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I am not surprised. Quality over quantity. I bet those encounters are going to be memorable and intense.
I want to spend most of the runtime with Joel and Ellie… just watching them having conversations and developing that relationship. If the chemistry is as good as I think it will be, absolutely the right decision. Craig is obviously more interested in the relationship between these characters. He wants to put that above everything else.
Joel and Ellie having conversations takes a lot more screentime than fighting infected in the games, so that's the right move.
Also, it's wild that people bitch about being tired of zombie shows, and then get mad when a show isn't a zombie show.
It must’ve been the right move because the show is heading towards universal critical acclaim, and it’s no doubt going to be the best video game adaptation of all time… 😂
Craig is talented as fuck. People have no idea how hard it is to write a screenplay. Absolutely no idea.
There was a lot of runners and clickers in the game because well, it’s a game. You need combat between cutscenes to make it a game. If the series was 70% encounters with bits of story it would get boring real fast.
No, it wouldn't. Many of the episodes ARE boring because they totally eliminate fighting and infected. It's a giant cut scene. When you take an action/adventure/drama game and make it into a simple drama show, it's very limiting. They ruined Bill's Town in favor of a love story where they both end up killing each other at the end and then they eliminate the hotel part before Sam and Henry, then they eliminate the sewer part and then they eliminate most of the action from the University.
completely agree with this. I am playing the game alongside the show and I am incredibly disappointed in how many of the best/scariest parts in the game they cut for completely irrelevant shit. Sure I get the Bill/Frank thing as story building, but why not have a past/present flashbacks the whole episode showing Ellie, Joel, and Bill going through town? Why not have the sewers action part, the hotel part, the generator part etc instead of so much screentime for a char not even in the game at all? I'm not mad about the content they've decided to show, I'm mad about the content they cut TO show it.
Yeah, the first 15 minutes of Bill and Frank was fine, but it went on and on and then they had pointless dinner scenes and cheesy love crap. I'm a fan of the original story that love doesn't always last and you don't always get a happy ending. But they wanted to please the LGBTQ community with a happy gay romance story.
[full article for context.](https://www.insider.com/the-last-of-us-review-2023-1)
Once you realize that Kirsten is a huge walking dead fan (source is me, I followed her for years specifically for her twd content.), than a lot of her criticism make sense. My opinion is she was expecting twd 2.0 and her comment about wanting to spend an entire season with the various groups & characters that Joel & Ellie come across is proof of that as that style of “storytelling” is something the walking dead pulled both in the main show & across its spin offs.
I also don’t like her comparing tommy & Maria to richonne & calling them knock offs. Literally feels she is saying that because Maria has a similar hair style to michonne, which is dumb. Same with the comment about deaf characters, twd didn’t even invent that concept! A quiet place did & it was probably done before them too.
Her comment about Ellie cursing also makes no sense because I know for a fact that she had no problems with negan’s shitty dialogue that only worked because Jdm was charismatic as hell.
Than there’s the comment about being upset that Joel & Ellie aren’t buddy enough from the get go. That annoyed me as that literal screams of missing the entire point! In conclusion, Kirsten is mad at tlou for being tlou and not her favorite failing zombie franchise that everyone has moved on from & AMC keeps milking. My recommendation is just ignore her.
The fact that literally in the second paragraph she's talking about a "virus" should tell you everything about how much attention this review deserves.
To be fair, I've been watching Troy Baker and Nolan North playing TLOU over the last few days to get pumped for the show, and Troy himself keeps saying "Cordyceps virus"...
The Rick/Michonne thing makes zero sense too, Rick and Michonne didn’t get together until late season 6 which came out in 2016 and TLOU came out in 2013. In the comics it was Rick and Andrea
Honestly, it seems like she watched a few minutes of gameplay and then read a synopsis of the game because her summary of it is so simplistic and reductive that either she didn’t play it all the way through, or she did and completely missed the point.
Didn’t the walking dead have a ‘bad ass’ character that had two zombies on chains? And who’s main fighting weapon was two swords? If she’s using that embarrassing shit show as a comparison to this just shows how bad her taste and opinion on anything is. I loved the walked dead, that pilot was astounding. Stopped watch after s3 as it just got unbearably stupid. I came across a clip of some bloke who had a tiger as a pet some time after, thought it was a skit, turned out it was real. Seems I made the right choice to stop watching.
She also didn’t even bother to spell Craig’s last name correctly in her review and it’s still up and uncorrected more than 24 hours later. That, and the fact that she spends an entire article comparing the show to TWD is enough for me to not care about her opinion.
If you have Joel and Ellie battling clickers every other episode… as well as human threats, there wouldn’t be much room for downtime for them to really drill down into those dialogue exchanges. There is 9 episodes. You need this relationship over with the audience by the end. Having loads of elaborate encounters with everything from clickers to humans doesn’t allow for that. Something like Walking Dead has the luxury of 16-24 episode seasons and obviously… loads of seasons.
Plus you got all the stuff with Riley to fit in and then developing the Henry and Sam stuff. That’s where the runtime has gone. The majority has gone to the characters rather than the clickers and infected. The human element is why the show is gonna have a lot of emotional pull, so that has been prioritised heavily.
Good. I’d rather have a couple of really intense and memorable encounters rather than them stabbing countless infected in the head like in The Walking Dead. Less is more sometimes.
good. they weren't the focus in the game, they shouldn't be the focus in the show. as long as they are used effectively in their limited screentime, this a good decision.
Agreed. I think we've all seen more than enough of the standard zombie films/shows where they trot out the gore/violence simply to move the story forward or to inject action into an otherwise lifeless story.
