Why The Last Of Us Won't Be The Zombie Show You're Expecting

The Last of Us may seem like a spiritual sequel to The Walking Dead or another zombie TV show, but it's much more than that.

HBO's TV adaptation of The Last of Us video games may include zombies, but it's not just another zombie show. For those unfamiliar with the series, it might be easy to think of The Last of Us as an attempt to jump on the zombie bandwagon at a time when the main The Walking Dead series is over and spinoffs are starting. Just as The Walking Dead was adapted from a graphic novel, The Last of Us is also adapted from a video game (which spawned their own graphic novel), so there may be some similarities.

Set 20 years after the start of the zombie apocalypse, The Last of Us follows a smuggler Joel (Pedro Pascal) as he transports a precious cargo across the ruins of America. That cargo is Ellie (Bella Ramsay), whom Joel distances emotionally. Their journey takes them through areas filled with deadly zombies and arguably more dangerous hordes of humans, and they must fight for their lives at every turn.

The Last Of Us Isn't Really About Zombies, But People

While HBO's The Last of Us has many of the characteristics of other zombie TV shows, that's not really what the story is about. first last of us video game Joel, Joel's brother (Tommy) and Joel's daughter (Sarah) try to escape the initial outbreak and the government's quarantine attempts. The trailer (along with Sarah's casting) revealed that HBO's The Last of Us will include a harrowing scene in which Sarah is shot dead by the military as she tries to escape.

While zombies play an important role in The Last of Us, the central story is that Joel never quite gets over the loss of his daughter. The relationship he develops with Ellie is a really central part of the story. This is followed by Joel's distrust of organizations and government structures due to his daughter's death and the events he witnessed. The fact that zombies form the backdrop to The Last of Us is almost an accident of the story, and will make HBO's The Last of Us adaptation more important than just another zombie TV show.

The Last Of Us Knows It Isn't A Zombie Show

While the trailers and trailers may first make it seem like it's a zombie show, at its core, The Last of Us knows it's not really a zombie series. one of the biggest signs Both games and TV shows avoid the word zombie. The "zombies" in The Last of Us are technically called Cordyceps, and are often shortened to "Infected". These creatures are humans infected with the Cordyceps fungus, which attacks the brains and causes them to mutate over time.

The original The Last of Us game pinned its hopes on healing, which did include a greater focus on zombie traps in the story. However, even if that was accidental, the follow-up games proved it all the more. The Last of Us: Part Two looks at the impact of the first game on humanity and questions how far anger and revenge can take people. The zombies/infected in The Last of Us are a constant threat to humanity, but they're not the focus of the story, and the show won't just be another zombie TV show.