The Last of Us

Y’all know that zombies are my favorite monster because they’re so versatile and a great blank slate for the social commentary that is the real purpose of the story. Don’t ever forget, it’s not about the zombies in zombie fiction. Over the years people have tinkered with the nature of zombies, largely beginning with 28 Days Later, where the dangerous monsters deviated by not actually being reanimated dead, but infected crazies. (Yes, I know, but what about George Romero’s Crazies in 1973. No one had heard of that till the 2010 remake, which was good but still not a big hit.) The Last of Us began as a very popular computer game, so now there is another layer on top of the whole infected but not really zombies effect. For me, that was two reasons to not bother seeing it. I had never played the game, though I had heard of it, and I’m not a big fan of super fast not-zombies. But then a funny thing happened. I watched an episode well into season two and discovered how good it is simply as a story and well done television. It’s not the first time that has happened to me, having not watched Xena Warrior Princess until well into the second season and getting hooked.

This review is about the series, not the game since I’ve never played. The story is simple on the surface. A terrible fungal infection called cordyceps invades human brains and creates the horrifying condition of super fast quasi humans who spread the infection through bites. Once bitten, there is no hope for a cure. You get bit, you’re dead, or at least not human. We’re introduced in the first episode to the main character, at least for a while, as he and his brother and his beloved daughter try to escape the insanity of a large Texas town where the military is shooting and bombing indiscriminately out of ignorance and panic. There is a large time jump of about twenty years and the story takes up again with Joel (Pedro Pascal – Game of Thrones, The Mandalorian) living a life of drudgery in a FEDRA controlled Boston. Citizens are now basically indentured servants to the remnants of governmental forces that have created quarantine zones, QZ, where they “protect” citizens from the still ravaging infected outside the walls. But Joel is a smuggler on the side, used to going outside to forage, and he is tapped by the resistance movement, the Fireflies, to transport precious cargo across the country. The cargo is a fourteen year old girl with a big secret. Ellie (Bella Ramsey – Game of Thrones) has just discovered she’s the only person in the world immune to a bite, so the Fireflies hope to find a cure through her. The road across the country to their hospital is perilous, and Joel is cold and distant.

Cordyceps is a real fungus, by the way. Find a youtube about it sometime and be prepared to be horrified.  I like this mechanism for creating monsters than the standard mysterious something, or a prion based infection. It’s more insidious, for one thing, and observably horrifying as it stands today in the real world. Again, without knowing anything about the game, I am most impressed with how well the team making this show portray relationships between people and leavening that with kick butt action sequences. The world is complicated, deeply layered and realistically portrayed as flawed even though some people mean well. The showrunners, Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann are obviously passionate about the project and have created something special. Druckmann is the person behind the game, but the two have collaborated closely. Mazin is my favorite showrunner since John Rogers for the show Leverage, because both of them tapped their passion for the project to create something special. I could watch both of them talk all day about their projects.

The show can be really frustrating to watch sometimes, because as Mazin has said, they really want to show beauty and love in the world for these characters we love, and always follow it shortly with something horrifying. It’s realistic, considering the state of apocalypse, and wrenches a viewer’s heart repeatedly. There is also a high quality of set decoration, cinematography, stunts, music, costuming. They do all the things really well. Because the showrunners are both game creators and game lovers, there is crossover of some of the voice actors, who shared a large amount of character development, making Joel and Ellie’s characters even deeper and more sympathetic. Best of all, the acting from everyone is exemplary. Oddly enough, this has exacerbated a huge problem with the show.

The problem is the fans. The Last of Us has rabid fans, of the game and the series. The game is very involved, with lots of extensive cut scenes – theatrical asides from gameplay designed to deepen the story and character development – that the showrunners have worked hard to recreate in the series. Fans are passionate about The Last of Us, which normally is a good thing. Game players are deeply involved in the characters they have come to love, and fans of the show are the same. Now that I’ve seen the show I totally get the passion because it’s a beautifully crafted thing from people who are also passionate about the story and characters. But a tv show will never be one hundred percent the same as the original format, just as a series or movie can never be the same as the original book. It can’t be because there are a lot of different aspects that can’t be entirely recreated in the real world. Not a few of the gamer fans have been horrible in their condemnation of the show because it’s not the same, or they feel it’s vastly inferior to the game. My investigation into the online world after watching season one and part of season two has been eye opening to just how cruel and awful and unfair these commenters can be. A lot of them have gone to online spaces to drive down approval ratings as well. It’s a mess and it’s terribly frustrating to read.

