Let The Last of Us TV Show Be Different From the Games

ign.com:

Warning: This piece contains full spoilers for The Last of Us and The Last of Us Part II.

The Last of Us is part of an ongoing craze of faithful video game adaptations with roots traceable all the way back to the original Silent Hill film. However, adapting a game like The Last of Us Part II is a bit different from adapting its predecessor, not just because it has a more complicated, fractured narrative, but also because it’s a (phenomenal) game with much more dramatic meat to explore, both in terms of sheer length and in the thornier dimensions it mines from its characters. To make a show that stands up to its inspiration, it most likely will have to make some major deviations from the source material. While diehard fans may cry foul, it might be the only way this adaptation can feel as vital as the game does.

It’s something co-showrunner Neil Druckmann, who is also creative director of The Last of Us games, agrees on. Talking to Variety about the adaptation process, he noted that a common mistake is “staying so close to the source material that is built and designed and written for this other medium that has strengths and weaknesses, and trying to translate it as is, with no changes to this other medium that has different strengths and weaknesses.” Looking at the newly released first trailer for Season 2, we can already see the first signs of how Druckmann and his creative partner Craig Mazin may have altered the original story to suit the television medium.

Season II.

The HBO Original Series #TheLastOfUs returns in 2025 on Max. #TLOUDay pic.twitter.com/Wdzk759JIg

With so many artistic mediums bleeding into each other these days, it can sometimes be hard to remember that video games and television are two very different things. Every medium for telling stories has pros and cons that are virtually inseparable from the form. The narrative techniques that make perfect sense in interactive fiction in regards to scene geography, atmosphere, environmental design, and use