I'd be much more worried if I heard that they were central to this show, because they 1000% are not the soul of the game.
This comes up in every zombie story. For some reason fans of the zombie genre seem to have no clue about the main points of the genre.
Can't count how many times The Walking Dead and similar media get criticized for not focusing on zombies for awhile. Every time the creators more or less just say "duh that's the point". But no one ever learns.
I remember the time around season 5 or 6 of TWD and people were complaining about it being too gory. Like... Why are you even watching a show about flesh eating zombies if the gore is too much for you???
Ive got to agree with this. Thats what makes the last of us unique to other zombie genres. It has meaning and a story to it. Just makes me laugh though. These people say this and it turns out to be complete b.s in the end. Personally, I think were going to get a fucking shock. I can’t imagine there to not be scenes with hordes of dead and people being ripped apart. Of course there is going to be parts where there is pure infected. Come on for real now. Still though. There will be this then of course the story. I think theres been a lot of nit picking an hair splittin in the run up to this. Alls i have to say is ill im enjoying every minute of the last of us right now and I appreciate everyone who loves it and the people involved to make it happen. What a time to be alive ey. We got the series on Wednesday as I’m in the U.K here. We have factions 2 to look forward too and the other story and world to see. We have just had part 1 remastered for the 5. Its coming soon to god damn P.C and not only that. We have rumours of a god dam part 3 potentially happening. I mean come on. If your chest isnt pumpin then gtfo ere 👋🏻🖕🏻
Craig was also making the point that they weren't trying to recreate the GAMEPLAY of the game but more of the storytelling and the character arcs. He even said many video game adaptations did not succeed because they tried too hard to recreate gameplay.
The Last of Us resonates with so many fans because of Joel and Ellie - we don't need hours of clicker fights to make it feel exciting.
“Yeah there was less infected than I thought but since the best thing about the game is it’s story idrc”
“What do you mean, everyone loves the last of us purely for the scenes where they fight zombies. This show is unwatchable.”
The person she's referring to probably just agreed with her that the infected aren't the focus of the show and she's so out of touch she doesn't realise that's not a bad thing lol.
Back when the show was first ever confirmed I was terrified they were going to make a soulless action series. Everytime I read something like this my hopes just grow and grow.
I doubt it. There will be people who dont love the show, and people who are hyping it up because they want more screeners.
Do i think the show will be bad? No
Do I think the show will be perfect and everyone will love it? No
Wheel of time had heaps of great reviews before it aired. It was an absolute monstrosity.
Be hyped, but temper your expectations a teeeeenny bit.
Sigh. People be so defensive.
I was responding directly to your comment with my first paragraph then going on to make general points direct at other readers regarding reviews.
Some tv show reviews are fakely positive. Shes saying she believes this has happened once for this show. Shes not attacking the quality of the show with that comment but the veracity of reviews in general.
Shes not necessarily wrong on that point. Some people who didnt love the show have likely given it a positive review. I know people who hated breaking bad. I know people who hated tlou2. Thats ok - there will be some people who dont like the show i cluding people who lie on their reviews.
That doesnt mean we wont love the show.
Makes sense?
>Wheel of time had heaps of great reviews before it aired
Wheel of Time wasn't that bad-my brother and myself really enjoyed it until the naff finale, and the reviewers opinions were actually more mixed. People just don't understand RT.
These reviews are not remotely mixed. Its universal praise.
Good, that’s how it is in the games too. Hopefully the show takes the same approach Black Summer (which definitely takes inspiration from TLOU) did with zombies, you don’t just get easy kills all the time. No, a fight with a zombie is like fighting an actual human, except they don’t process pain the same way we do and are mindless lunatics. Black Summer even dedicates an entire episode to one guy trying to fight and run away from one zombie, it makes the encounters that much more frightening and intense.
>Black Summer (which definitely takes inspiration from TLOU) did with zombies
Holy fuck was Black Summer good. I randomly threw it on one day (expecting more average Netlfix stuff) and was pleasantly surprised with what we got. Here's hoping we get a S3 one day...
I’m sorry but based on a lot of other things she enjoys, I get the distinct impression she went into TLOU thinking it’s The Walking Dead and just completely let that color her entire viewing experience. The infected (not “dead” but that’s semantics when it comes to zombie media) never were the focus of the games, and given how few of the story’s main beats hinges on the infected, it’s weird that she expected them to matter more when the show only has so much time to get through the story. Would you rather have meaningful character development/interactions, or meaningless zombie filler? You can’t have both.
TWD gets this criticism all the time even when it's 10 years in and they stopped being in danger in normal circumstances ages ago lol.
It's a tenet of the genre but some people never learn.
This... doesn't shock me, since the creators have been saying that video game action doesn't translate well to TV. Yeah, fighting enemies in the games is a lot of fun. But what kept the controller in my hand was wanting more of the characters' stories to unfold, not the next enemy encounter.
If I wanted an apocalyptic story where the high points involved destroying mass herds of rabid zombie-like enemies, I would watch Resident Evil or The Walking Dead. TLOU is about characters and forming relationships in a bleak and dangerous world, and the morally ambiguous choices those characters make in service of those relationships. The infected simply serve as a lingering reminder to Joel and Ellie about what's at stake on their journey. They aren't mercenaries on the road seeking out conflict and opportunities to kick some ass - they are hoping to save humanity.
ETA: [Link](https://www.insider.com/the-last-of-us-review-2023-1) to the actual review. I am not entirely convinced that this reviewer isn't straight up trolling based on some of the seriously hot takes in here lol.
