The Last of Us

Enter the post-apocalyptic world of — The Last of Us, where the Cordyceps brain infection reigns supreme with terrifying mutations by creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann.

The Last of Us series is an adaptation of the game itself – “The Last of Us” which was produced by gaming company Naughty Dog in 2013, and is also responsible for the beloved game, Uncharted which had its movie adaptation in 2022 featuring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg.

After a global pandemic that sees the destruction of civilization as a whole, a hardened survivor ‘Joel’ takes charge of a 14-year-old girl named ‘Ellie’ with the thought that she may be humanity’s last hope.

As an adaptation to a game, there will be obvious changes to accommodate those that have not played the game whilst yet still trying to stay true to the story that we as gamers all fell in love with.

With the nitty-gritty details out of the way, let’s dive into the world of The Last of Us and venture into whether it’s worth watching.

As a fellow gamer that’s played and finished the game itself, I have to applaud the direction in which the series decides to take, where the journey of Joel played by Pedro Pascal, and Ellie by Bella Ramsey is more personal to him, only deciding to help smuggle Ellie to rescue his brother Tommy. Unlike in the game where it was more about getting more guns.

One thing that’s made pretty certain in the first episode is that of the character of Joel, the man is not your typical knight in shining armor that’s there to rescue everyone, no, in fact, it’s shown time and time again that as a former black market smuggler, Joel is willing to do anything and everything to achieve his target. There is no line Joel has not crossed to survive, which is the status quo of this post-apocalyptic life.

However, it’s not true to say that Joel has always been this way. As before the infection took over, we’re shown that he once was a caring brother to Tommy played by Gabriel Luna, and a loving father to his late daughter Sarah played by Nico Parker who unfortunately died during their desperate attempt to get away from the chaos when all hell broke loss.

There’s a clear distinction in the series that highlights the hopelessness of this world. You can’t trust anybody, and everyone is looking out only for themselves.

Nothing is easy to come by even something to eat is scarce to find, so we have people pretending to be pastors yet behind closed doors those same people are pedophiles preying upon orphans like it’s their god given right and hiding the sickening truth that behind each meal is someone’s sibling, spouse and even parent. As if the world itself isn’t hard enough as it is, you have cannibals in sheep’s clothing.

Without a doubt, I had my reservations regarding Bella Ramsey playing the role of Ellie and whether she could pull it off, but she quickly changed my mind within the second episode.

Ellie with her curious and charismatic character is a light that this world needs at a time like this, it’s this childish manner filled with the desire to know more about the world before the pandemic that brings Tess and Joel into a new light, Ellie gives them hope both literally and figuratively. In one sense her blood could save the world but in another, her desire to save others in need is what inevitably saves Joel.

Throughout the entire season, I could find no fault with the production team even though there might be, but it was when I first heard the sound of the clickers that I was reminded of the countless number of deaths I went through when playing the game and their appearance in episode two sent chills down my spine like the feeling you get right before leaping a bungee jump.

Every episode in a way addresses a major character that we either assist or kill during the play-through of the game but the series goes a tad bit further giving us more content and definition into the characters, the best moments for this would be Bill and Frank, Henry and Sam, and lastly David.

I digress from mentioning anything regarding the final episode as I feel that I would end up spoiling an incredible finale to The Last of Us but those that played the game should be happy with the conclusion for sticking true to the source material.

In simple words, The Last of Us dives deep into the post-apocalyptic, and the psychological changes humans are willing to take in the name of survival. Every person finds their reason to continue living in this heart-rending world.

I give The Last of Us 4.7 out of 5 rating.

Whether it’s good or bad doesn’t matter, the name of the game is survival, no matter what.

Let me know in the comments section below whether you watched The Last of Us and what your thoughts about the adaptation are. Did you enjoy it or did you hope for more?

Thank you for reading another review from, LSR.

Until next time, stay blessed.