Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
HBO's The Last of Us adaptation is a pretty good TV show, all told. With the recent release of season 2, I want to use this video essay to talk about why I think 2013's game tells a far better story. No spoilers for season 2, but season 1 (and 2013's game) will be discussed in full.
Support the show on Patreon - patreon.com/writingongames
Podcast - http://anchor.fm/writingongamescast
Second Channel - youtube.com/channel/UC1xxfS_HILi09yaELQdmV1A
---
2013's The Last of Us remains one of my favourite stories in games, and one that seems ripe for adaptation, given that Joel and Ellie's journey is largely cinematic in nature.
When I reached the end of season one's adaptation, then, I found myself thinking I'd had a good time, but also wondered why this needed to exist. It's not a problem of faithfulness to the source material—as evidenced in episode 3, the show is often transcendent when it abandons the game's plot and becomes its own thing. Instead, it was actually those moments where the show rigidly stuck to the game's events that the gulf in storytelling prowess between the show and game made itself apparent—the show filling in the blanks of a story that were absolutely better left blank, and missing what made the game so magic in the process. It all led me to conclude that were it to come to it, I'd recommend newcomers check out an abridged YouTube playthrough of all things, rather than the show itself.
In this critique/analysis of HBO's The Last of Us, then, let's talk about why the show, despite being mostly very enjoyable, left me feeling pretty empty once the final credits rolled.
0:00 - Intro
0:20 - The Last of Us left me conflicted
5:04 - The Success
9:14 - The Failure
17:10 - "But more people can experience it!"
19:12 - Outro
---
Thumbnail by @hotcyder
Animated text intro by Isaac Holland - twitter.com/drazgames
#thelastofus #hbothelastofus
HBO's The Last of Us adaptation is a pretty good TV show, all told. With the recent release of season 2, I want to use this video essay to talk about why I think 2013's game tells a far better story. No spoilers for season 2, but season 1 (and 2013's game) will be discussed in full.
Support the show on Patreon - patreon.com/writingongames
Podcast - http://anchor.fm/writingongamescast
Second Channel - youtube.com/channel/UC1xxfS_HILi09yaELQdmV1A
---
2013's The Last of Us remains one of my favourite stories in games, and one that seems ripe for adaptation, given that Joel and Ellie's journey is largely cinematic in nature.
When I reached the end of season one's adaptation, then, I found myself thinking I'd had a good time, but also wondered why this needed to exist. It's not a problem of faithfulness to the source material—as evidenced in episode 3, the show is often transcendent when it abandons the game's plot and becomes its own thing. Instead, it was actually those moments where the show rigidly stuck to the game's events that the gulf in storytelling prowess between the show and game made itself apparent—the show filling in the blanks of a story that were absolutely better left blank, and missing what made the game so magic in the process. It all led me to conclude that were it to come to it, I'd recommend newcomers check out an abridged YouTube playthrough of all things, rather than the show itself.
In this critique/analysis of HBO's The Last of Us, then, let's talk about why the show, despite being mostly very enjoyable, left me feeling pretty empty once the final credits rolled.
0:00 - Intro
0:20 - The Last of Us left me conflicted
5:04 - The Success
9:14 - The Failure
17:10 - "But more people can experience it!"
19:12 - Outro
---
Thumbnail by @hotcyder
Animated text intro by Isaac Holland - twitter.com/drazgames
#thelastofus #hbothelastofus