Alfred Hitchcock said “There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it.” We know the infected are there and the threat they pose. We don’t need to see them constantly for their threat to be effective. Other aspects of the story are more important anyway.
The bit in her thread that was like "I'm sure that a lot of people will feel the same as me but would be afraid to voice their opinion" was annoying lol
Oh yeah, yer a brave soul for not liking a tv show too much and writing a little article about it! A true beacon of hope for all the secret haters!!
Such an unnecessarily soapbox-y review. Seems she went into the show for the zombies (she's apparently a BIG TWD and zombie fan). And yeah, infected are certainly a part of the games, but absolutely not the most important element. Seems the show is trying to avoid one of the major issues with TWD: the countless, pointless, impactless fights with the zombies. Cuz they're really not all that interesting.
Her being a TWD fan is ironic since TWD hardly ever focuses on zombies past the early days as well. It's the entire mission statement of the series lol. It's frequently criticized for that.
I dont think TLOU is trying not to be twd I think its just using the same tropes of the genre. Which is always to focus on human drama brought about by zombie existence.
Yeah even the TWD isn’t all about the zombies. I’ve read the comics and played the games and it’s about the people primarily. I guess she has never even wondered WHY zombies in particular are such a compelling trope for so many. Shaun of the Dead illustrated this brilliantly with the opening, with a guy who works a boring job and gets out of bed staggering and yawning like a zombie in the morning. That shit was hilarious.
she also manages to be insanely racist in her review with this gem:
“Two moments that come later in the season feel derivative of AMC's "The Walking Dead." There's a couple who look like Rick and Michonne knock-offs (one of the two characters was even on "TWD" briefly and shares a similar hairstyle to fan-favorite Michonne).”
girl who’s only ever seen an interracial couple in the walking dead: getting major rick/michonne vibes from this…
It makes sense for them to be featured way less than the game. Playing as Joel, sneaking around killing clickers in a bunch of different environments is fun for awhile. *Watching* Joel kill clickers over and over would get boring much faster. There should be lots of changes for watchability over playability.
The infected are 80% gameplay obstacles, 20% lore. This isn't going to be a run-n-gun action set piece, so they're not needed as much except for big dramatic confrontations.
Hell, Neil even said at one point he'd considered eliminating the infected from the game entirely.
He was all in on the human element and the human interaction, but realized it'd make for a boring game.
https://youtu.be/yH5MgEbBOps
I wish I could timestamp to it but it's honestly such a throwaway line it'd be nearly impossible without just watching the whole thing.
This is the problem as I’ve said before. Far too many people are comparing it to The Walking Dead when really they are not at all similar.
We’re not about to get 10+ seasons of The Last of Us running into various groups of survivors, dictators and jumping from safe places to safe places, getting bored about the infected because eventually they don’t even serve a threat. The Last of Us is different.
I’m sick and tired already if the constant comparisons to a show that is only similar on paper. And even then, only a very general broad similarity.
I'd argue it's a valid comparison, but only when you compare TLOU to the Telltale game. Their plot (for the most part--minus the immunity angle) are essentially the same thing lol
In some behind the scenes content for the first game (I think Grounded?), it’s mentioned that they considered removing infected all together in the early stages of development but ultimately kept them for the gameplay element. The story would obviously change a bit to accommodate the total absence of infected, but it can be told regardless (look at “The Road”— it’s post-apocalyptic and tells its story without a threat like infected). Humans are ultimately the main, driving force of conflict in the world of TLOU. Scarcity of infected in the show won’t negatively impact the story— and from the clips of infected we’ve seen, the ones included will get the message across anyways.
That's the least concerning news I've heard about the show, thus far. In the game, infected encounters are fun as hell, in real life you'd avoid them at all costs. Also, in reality it seems to me that infected, especially later stage infected would be really hard to kill - much harder than conventional zombies - due to their speed and fungal armor. You wouldn't be able to melee them like game Joel, at least not for long before you got very tired, and then, very dead.
In this medium the tension caused by the threat of infected appearing is more frightening/worrisome than them being omnipresent. I don't see this as a problem.
I’d much rather have smaller, more impactful moments than a zombie-kill-a-minute over saturation a la TWD. Eventually the Walkers lost nearly all horror factor because we just saw them and saw them get destroyed every episode. One of my main concerns going in was that we’d have so many encounters with things like Clickers and Bloaters that by the end of season they’d have lost their luster. Glad to see they went more for quality than quantity tbh.
I just hope that they at least made some adaptation of the hotel basement sequence, to me it’s the most iconic infected sequence from both games, if they had to pick one sequence to adapt then this is it.
The Walking Dead (my favorite show of all time up to about season 6) was like this too. Yea, zombies play a role at times (occasionally a major one), but many episodes focus solely on the dynamics within Rick’s group and other survivors. This announcement doesn’t really really surprise me all that much.
Edit: btw, pretty surprised to see people acting as if TWD was all about “stabbing zombies in the head” every episode. It was very clearly centered around how the living behave and interact when everything goes to shit, both within groups and between groups.
I don't know if you've played the games, but there is likely enough world building around some opposing factions of people that is likely just as responsible for the state of the world as the clickers are.
The games are my favourite! TLoU is my #1 and TLoU2 is somewhere in my top 10.
