The Last of Us Episode 1: How to Perfectly Adapt a Video Game

On Sunday night (16), one of the most anticipated moments for video game fans finally happened: the premiere of the TV adaptation of The Last of Us from HBO. In an hour-and-twenty-minute first episode, the fascinating world that gripped PlayStation gamers a decade ago is brought to a new medium, with Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey performing superbly in the roles of Joel e Ellie.

Check out the impressions of showmetech about the first episode of the following adaptation:

Warning: Spoilers ahead for the first episode of The Last of Us!

Was The Last of Us Born for TV?

The adaptation of The Last of Us faithfully follows the game, although in this first episode it was already possible to see a certain expansion of key moments of the narrative, especially in the opening act: Sarah (Nico Parker), the daughter of Joel (Pedro Pascal), who dies in the opening moments of the game, gains greater prominence here, with much of her last day alive gaining the spotlight – she taking Joel’s watch to fix it, waiting for the object to be ready and even delivering it to your father.

These actions, however, are not new: they are all mentioned in the game, but in general what really happens originally is that we are introduced to Sarah e Joel already close to the chaos of the fungus apocalypse, while here we have a little more time to get to know them as normal, not desperate people. It's an interesting decision that makes the impact of seeing Sarah's death at the conclusion of the prologue, and also Joel's transformation into a very different person 20 years in the future, that much bigger.

What I found most interesting about all of this, however, is the fact that from the moment the series started showing the same moments from the game's prologue, practically everything, from the photography choices to the dialogues, seems to have been replicated. 1:1 – only with a spectacular fluidity that seems to show that The Last of Us already had characteristics for this medium.

In fact, it made me wonder if the series might not be a lot more effective for storytelling, since although I have given 10 to The Last of Us: Part 1 due to its technical excellence, I still believe that its gameplay ends up harming a good story, since it ends up being a little too commonplace for the infamous “action games” that exist in droves in the AAA industry. In the HBO adaptation, just watching the narrative flow, my feeling is that it's being elevated – but that's a statement I'll wait for the conclusion of the series to confirm, becoming much more of a daydream at this point than anything else.

Anyway, the prologue with Sarah takes up about a third of the first episode, with the remainder already taking place at the times when the bulk of the narrative takes place – with Joel e Tess (Anna Torv) trying to get a car battery to check if Tommy (Gabriel Luna), the protagonist's brother, okay, they end up in direct conflict with the Fireflies, a group of rebels directly opposed to the US federal response to the apocalyptic pandemic that serves as the backdrop for the series. 

During this confrontation, Joel e Tess end up finding Marlene (Merle Dandridge, who is also the voice of the character in the video game), who, injured in another confrontation, begs them both to take young Ellie to Massachusetts, offering varied supplements in exchange – it is worth noting that, even appearing more towards the final third of the episode, Beautiful Ramsey already shows that her Ellie is amazing, with the combative and at the same time jovial personality of the video game version being perfectly replicated, in an engaging way and that awakens the same initial feeling I had in the game – disgust for the boring teenager that, initially, she presents itself.

the big hook

Being an episodic series rather than a video game that we can sit back and play for as long as we can, my big question was where the cuts for episodic purposes would take place in order to engage the audience to return next Sunday. In this first episode, in my opinion, the choice was perfect, with the chapter ending with the revelation that Ellie is infected with the virus that caused the great pandemic of The Last of Us, but for some reason is asymptomatic.

The moment is perfect to engage the viewer and lead him to theorize what might be the character's secret and the true intention of the characters. Fireflies in wanting to get her out of Boston – while also serving as a possible generator of conflict between Joel, Tess e Ellie. It's a little sad to already know everything that happens, as I feel that some of the impact of this revelation has been lost on me, but those are the challenges of adapting, aren't they? She also needs to keep those who have followed the original engaged – and at least in this first episode, she managed it masterfully.

A superb first episode

I stayed up all night trying to find something I didn't like about the first episode of the adaptation of The Last of Us – an effort, in the end, futile, which only served me to be functioning this Monday through massive doses of caffeine. THE HBO did an amazing job of translating the game universe to TV, and I think I can now really love that narrative without the hindrances that the AAA video game industry caused with video game titles. PlayStation.

sincerely, the HBO has been getting it right for years with its series (well, apart from the end of War of Thrones, but that's another story), and seeing that this absurd artistic touch was also put to good use for The Last of Us could be the big turning point for video game adaptations – which, you see, haven't been bad for a few years now, with the two movies of Sonic being extremely fun and the animation of Super Mario scheduled to come out this year looking interesting but that hadn't yet had a series live action well done.

In any case, regardless of its long-term impact, what matters is that right now we have a series that made a brilliant debut and which, if maintained at the same level, promises to be one of the year's highlights.

corner of speculation

Every week, I'll put in some bullet points some thoughts on the future of the adaptation, thinking about what might happen in the next episodes and what might differ from video games. In this first chapter, these are the points I raised:

• Could the series be preparing some kind of flashback com Marlene and the mother of Ellie? Just like in the game, the leader of the Fireflies from Boston cites having been a friend of the young protagonist’s mother – and considering the expansion we had to Sarah, who knows the same doesn't happen to her?
• Riley is also quoted, and we already know that it will be interpreted by Storm reid. Could it be that one of my dreams that, unfortunately, did not come to pass in The Last of Us Part 1 for PS5, will occur in the adaptation of HBO, with the narrative of the DLC Left Behind being fitted as a flashback in a future episode? I sincerely hope so, as he is an integral part of understanding Ellie, and to this day I am still bummed that change was not made in the remaster about the game. 

The Last of Us will have new episodes every Sunday, airing on the channel HBO and also on the streaming service HBOMax.

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The Last of Us is one of HBO Max's releases in January 2023