The moment we have all been waiting for all of us gamers has finally arrived! The Last of Us premiered on Sunday on HBO/HBO Max in a groundbreaking premiere episode. By far one of the best game adaptations of the hit PlayStation game “The Last of Us”, the show scored the second-biggest debut in the last 13 years, behind only “House of the Dragon for HBO.
The show takes place 20 years after modern civilization has been destroyed. Joel, a hardened survivor, is hired to smuggle Ellie, a 14-year-old girl, out of an oppressive quarantine zone. What starts as a small job soon becomes a brutal and heartbreaking journey as they both must traverse the U.S. and depend on each other for survival.
Spoilers below… stop reading if you haven’t seen the episode.
It starts off in a chilling flashback scene with scientists explaining the inevitable. Talking about pandemics with viruses and bringing things too close to home. Here however it is fungus that could infect humans. It it at this moment in silence after this is said, where we realize calamity is imminent, and that there’s nothing we can do to stop it.
The Beginning, Outbreak Day
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Now we move into the real source material. Time jumping into 2003, where we are introduced to Joel (Pedro Pascal) and his daughter Sarah (Nico Parker). If you played the game then you know this is outbreak day and what is to come. However, apart from the game itself, the show adds more layers to these characters by filling in what the game didn’t. There is more depth and emotion we can feel conveyed in these scenes. The most chilling part was when we see the old lady, who resides next door begin to move her mouth in a strange way while earlier she was seen completely incapacitated in a wheel chair. While this is all going Sarah is in front of her picking up a movie for her father on his birthday. It is at this moment, that underlines what is to come for Sarah.
This is when the dread starts to set in and we begin to see how everything starts to fall apart. Taken straight from the game, we start to see one by one everyone start to get infected. As we all know how bad this can get with our very own COVID pandemic, it starts to feel more and more real that this is happening. We are then put in a first person POV (like the game) showing us all the chaos surrounding Joel, Tommy (Gabriel Luna) and Sarah while they are driving through the city to escape. Although nothing can prepare us for the death of Sarah. The utter heartbreak and devastation that Pascal portrayed brought all of us to tears.
Living In A Post-Apocalyptic World
Courtesy of HBO/HBO Max
Now we jump to 20 years later, 2023. Here we see Joel, looking completely worn down and gray haired. A man that has completely given up on life. We also see the utter destruction that this devastating fungal pandemic has caused wiping out most of humanity. Gone are the days of freedom, enter in Quarantine Zones, curfews and the military (FEDRA) taking over at check in locations. PTSD kick in yet? In Hunger Games fashion, food supply is very low and are called rations which is a fixed amount. Money is no longer used and jobs are assigned by the military.
However, a slight change was made apart from the game. Instead of Joel looking for ammo and pills, here is a looking for a car battery to find his brother Tommy. This is where he and Tess (Anna Torv) meet Ellie (Bella Ramsey), a foul mouthed spunky teenager who was kidnapped by the Fireflies. The Fireflies were a revolutionary militia group featured as an antagonistic faction. Here Marlene who is the leader for this faction tasks Joel and Tess to take the girl to remaining Fireflies outside the city. Them not knowing how incredibly important she is to all this. The episode ends off with them escaping the city to deliver Ellie to the remaining Fireflies.
What can we expect the rest of the season?
Courtesy of HBO/HBO Max
HBO has given us a trailer of what is to come for the rest of the season. We see Joel and Ellie facing off against all the horrors of this post-apocalyptic world. It includes a bunch of spoilers for what’s ahead, so if you don’t want to see, please skip. It even gives us a first look at what the cordyceps will look it. Cordyceps are humans that were invaded by the fungus who uses them as host’s. They connect to our brain and create us to behave aggressively by spreading the fungus through a bite.
Below please find the trailer for what’s in the store the rest of the season courtesy of HBO/HBO Max
Cast includes Pedro Pascal as Joel, Bella Ramsey as Ellie, Gabriel Luna as Tommy, Anna Torv as Tess, Nico Parker as Sarah, Murray Bartlett as Frank, Nick Offerman as Bill, Melanie Lynskey as Kathleen, Storm Reid as Riley, Merle Dandridge as Marlene, Jeffrey Pierce as Perry, Lamar Johnson as Henry, Keivonn Woodard as Sam, Graham Greene as Marlon, and Elaine Miles as Florence. Ashley Johnson and Troy Baker also star in the series.
Courtesy of HBO/HBO Max
Brace yourselves because we are going to be in for quite a ride. New episodes of HBO’s The Last of Us will be airing on Sunday at 9:00 PM EST, running up to the Season 1 finale on March 12, 2023.
