in which Joel and Ellie meet someone else, revealing they have heartbreaking stories or terrifying secrets. and they meet a horrifying end before our hero heads.
But by taking time to think about the inhabitants of the world Joel and Ellie travel through, Last of Us assert itself, as opposed to other It could be compared to a big cultural touchstone.not like the walking dead, takes seriously the idea of community in a post-apocalyptic setting. In fact, community is the ultimate goal of survival. Last of Us, Joel and Ellie continually see how others live under the strict regime of FEDRA, the closest thing to the federal government. Alone with your loved one. In the socialist camp, things are slowly moving towards normality. In a religious cult that offers solace from fear.
Last of Us The exploration of these ideas isn’t rigorous—the show, like its source material, has fairly clear views on how to live “right” in a community—but what makes the series more hopeful Enough for… most of my post-apocalyptic fiction companions. How much of that hope is felt depends on the lens the viewer brings to the show.This is because queer/BIPOC characters are routinely violently killed off (in debacles that are inexplicably similar to the source material). Last of Us Beyond novelty as a video game adaptation. By itself, he’s one of dozens of zombie-filled wastelands that viewers can stream from the US and abroad. It’s hard to say why anyone would choose this one if they could choose their own apocalypse.
secret to Last of UsIts success as a video game didn’t always lie in its originality. Zombie he was already old hat in 2013. the walking dead With popularity peaking among non-gamers, game publishers happily flooded the market with violent titles that involved hordes of surviving zombies and zombie-like creatures. Last of UsThe trick is to bring humanity back to a media that is often intent on putting it on the back burner, making players feel grounded in the characters they played and feel guilty for the violence they committed against those they didn’t. In context, it transcended its conventional narrative to become a milestone for an entire industry. That TV adaptation arrives in such a baggage-free medium. Last of Us Live or die like most art: In the way it is human and in the way it is not.
Last of Us Premieres on HBO and HBO Max on Sunday, January 15th.