In the game, The Last of Us, players enjoy a vivid world infested by a zombie outbreak of a mutant fungus. Naughty Dog amazed the whole gaming community with their 2 games.
But now, since HBO is about to release a whole series around the games, fans are curious about what to expect.
Since it will be adapted from the game, it is already confirmed that we’ll not miss what we observed in the game. Moreover, we will get to see more exciting plot scenes.
So, what can we expect from the upcoming television series adaptation of Last of us?
Casters gaining foreground status
We expect no less from HBO as they have been choosing the most suitable actors and actresses to play prominent roles in the series for quite a few years.
Main
Ellie is decided to play by Bella Ramsey, a 14-year-old teenager. She is often demonstrated as resisting and has anger issues but desires kinship secretly. Unlike other humans, she is immune to the fungus infection and might be the key to its cure.
Her character is displayed as a lesbian in the series and she even came up with amusing news during production. She stated, “the show feels like the biggest thing I have ever done.” This hints to us that she enjoyed the film and gave her best.
As a result, we can hope for better performance from her. During the process of acting, she was encouraged not to play the game even though she wanted. The producers didn’t want her to replicate the original performance.
Thus, she watched a few gameplays on Youtube to get a sense of it.
Joel will be played by Pedro Pascal, who suffered from drastic tragedy in the past and is tasked to save the girl from the apocalypse. Pascal was in his leisure after the release of the second season of The Mandalorian, and during that time, he was offered from various networks, among which he chose The Last of Us.
This led him to become one of the highest-paid actors in the American television series earning thousands of dollars per episode he played.
Both of these prominent characters are experienced in acting. However, it’s up to them how effectively they will perform their role in this series.
Others
Following Joel and Ellie, Tommy, Marlene, and Tess are the other recurring characters in the game.
Gabriel Luna plays the role of Tommy, the younger brother of Joel. He is also a soldier who shared his belief and developed his idealism, hoping for the betterment of the world.
Luna was asked to submit a tape for the audition after a month of casting for Pedro and Ramsey because he had close ties with executive producers Carolyn Strauss and Craig Mazin. Moreover, he also worked with HBO on True Detective.
Soon after he submitted the tape, he was contacted by Craig Mazin, co-creator Neil Duckman, and Strauss, as they believed that he was the only one to fulfill that role. Luna helped himself with the research of the game by playing The Last of Us on PS 5 provided to him.
Marlene, the head of fireflies will be played by Merle Dandridge, Tess will be played by Anna Torv, Sarah will be played by Nico Parker, and the role of other characters will be played by multiple successful characters.
The game is massively popular all around the globe, and, undoubtedly, the film will surely advance its fame since it already has a base. So, if the casters played their role effectively, it is sure that they would gain remarkable appreciation.
Change in the story
We know that the movie will be related to the game as it is adapted from it. But it tickles most of us if there will be any changes or not, as we know both movies and games are totally different things.
The major change we’ll observe is the difference in the timeline. The series from HBO is decided to be set in 2023, and the day of the outbreak is 20 years earlier than that i.e., 2003, whereas the game world takes place in 2033, and the day of the outbreak is in 2013.
The sum of the zombies would apparently decrease but don’t worry, there’ll still be a lot of them. The character of Sam will possibly be deaf because the actor who played his role is also deaf. However, this won’t affect the entertainment of the show.
Moreover, it will create an unexpected pinch of dramatic taste in the show and acknowledge that even people with certain disabilities can cope with those harsh situations.
Of course, there will be similar locations and scenes like games, but some of them will be changed. However, we get to observe a lot of other scenes that will suit us better in live-action.
Even Mazin exhibited that the movie series is adapted to fill out the remaining portions and expand. Their ultimate purpose is to advance, not deplete.
This means that we’ll not miss out on what we already witnessed in the game. In fact, we’ll get the more surprising turn of events. In a particular interview, Druckmann also stated a certain scenario is added which will leave all of the viewers jaw-dropped.
What’s more fascinating is that Druckmann noted that the most unpredicted moments are added to give the movie an Uncharted flavor. There is a possibility that people might love to watch the adaptation of the film rather than play the original game.
But this doesn’t mean that movie will be different from anime; it’ll be. As they are planning to add more amusing scenes in the movies, slight changes will be seen.
Has the production of the Last of Us already begun?
The Last of Us is assumed to be the greatest television in production in Canada with an estimated revenue of over CA$ 200milllion for Alberta. The Canadian presidential artist also stated that the budget of each episode of the series will exceed more than CA$10 million.
The premier of Albert and Jason Kenney was also told that the budget might cross over CA $200 million in a year. The production of this series needs five different directors and more than 100 technicians.
Rose Lam, Neil Drukmann, Craig Mazin, Evan Wells, Carter Swan, Asad Qizilbash, and Carolyn Strauss serve as the executive producers of the movie. The locations where the production takes place are Canada and Alberta.
The production companies involved in this movie are Sony Pictures Television, Playstations Productions, The Mighty Mint, Word games, and Naughty Dog.
It is already confirmed that the Last of Us has already started its filming. It began on July 12, 2021, in Calgary, Alberta. The filmmakers took that whole year to produce different episodes as planned.
Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the production team managed to complete numerous episodes that included some sequences of the game. It is also confirmed that the production team succeeded in producing around 7 episodes in the time duration of a year.
According to our research, it is stated that the production ended on early June 11, 2022. However, we strictly don’t know how many episodes were produced till that period. It is also officially confirmed that the series will debut in January 2023.