Even worse is how they’ve treated the main actress, Bella Ramsey. I’ve never seen such hatred spewed at a gifted young woman. I won’t go into specifics because even mentioning it could be triggering. Ramsey is young, only eleven years old when they portrayed Lyanna Mormont on Game of Thrones and is now only twenty one years old. They discovered they’re on the spectrum from a series crewmember in season one, and has a touch of dwarfism which makes them both rather short and with unusual facial features for an actress. An amazing number of “fans” have been saying amazingly cruel things about their looks especially, and about their acting as well. They were nominated for an Emmy for season one, and now that I’ve seen the show I understand why. Ramsey is a gifted actress who believably portrays a small woman being violently heroic and massively traumatized by the dangerously apocalyptic world they inhabit. The “fans” chant “we want Pedro” (Pascal) and hate the amount of screen time Ellie gets, and they have lost their minds over something else. Ellie is queer. She’s not the only queer character in the show, and the “fans” scream a lot about how disgusting that is. But I don’t fully understand their hysteria, because Ellie is queer in the game. One of the first season episodes does a deep dive into the relationship between two men, and is widely viewed as possibly the best tv episode ever made. If my ugly crying at the end of that episode is any indication, people are right. But not the “fans”, who have gone insane over that queer story. It’s not so much about the constant hate, though that is terrible, but how deeply cruel and loud it is online. I was shocked by it, and I only touched the surface.

Another thing the “fans” cry about it comparing The Last of Us with The Walking Dead. Of course there will be that sort of thing going on because both stories are about what happens after a zombie (or pseudo zombie) apocalypse. I noticed right away that the biggest difference is clothing. Characters in The Walking Dead all shop at Apocalypse ‘R Us, or GrimThreads Boutique. All color completely disappears and everyone wears only muted greys and browns. I’ve hated that so much. In The Last of Us, people will wear clothes with actual color and I love that so much because if you’re scrounging for clothes where do you even find nothing but grey and brown? Another easy comparison between the shows is the violence. Instead of trying to shock and disgust viewers with over the top gore and cruel violence, this show uses the violence to frighten the viewer and enhance the characters’ story. It’s more about storytelling here rather than hitting a viewer over the head and trying to hurt them. I prefer this show in that respect as well.

The show is not perfect, of course, and falls into apocalypse traps. For instance, how in the world have people survived for twenty years by scrounging for cans of food? Didn’t we learn a lesson during the pandemic? (*cough*toiletpaper*cough*) Things disappear quickly and won’t magically reappear without being manufactured, or farmed. Another apocalypse trap is a never ending supply of ammunition. Guns are everywhere in America, we all know that, but how can people still be rattling off a hundred rounds in a firefight twenty years later? It’s an annoying disconnect for someone like me.

Overall, I have to say I have fallen in love with this show and will follow it as long as it lasts. Because streaming services have no staying power, I won’t be surprised if it ends well before the story finds a completion point. But I’ll take what I can get and buy the disks when they’re available. This series is beautifully acted, beautifully crafted by a team of dedicated creators, and is well worth the time to dive into. Watch this if you like a good story well told. Don’t read comments online, though, unless you are made of tougher stuff than me.

Triggers: violence, horror images, online commentary The Last of Us

Available on: Max (HB0)

LINKS

• The Last of Us – Official HBO Site
• The Last of Us – IMDB
• The Last of Us – Wikipedia

CFR: In Addition

I have heard about this game and this show for many years. I am so glad that it is doing well and that it is made well. I will never be able to watch it as I can’t handle post-apocalypse world stories. However I salute that this show is GOOD and shows humanity. I am so glad it has postivie relationships of all kinds. Plus I adore Pedro Pascal. What a mighty good man.

So I will also add that toxic fans who love to fan their hatred by spewing forth nonsense on the Internet are so disappointing. They are ruining a lot of Star Wars, and have no clue about Star Trek. It is sad that they think more Pedro is the answer when Pedro is very proud of his trans sister and totally supports his co-star Bella Ramsey. Hey, take a page out of Pedro’s book and support all differences. It’s sexy. Like Pedro.

Keep enjoying The Last of Us everyone! I’m so glad you like it dearest, Cranky. Enjoy it for me as well.