HBO’s The Last of Us – Best TV Show This Year?
HBO’s titular series has had a strong start, but can it continue to impress? Join Joel and Ellie in an exciting new adventure starring Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey.
The time is upon us, the first episode from HBO’s The Last of Us is out in the aether and everyone should have had the opportunity at this point to watch it and to digest what happened.
Much of what inspired the original game seems apparent here, with the TV series being adapted by the game’s creator, Neil Druckmann with aid from the showrunner of Chernobyl, Craig Mazin.
At least from episode one, it’s a positive step in the right direction in bucking the trend of terrible video game adaptions into movies and TV. Albeit, The Last of Us is probably closer to what you might experience on the big screen anyway – it was already a cinematic experience, so it’s easy to accept the transition from game to TV.
Those unfamiliar with the games will find enough here without needing to know anything beforehand. The Last of Us is an experience not unlike other “end of days” movies like 12 Monkeys in that respect and is quite accessible for new viewers to sit down and watch without worry.
Pedro Pascal returns to our screens as Joel – one of our main protaganists, who is also joined by another Game of Thrones allumni, Bella Ramsey – who stars as Ellie.
So far the casting choices have proved fruitful – with many on-screen dynamics working quite well (not feeling forced to any degree), which goes a long way to draw in the viewer as The Last of Us is a very character driven story. The focus here, is very much on character development: something we know Druckmann does extremely well across both Part 1 and Part 2 of the games.
In a morally grey time, navigating complex interactions and justifications for their their actions is going to be a difficult task for the writers over the course of this 9 episode series but we’re excited to see whether or not we’re going to be getting a scene for scene play out from the game – or if we’ll be getting some unexpected surprises or changes.
No matter which direction the show steers, it seems (at least for now) that it’s in capable hands and has had an incredibly strong start.
Have you watched it yet? What did you think of the first episode? Let us know in the comments below!