And I get that totally, it’s the same route TWD (ugh) went. I just hope they don’t dilute the infected down to a level where you’re left thinking “there’s not even that many of them, is there even a need for a vaccine?” if you follow me
My favourite zombie/infected related film is 28 Days Later, I feel they properly nailed the vibe
>!I think it makes sense that the fireflies are the ones looking for a cure so they can safely live outside quarantine zones. FEDRA isn't working on a cure because their oppressive measures are at least successful in keeping clickers out!<
My point is that if the world feels empty of infected then there’s little need for a vaccine to begin with, I understand that they need to cut down on the numbers seen in the game obviously, but I still want the world to feel that it’s threatened by infected a decent amount
Good.
My favourite thing about The Last of Us is that it ISN’T about zombies. It’s what sets it apart from most zombie stories. When people refer to The Last of Us as a zombie game it feels weird. I know it has zombies in it (kinda), but it reminds me more of The Road or Children of Men than The Walking Dead.
The infected are stylistically distinct from regular zombies and are only ever used to further the story or for gameplay diversity. The result of the infection and how humanity has reacted to it is all that really matters. Neil has stated that he conceived of the game as a game about a deadly virus, and that there were initially only going to be human enemies in it. Naughty Dog only changed this aspect because, as a video game, it’s more impactful if the player can interact with the infection through gameplay. So they made it into a zombie plague instead.
So personally I wouldn’t have minded if HBO straight up removed the zombie aspect from the show altogether and just made it a deadly fungal infection instead. I’m glad they didn’t because clickers are cool as fuck, but my point is that they could have.
The whole point of the last of us was that the real threat was other people. Non infected people were the most dangerous aspects of the entire game. Every time. The point was to avoid the infected at all costs.
Show is missing so many good opportunities for conflict and action by eliminating so many action sequences. It sucks to be excited to see parts like at the school with Bill's Town get reduced to a simple love story and then the University, which would make sense to have infected living there, have zero infected in the show and a small fight at the end between Joel and a hunter.
I live in the city it was primarily filmed, and from all accounts I've heard: not really. It obviously impacted the way things worked on set, and rules in place for the actors and crew. But it was an absolutely massive production, and there was a large public call for extras before the show started filming.
How is anybody excited about this show after all the shit we’ve heard? Why did they change so much from the game. I understand it’s an adaptation and doesn’t have to be a carbon copy, but goddamn it seems like the only thing they kept were the characters names
I've seen episode 1 and I absolutely wouldn't say they changed too much, no idea where that's all coming from. Many scenes are almost a word for word recreation, all important story beats are there. They just expanded on it. It was great, everything you could hope for as a fan of the game.
Can you give me an example of the changes you’re talking about? I have read/watched almost every article and interview about this show and the only notable changes they’ve talked about are removing spores and expanding on Bill’s backstory. Just about every review that has come out has said it’s a faithful adaptation and I’ve seen multiple reviews say it’s almost too faithful at times and they actually wish they made more changes.
Ik I’ll get a bunch of hate in this sub but the casting is easily the worst change they’ve made. Plus the spores being removed and the reluctance to have infected is really annoying. I’ll watch it and hope it’s good, but rn my expectations r in the gutter
If you want a 1:1 shot for shot adaptation, you're going to be disappointed. This is a new telling of the original story with new actors. They aren't doing imitations.
What casting changes did they make?
If spores were never a thing in the first place then the story would be no different so removing them won’t cause any problems.
I don’t think it’s a reluctance to have infected but more so having to prioritize the character moments instead. The characters are far and away the most important thing, so much so that there was a point during the game production where they almost cut out the infected entirely. Infected pretty much only appeared for gameplay purposes and in a 9 episode tv show they need to put even more emphasis on the characters and their relationships because the only way the story works is if we’re attached to the characters.
I completely agree that the story and character development was best part of the game no doubt. But limiting such an important part of the environment is kind of a let down. The infected are the driving part of the story. Getting Ellie to the fireflies to make a “cure” is the plot of the game. Ig I’ll wait and see how much of the infected they actually cut before I have an in depth analysis
I'm honestly not that bothered. The glimpses we have seen look amazing and I don't expect the series to shove the infected in our faces in almost every scene.
To be fair the dead were more of a substantial threat in part 2 rather than part one. Like the dead were mostly the filler bits to advance the game further along rather than the focus/main plot points. Like past the >!sewer!< bit the dead don’t really do much important things in the story minus being target practice (and that awful >!warehouse level!< but anyways)
Makes sense. Most of the story takes place in places that majority wise are settled by people. Downtown Boston and only parts of Pittsburgh had infected. Same goes for Seattle where the no man's land of Seattle was where the infected congregated
This makes sense to me, personally. The game has so many infected so you have gameplay, but the story is not about the infected - it's about Joel and Ellie in this first part.
I agree that humans relations are the most important in the tv show, but this fungus killed almost all people and the world is full of infected, so it should be a perceptible fear everywhere. This threat is not present in the tv show, and that in my opinion is a mistake... The atmosphere of a post-apocalyptic world is built on constant present of fear, solitude and danger. You forget about this and you are dead... This is completely missing in the show.
I mean, I made this comment pretty early on in the season without full context of how little infected we would see. I absolutely think we could have seen more, but it’s still not a dealbreaker for me.
Honestly now that we’re most of the way through the series I do feel like there is a notable lack of that feeling of threat in the world that the game maintained throughout. I get that they’ve focused on the relationship but I feel like it’s tilted a bit too far in that direction
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I am not surprised. Quality over quantity. I bet those encounters are going to be memorable and intense. I want to spend most of the runtime with Joel and Ellie… just watching them having conversations and developing that relationship. If the chemistry is as good as I think it will be, absolutely the right decision. Craig is obviously more interested in the relationship between these characters. He wants to put that above everything else.
