Minor spoilers for episode 3 in the final paragraph.
When video games are adapted into TV shows or films the results are usually, if I’m being generous, mixed. There are the odd commercial successes—such as the recent Sonic the Hedgehog films—but more often than not audiences are left disappointed. For fans of video games, the negative reputation such adaptations possess can feel like a kick in the teeth. Many gamers, myself included, would argue that storytelling is often at its finest in the world of video games. However, this can feel like a difficult position to hold when so many adaptations prove to be a symbol of mediocrity. Worse still are those adaptations that make gamers question whether or not those behind the camera ever played the video game in the first place. Look no further than Super Mario Bros. (1993)—watch it at your own peril.
It was with great relief, then, that I sat down to watch the first episode of The Last of Us earlier this year and discovered that it was not only a good adaptation, but one of the best pieces of TV I’d seen in a while. Seriously, having this and Happy Valley to look forward to every week in January had me worried that 2023 has peaked far too early. But what exactly is The Last of Us, and why is it so great?
The Last of Us is the story of Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey), a reluctant pair who have to navigate their way through a zombified wasteland in the hope of finding a cure for the infection—a cure to which Ellie is the key. It’s a simple, familiar premise, but has interesting enough characters to feel entirely fresh. Credit for the adaptation must first of all go to the writers. The decision to actually have the writer of the game, Neil Druckmann, co-write the show alongside Craig Mazin, writer of the critically-acclaimed TV drama Chernobyl, was genius. The former knows exactly why The Last of Us succeeded as a video game and so can ensure the heart of that story makes it to the screen unharmed. The latter understands the landscape of TV and how to make a TV drama that remains compelling and entertaining for viewers. Together they have created a show which appeals to ordinary TV audiences whilst also keeping fans of the game on board.
Rather than alienating fans by cobbling together a mess that barely resembles the video game—still looking at you, Super Mario Bros.—Druckmann and Mazin have enhanced it by introducing new scenes that allow for increased character development and worldbuilding. In the video game, players can explore and find items that reveal snippets about the world, but a TV show doesn’t work that way. Instead we are treated to flashbacks set before the apocalypse, elongated scenes between the series leads and stunning recreations of in-game sequences, all of which are supported by Gustavo Santaolalla’s haunting score. This satisfies fans’ desire to see beloved in-game moments on-screen, whilst also preventing us from losing interest in a story we have already experienced in a different medium.
There is also pleasure in knowing how the story will unfold when discussing it with non-gamer friends. I received regular text-updates from one of my friends as she progressed through the feature-length series opener. As the tension built, her texts got progressively more frantic. We get to experience the whole story again through the eyes of others, awaiting their reaction to the scary, the sad and the satisfying with anxious anticipation.
Casting superb series leads is also essential to making an adaptation like this work and The Last of Us definitely delivered on this front. Pedro Pascal, the Mandalorian himself, takes on the role of Joel, capturing his world-weary spirit perfectly. Complementing his performance is Bella Ramsey—best known for playing Lyanna Mormont, the most intimidating 10-year-old I have ever seen, in Game of Thrones—who manages to lighten the bleakness of the apocalypse with her comedic flair as Ellie.
Perhaps the most impressive thing about the show is the way its reception seemed to just get more positive as the episodes came out each week. It is rare for any show, let alone a video game adaptation, to become a darling of both critics and general audiences alike, yet this is what The Last of Us has achieved. Not only does it have both a critical and audience score hovering around 90% on Rotten Tomatoes—which, while I maintain that review aggregator sites should not influence your decision to watch a film or TV show too heavily, is impressive nonetheless—it also drew in HBO’s second-largest number of viewers since 2010, only behind House of the Dragon. By the time of the finale, viewing figures had actually increased by 74% from the series opener, remarkable for a show on a weekly release schedule in the age of streaming binges.
To close this article, I want to zoom in on one episode in particular which wholly convinced me that this is the best post-apocalyptic story of recent years—episode three, my favourite of the series. When discussing the second episode with a friend, we both agreed that living just wouldn’t be worth it in a zombie-infested hellscape. Then came episode three to prove us both wrong. The majority of this episode is essentially a vignette which can easily be understood in isolation from the rest of the show. It centres around the side characters of Bill (Nick Offerman) and Frank (Murray Bartlett), two guys who stumble across each other in the early days of the apocalypse. We see them get to know each other, fall in love and spend their lives staying happily in a guarded homestead the initially distrustful Bill set up prior to the outbreak. In just over an hour, the writers force the audience to acknowledge that even in the darkest of times, living is still worthwhile if it means a few more precious moments with those you love the most. In a genre where it often seems like survival is a fate worse than death, Druckmann and Mazin beautifully sketch why this is not the case. If nine episodes of dystopian fiction feels too harrowing to sit through, just give this one a try. For this episode alone, The Last of Us is a must-watch.