It may have taken nearly ten years since the video games’ release, but finally we get to see The Last of Us on the TV screen (which in our opinion is a much better choice than trying to condense a 14 hour+ game into a 2/3-hour movie).
Potentially the biggest struggle co-creator of the game Neil Druckmann would find when developing this adaption would be to strike the fine balance of allowing the story of TLOU to truly breathe and deliver all of its storytelling nuances, whilst taking us on a hard-hitting emotional ride. Thankfully for Druckmann, long time TLOU admirer and creator of the highly acclaimed five-part miniseries Chernobyl Craig Mazin was willing to take on the challenge to do so.
Set in 2003, we meet carpenter Joel (Pedro Pascal) and his daughter Sarah (Nico Parker) put against a backdrop of a looming apocalypse. What the show does brilliantly in comparison to the game is set the scene of the build to the looming threat cast upon them; an outbreak of a cordyceps fungus virus that takes over its hosts’ brains, turning them into cannibalistic creatures. Without stepping into too much spoiler territory, there’s a 20-year time jump following the outbreak, showing the devastating destruction left in its wake and what effect it’s had on our key characters.