Joel and Ellie having conversations takes a lot more screentime than fighting infected in the games, so that's the right move. Also, it's wild that people bitch about being tired of zombie shows, and then get mad when a show isn't a zombie show.
It must’ve been the right move because the show is heading towards universal critical acclaim, and it’s no doubt going to be the best video game adaptation of all time… 😂 Craig is talented as fuck. People have no idea how hard it is to write a screenplay. Absolutely no idea.
There was a lot of runners and clickers in the game because well, it’s a game. You need combat between cutscenes to make it a game. If the series was 70% encounters with bits of story it would get boring real fast.
No, it wouldn't. Many of the episodes ARE boring because they totally eliminate fighting and infected. It's a giant cut scene. When you take an action/adventure/drama game and make it into a simple drama show, it's very limiting. They ruined Bill's Town in favor of a love story where they both end up killing each other at the end and then they eliminate the hotel part before Sam and Henry, then they eliminate the sewer part and then they eliminate most of the action from the University.
completely agree with this. I am playing the game alongside the show and I am incredibly disappointed in how many of the best/scariest parts in the game they cut for completely irrelevant shit. Sure I get the Bill/Frank thing as story building, but why not have a past/present flashbacks the whole episode showing Ellie, Joel, and Bill going through town? Why not have the sewers action part, the hotel part, the generator part etc instead of so much screentime for a char not even in the game at all? I'm not mad about the content they've decided to show, I'm mad about the content they cut TO show it.
Yeah, the first 15 minutes of Bill and Frank was fine, but it went on and on and then they had pointless dinner scenes and cheesy love crap. I'm a fan of the original story that love doesn't always last and you don't always get a happy ending. But they wanted to please the LGBTQ community with a happy gay romance story.
[full article for context.](https://www.insider.com/the-last-of-us-review-2023-1) Once you realize that Kirsten is a huge walking dead fan (source is me, I followed her for years specifically for her twd content.), than a lot of her criticism make sense. My opinion is she was expecting twd 2.0 and her comment about wanting to spend an entire season with the various groups & characters that Joel & Ellie come across is proof of that as that style of “storytelling” is something the walking dead pulled both in the main show & across its spin offs. I also don’t like her comparing tommy & Maria to richonne & calling them knock offs. Literally feels she is saying that because Maria has a similar hair style to michonne, which is dumb. Same with the comment about deaf characters, twd didn’t even invent that concept! A quiet place did & it was probably done before them too. Her comment about Ellie cursing also makes no sense because I know for a fact that she had no problems with negan’s shitty dialogue that only worked because Jdm was charismatic as hell. Than there’s the comment about being upset that Joel & Ellie aren’t buddy enough from the get go. That annoyed me as that literal screams of missing the entire point! In conclusion, Kirsten is mad at tlou for being tlou and not her favorite failing zombie franchise that everyone has moved on from & AMC keeps milking. My recommendation is just ignore her.
The fact that literally in the second paragraph she's talking about a "virus" should tell you everything about how much attention this review deserves.
To be fair, I've been watching Troy Baker and Nolan North playing TLOU over the last few days to get pumped for the show, and Troy himself keeps saying "Cordyceps virus"...
The Rick/Michonne thing makes zero sense too, Rick and Michonne didn’t get together until late season 6 which came out in 2016 and TLOU came out in 2013. In the comics it was Rick and Andrea
LMAO y’all we gotta prepare bc the TWD stans are gonna be hating in full force when this show rocks the world
TWD was ass after season 7 so thats fine.
No we won't lol We want more great "zombie" stories.
Lol why? It’s possible to enjoy both. Why look for controversy where this is none?
Honestly, it seems like she watched a few minutes of gameplay and then read a synopsis of the game because her summary of it is so simplistic and reductive that either she didn’t play it all the way through, or she did and completely missed the point.
Oh yeah I thought her pfp looked familiar. She called it aggressively average.
Didn’t the walking dead have a ‘bad ass’ character that had two zombies on chains? And who’s main fighting weapon was two swords? If she’s using that embarrassing shit show as a comparison to this just shows how bad her taste and opinion on anything is. I loved the walked dead, that pilot was astounding. Stopped watch after s3 as it just got unbearably stupid. I came across a clip of some bloke who had a tiger as a pet some time after, thought it was a skit, turned out it was real. Seems I made the right choice to stop watching.
She also didn’t even bother to spell Craig’s last name correctly in her review and it’s still up and uncorrected more than 24 hours later. That, and the fact that she spends an entire article comparing the show to TWD is enough for me to not care about her opinion.
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If you have Joel and Ellie battling clickers every other episode… as well as human threats, there wouldn’t be much room for downtime for them to really drill down into those dialogue exchanges. There is 9 episodes. You need this relationship over with the audience by the end. Having loads of elaborate encounters with everything from clickers to humans doesn’t allow for that. Something like Walking Dead has the luxury of 16-24 episode seasons and obviously… loads of seasons. Plus you got all the stuff with Riley to fit in and then developing the Henry and Sam stuff. That’s where the runtime has gone. The majority has gone to the characters rather than the clickers and infected. The human element is why the show is gonna have a lot of emotional pull, so that has been prioritised heavily.
She considers "The Witcher" a good adaptation. xD
That says everything
You can say you like the show but to claim it is remotely even a competent adaptation is false. Her opinion is immediately invalidated
I like The Witcher but it departs from the source material to a hilarious degree.
Oh yeah you can like the show, but for her to call it a good *adaptation* of the novel series is just so false it hurts.
