Warning: The following article will spoil several plot developments of the original game. Read at your own risk.
In a teaser highlighting several pieces of upcoming content, HBO has released the first footage for their adaptation of Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us. It takes place in a world overrun with the Cordyceps brain infection, inspired by Ophiocordyceps unilateralis. As the infection takes hold, you gradually evolve into a more and more monstrous form. And if you die, you fuse to the area around you and release infectious spores, which you can see at the very end of the teaser.
Joel (Pedro Pascal) is a hardened survivor who ends up being put in charge of transporting Ellie (Bella Ramsey), a teen girl whose immune to the infection and may be the key to creating a vaccine. In the original game, Joel and Ellie were played by Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson, who’ll appear in the show in roles that have not yet been disclosed.
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Ramsey previously stated that the show while the show would be respectful and follow the emotional beats of the game, it would still explore different avenues. That’s shown right away as the first footage we see is of Joel and Ellie traveling in a snow-covered environment. Ellie was on her own for most of the winter portion of the game due to Joel being injured.
Some of the scenes that fans will recognize from the game have also been altered slightly. For instance, in the game, Joel shows Ellie how to use a handgun that’s a little more her size. In the game that takes place in the open while in the trailer, the two seemed to be hiding from something in a building with newspapers plastered over the windows.
Endure and Survive
The trailer also provides us with our first look at Nico Parker as Sarah, Joel’s daughter, originally played by Hana Hayes. While blonde in the game, she’s a brunette in the show. The footage depicts her being carried in Joel’s arms with a large fire in the background. If the show follows the game’s events, that will occur at the very start during the prologue, right before Sarah gets killed.
Not only do we get to see Sarah, but we also get to see Nick Offerman as Bill, who W. Earl Brown played in the game. Bill was a survivalist who littered Lincoln, Massachusetts with boobytraps and doesn’t get along very well with people, especially strangers. In the game, Joel and Ellie go to Bill to get a car for their journey. You can see Ramsey as Ellie playing with a car’s rearview mirror in the trailer, with Pascal in the driver’s seat.
The trailer also includes part of a re-enactment of one of the game’s most emotional moments. Joel tells Ellie she doesn’t know what loss is, while Ellie says everyone she’s cared for has died or left her. The trailer is edited in a way that makes it seem like the exchange happens the opposite way in the show than it occurs in the game, though.
The footage also depicts Ellie looking at her trusty switchblade, which she uses instead of having to make shivs like Joel. She’s also shown running away from something in the dark and shooting at it, which could be at the infected, military, hunters, cannibals, or a new enemy that wasn’t in the original game.
The show’s first episode is expected to be released in early 2023. The original game was released in 2013 for the PlayStation 3, while a remastered version of the game for the PS4 was released in 2014. There’ll also be an upcoming remake for the PS5, retitled The Last of Us Part I, which will be released on September 2nd of this year.
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