An excellent adaptation of a video game classic

Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey in The Last of Us HBO TV series

Quickly becoming one of HBO's biggest shows

The Last of Us, is a new Amerian post-apocalyptic drama HBO TV series presentation that premiered on January 15, 2023 on HBO Max in the USA. It is based on the 2013 PlayStation video game of the same name, created by Naughty Dog Inc. which is owned by Sony's PlayStation Studios. Since its pilot episode (just over 80 mins runtime) was aired in season 1, it has seen a lot of positive reviews from fans and critics alike. Especially those who have played the game over the years and are avid followers. 

Critics say the adaptation is one of the best and most faithful that has been made for television in regard to a video game thus far. It sets a new precedent for the adaptation formula. The fact that big internet sites like "The Guardian, "The New York Times, "IGN", Washington Post", The Hollywood Reporter and "Collider" to name some, have all reported favorably on the show to date,  attests to its wide positive reception. Craig Mazin created the screenplay for television and the story for the game was written by Neil Druckmann (Co-president at Naughty Dog Inc.) both of whom work together to bring this amazing piece of story telling  to TV.

The series stars Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey in the lead roles as the characters Joel and Ellie respectively. Just like in the video game, Joel is a survivor who lives after the world went to ruins from a zombie-creating fungi pandemic that wiped out most of the living creatures and destroyed the world. He is unwillingly tasked with getting a young 14year old girl across America from Boston to Wyoming, supposedly to bring about a secret cure to the infection. 

Both actors do a excellent job at portraying these characters by giving them depth and a sense of authenticity with regard to the games. The show doesn't divert much form the major plot points at all but when it does a bit it thrillingly increases the depth of the story for the better according to many critics. A case in point is episode 3 starring Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett which is almost like a standalone episode done in a flashback style and deviates from the game's main story significantly with Bill's and Frank's (Offerman and Barlett respectively) story.

There is a quite a story to tell in The Last of Us

With the First season coming to a close in about 2 weeks and news that it has already been renewed for a season 2, viewers are anxious to see how the story will unfold and how the actors will grow into the characters even more than they have done with the bonding we saw during the majority of the first season so far. The renewal was announced by HBO officially on January 27. The entire of the first season is anticipated to cover the whole story of first game from 2013 with Season 2 starting to develop on part 2 of the game released by Naughty Dog Inc, In 2020. Meantime we can enjoy season 1 which continues to air on HBO at 9/8pm central time, with episodes also being streamed on HBO Max.