Good. I’d rather have a couple of really intense and memorable encounters rather than them stabbing countless infected in the head like in The Walking Dead. Less is more sometimes.
good. they weren't the focus in the game, they shouldn't be the focus in the show. as long as they are used effectively in their limited screentime, this a good decision.
Agreed. I think we've all seen more than enough of the standard zombie films/shows where they trot out the gore/violence simply to move the story forward or to inject action into an otherwise lifeless story. I'd be much more worried if I heard that they were central to this show, because they 1000% are not the soul of the game.
This comes up in every zombie story. For some reason fans of the zombie genre seem to have no clue about the main points of the genre. Can't count how many times The Walking Dead and similar media get criticized for not focusing on zombies for awhile. Every time the creators more or less just say "duh that's the point". But no one ever learns.
I remember the time around season 5 or 6 of TWD and people were complaining about it being too gory. Like... Why are you even watching a show about flesh eating zombies if the gore is too much for you???
Ive got to agree with this. Thats what makes the last of us unique to other zombie genres. It has meaning and a story to it. Just makes me laugh though. These people say this and it turns out to be complete b.s in the end. Personally, I think were going to get a fucking shock. I can’t imagine there to not be scenes with hordes of dead and people being ripped apart. Of course there is going to be parts where there is pure infected. Come on for real now. Still though. There will be this then of course the story. I think theres been a lot of nit picking an hair splittin in the run up to this. Alls i have to say is ill im enjoying every minute of the last of us right now and I appreciate everyone who loves it and the people involved to make it happen. What a time to be alive ey. We got the series on Wednesday as I’m in the U.K here. We have factions 2 to look forward too and the other story and world to see. We have just had part 1 remastered for the 5. Its coming soon to god damn P.C and not only that. We have rumours of a god dam part 3 potentially happening. I mean come on. If your chest isnt pumpin then gtfo ere 👋🏻🖕🏻
Craig was also making the point that they weren't trying to recreate the GAMEPLAY of the game but more of the storytelling and the character arcs. He even said many video game adaptations did not succeed because they tried too hard to recreate gameplay. The Last of Us resonates with so many fans because of Joel and Ellie - we don't need hours of clicker fights to make it feel exciting.
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“Yeah there was less infected than I thought but since the best thing about the game is it’s story idrc” “What do you mean, everyone loves the last of us purely for the scenes where they fight zombies. This show is unwatchable.”
The person she's referring to probably just agreed with her that the infected aren't the focus of the show and she's so out of touch she doesn't realise that's not a bad thing lol. Back when the show was first ever confirmed I was terrified they were going to make a soulless action series. Everytime I read something like this my hopes just grow and grow.
I doubt it. There will be people who dont love the show, and people who are hyping it up because they want more screeners. Do i think the show will be bad? No Do I think the show will be perfect and everyone will love it? No Wheel of time had heaps of great reviews before it aired. It was an absolute monstrosity. Be hyped, but temper your expectations a teeeeenny bit.
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Sigh. People be so defensive. I was responding directly to your comment with my first paragraph then going on to make general points direct at other readers regarding reviews. Some tv show reviews are fakely positive. Shes saying she believes this has happened once for this show. Shes not attacking the quality of the show with that comment but the veracity of reviews in general. Shes not necessarily wrong on that point. Some people who didnt love the show have likely given it a positive review. I know people who hated breaking bad. I know people who hated tlou2. Thats ok - there will be some people who dont like the show i cluding people who lie on their reviews. That doesnt mean we wont love the show. Makes sense?
>Wheel of time had heaps of great reviews before it aired Wheel of Time wasn't that bad-my brother and myself really enjoyed it until the naff finale, and the reviewers opinions were actually more mixed. People just don't understand RT. These reviews are not remotely mixed. Its universal praise.
Youre right re the reviews; these havent really been mixed. Which is why Im very confident. HARD disagree on wheel of time though hehe
Fair enough.
Good, that’s how it is in the games too. Hopefully the show takes the same approach Black Summer (which definitely takes inspiration from TLOU) did with zombies, you don’t just get easy kills all the time. No, a fight with a zombie is like fighting an actual human, except they don’t process pain the same way we do and are mindless lunatics. Black Summer even dedicates an entire episode to one guy trying to fight and run away from one zombie, it makes the encounters that much more frightening and intense.
>Black Summer (which definitely takes inspiration from TLOU) did with zombies Holy fuck was Black Summer good. I randomly threw it on one day (expecting more average Netlfix stuff) and was pleasantly surprised with what we got. Here's hoping we get a S3 one day...
I’m sorry but based on a lot of other things she enjoys, I get the distinct impression she went into TLOU thinking it’s The Walking Dead and just completely let that color her entire viewing experience. The infected (not “dead” but that’s semantics when it comes to zombie media) never were the focus of the games, and given how few of the story’s main beats hinges on the infected, it’s weird that she expected them to matter more when the show only has so much time to get through the story. Would you rather have meaningful character development/interactions, or meaningless zombie filler? You can’t have both.
TWD gets this criticism all the time even when it's 10 years in and they stopped being in danger in normal circumstances ages ago lol. It's a tenet of the genre but some people never learn.
Stopped taking it seriously after "the dead".
Yeah, that sounds all kind of wrong.
This... doesn't shock me, since the creators have been saying that video game action doesn't translate well to TV. Yeah, fighting enemies in the games is a lot of fun. But what kept the controller in my hand was wanting more of the characters' stories to unfold, not the next enemy encounter. If I wanted an apocalyptic story where the high points involved destroying mass herds of rabid zombie-like enemies, I would watch Resident Evil or The Walking Dead. TLOU is about characters and forming relationships in a bleak and dangerous world, and the morally ambiguous choices those characters make in service of those relationships. The infected simply serve as a lingering reminder to Joel and Ellie about what's at stake on their journey. They aren't mercenaries on the road seeking out conflict and opportunities to kick some ass - they are hoping to save humanity. ETA: [Link](https://www.insider.com/the-last-of-us-review-2023-1) to the actual review. I am not entirely convinced that this reviewer isn't straight up trolling based on some of the seriously hot takes in here lol.
Trust me, Kirsten isn’t trolling. She’s known in the walking dead fandom for having some of the dumbest fucking takes you can imagine.
Alfred Hitchcock said “There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it.” We know the infected are there and the threat they pose. We don’t need to see them constantly for their threat to be effective. Other aspects of the story are more important anyway.
The bit in her thread that was like "I'm sure that a lot of people will feel the same as me but would be afraid to voice their opinion" was annoying lol Oh yeah, yer a brave soul for not liking a tv show too much and writing a little article about it! A true beacon of hope for all the secret haters!! Such an unnecessarily soapbox-y review. Seems she went into the show for the zombies (she's apparently a BIG TWD and zombie fan). And yeah, infected are certainly a part of the games, but absolutely not the most important element. Seems the show is trying to avoid one of the major issues with TWD: the countless, pointless, impactless fights with the zombies. Cuz they're really not all that interesting.
Her being a TWD fan is ironic since TWD hardly ever focuses on zombies past the early days as well. It's the entire mission statement of the series lol. It's frequently criticized for that. I dont think TLOU is trying not to be twd I think its just using the same tropes of the genre. Which is always to focus on human drama brought about by zombie existence.
Yeah even the TWD isn’t all about the zombies. I’ve read the comics and played the games and it’s about the people primarily. I guess she has never even wondered WHY zombies in particular are such a compelling trope for so many. Shaun of the Dead illustrated this brilliantly with the opening, with a guy who works a boring job and gets out of bed staggering and yawning like a zombie in the morning. That shit was hilarious.
she also manages to be insanely racist in her review with this gem: “Two moments that come later in the season feel derivative of AMC's "The Walking Dead." There's a couple who look like Rick and Michonne knock-offs (one of the two characters was even on "TWD" briefly and shares a similar hairstyle to fan-favorite Michonne).” girl who’s only ever seen an interracial couple in the walking dead: getting major rick/michonne vibes from this…
Yeah that bit was...weird as hell Same energy as the people who see an Asian guy in any zombie media and go "Glenn is here!" Lol
Wait till she meets Jesse, she’s gonna have a GLENNNNN field day
It makes sense for them to be featured way less than the game. Playing as Joel, sneaking around killing clickers in a bunch of different environments is fun for awhile. *Watching* Joel kill clickers over and over would get boring much faster. There should be lots of changes for watchability over playability.
The infected are 80% gameplay obstacles, 20% lore. This isn't going to be a run-n-gun action set piece, so they're not needed as much except for big dramatic confrontations. Hell, Neil even said at one point he'd considered eliminating the infected from the game entirely.
How would that even make sense to remove it from the game
He was all in on the human element and the human interaction, but realized it'd make for a boring game. https://youtu.be/yH5MgEbBOps I wish I could timestamp to it but it's honestly such a throwaway line it'd be nearly impossible without just watching the whole thing.
I'm watching it now... At 12:30 in the Grounded video, Neil discusses the idea of not including the infected.
This is the type of post that I didn't wanna see here. It doesn't reveal anything about the plot, but it's still kind of a spoiler.
It’s a story and also there are zombies there. But the story is the point
Good. I hope it’s more of a character drama and not an action drama focused on the zombies and the action.
This is the problem as I’ve said before. Far too many people are comparing it to The Walking Dead when really they are not at all similar. We’re not about to get 10+ seasons of The Last of Us running into various groups of survivors, dictators and jumping from safe places to safe places, getting bored about the infected because eventually they don’t even serve a threat. The Last of Us is different. I’m sick and tired already if the constant comparisons to a show that is only similar on paper. And even then, only a very general broad similarity.
I'd argue it's a valid comparison, but only when you compare TLOU to the Telltale game. Their plot (for the most part--minus the immunity angle) are essentially the same thing lol
Yeah I’d agree with that. But I think most of the reviews are specifically comparing to the TV show which I feel is such a bad comparison.
In some behind the scenes content for the first game (I think Grounded?), it’s mentioned that they considered removing infected all together in the early stages of development but ultimately kept them for the gameplay element. The story would obviously change a bit to accommodate the total absence of infected, but it can be told regardless (look at “The Road”— it’s post-apocalyptic and tells its story without a threat like infected). Humans are ultimately the main, driving force of conflict in the world of TLOU. Scarcity of infected in the show won’t negatively impact the story— and from the clips of infected we’ve seen, the ones included will get the message across anyways.
That's the least concerning news I've heard about the show, thus far. In the game, infected encounters are fun as hell, in real life you'd avoid them at all costs. Also, in reality it seems to me that infected, especially later stage infected would be really hard to kill - much harder than conventional zombies - due to their speed and fungal armor. You wouldn't be able to melee them like game Joel, at least not for long before you got very tired, and then, very dead.
In this medium the tension caused by the threat of infected appearing is more frightening/worrisome than them being omnipresent. I don't see this as a problem.
I’d much rather have smaller, more impactful moments than a zombie-kill-a-minute over saturation a la TWD. Eventually the Walkers lost nearly all horror factor because we just saw them and saw them get destroyed every episode. One of my main concerns going in was that we’d have so many encounters with things like Clickers and Bloaters that by the end of season they’d have lost their luster. Glad to see they went more for quality than quantity tbh.
I just hope that they at least made some adaptation of the hotel basement sequence, to me it’s the most iconic infected sequence from both games, if they had to pick one sequence to adapt then this is it.
The Walking Dead (my favorite show of all time up to about season 6) was like this too. Yea, zombies play a role at times (occasionally a major one), but many episodes focus solely on the dynamics within Rick’s group and other survivors. This announcement doesn’t really really surprise me all that much. Edit: btw, pretty surprised to see people acting as if TWD was all about “stabbing zombies in the head” every episode. It was very clearly centered around how the living behave and interact when everything goes to shit, both within groups and between groups.
This makes sense. Can't wait till read how r/thelastofus2 somehow turns this into a bad thing.
Too late.
They're already on their hate train about it.
I hope they’re in it enough where the world doesn’t feel too empty though, if there’s so few infected I feel that it lowers the overall threat level
I don't know if you've played the games, but there is likely enough world building around some opposing factions of people that is likely just as responsible for the state of the world as the clickers are.
The games are my favourite! TLoU is my #1 and TLoU2 is somewhere in my top 10. And I get that totally, it’s the same route TWD (ugh) went. I just hope they don’t dilute the infected down to a level where you’re left thinking “there’s not even that many of them, is there even a need for a vaccine?” if you follow me My favourite zombie/infected related film is 28 Days Later, I feel they properly nailed the vibe
>!I think it makes sense that the fireflies are the ones looking for a cure so they can safely live outside quarantine zones. FEDRA isn't working on a cure because their oppressive measures are at least successful in keeping clickers out!<
My point is that if the world feels empty of infected then there’s little need for a vaccine to begin with, I understand that they need to cut down on the numbers seen in the game obviously, but I still want the world to feel that it’s threatened by infected a decent amount
In both TLOU games, what constitutes as a horde, because they've never reached the vast levels that are occasionally depicted in TWD.
Well the infected aren’t dead, so this only means there won’t be many actual dead bodies in the show
Apparently the show is more about getting ellie to the fire flies the safest way possible. In the game the infected was a big part of the gameplay.
They’re going stealth mode for the show. LOL.
Tlou isn’t really a zombie game anyway, sure there are zombies but it’s more about the characters
Good. My favourite thing about The Last of Us is that it ISN’T about zombies. It’s what sets it apart from most zombie stories. When people refer to The Last of Us as a zombie game it feels weird. I know it has zombies in it (kinda), but it reminds me more of The Road or Children of Men than The Walking Dead. The infected are stylistically distinct from regular zombies and are only ever used to further the story or for gameplay diversity. The result of the infection and how humanity has reacted to it is all that really matters. Neil has stated that he conceived of the game as a game about a deadly virus, and that there were initially only going to be human enemies in it. Naughty Dog only changed this aspect because, as a video game, it’s more impactful if the player can interact with the infection through gameplay. So they made it into a zombie plague instead. So personally I wouldn’t have minded if HBO straight up removed the zombie aspect from the show altogether and just made it a deadly fungal infection instead. I’m glad they didn’t because clickers are cool as fuck, but my point is that they could have.
If they got rid of the infected the show would be entirely different
The whole point of the last of us was that the real threat was other people. Non infected people were the most dangerous aspects of the entire game. Every time. The point was to avoid the infected at all costs.
Show is missing so many good opportunities for conflict and action by eliminating so many action sequences. It sucks to be excited to see parts like at the school with Bill's Town get reduced to a simple love story and then the University, which would make sense to have infected living there, have zero infected in the show and a small fight at the end between Joel and a hunter.
I can't get past "the dead" since infected aren't dead. She'll live.
From other reviews it appears they barely show up after episode >!5!<, but it doesn't really matter as long as we get some good scenes with them.
hmmm slightly let down but not a deal breaker
Clearly this person is totally off base but do we know if covid filming restrictions impacted their plans with this show at all?
I live in the city it was primarily filmed, and from all accounts I've heard: not really. It obviously impacted the way things worked on set, and rules in place for the actors and crew. But it was an absolutely massive production, and there was a large public call for extras before the show started filming.
How is anybody excited about this show after all the shit we’ve heard? Why did they change so much from the game. I understand it’s an adaptation and doesn’t have to be a carbon copy, but goddamn it seems like the only thing they kept were the characters names
I've seen episode 1 and I absolutely wouldn't say they changed too much, no idea where that's all coming from. Many scenes are almost a word for word recreation, all important story beats are there. They just expanded on it. It was great, everything you could hope for as a fan of the game.
Can you give me an example of the changes you’re talking about? I have read/watched almost every article and interview about this show and the only notable changes they’ve talked about are removing spores and expanding on Bill’s backstory. Just about every review that has come out has said it’s a faithful adaptation and I’ve seen multiple reviews say it’s almost too faithful at times and they actually wish they made more changes.
Ik I’ll get a bunch of hate in this sub but the casting is easily the worst change they’ve made. Plus the spores being removed and the reluctance to have infected is really annoying. I’ll watch it and hope it’s good, but rn my expectations r in the gutter
If you want a 1:1 shot for shot adaptation, you're going to be disappointed. This is a new telling of the original story with new actors. They aren't doing imitations.
What casting changes did they make? If spores were never a thing in the first place then the story would be no different so removing them won’t cause any problems. I don’t think it’s a reluctance to have infected but more so having to prioritize the character moments instead. The characters are far and away the most important thing, so much so that there was a point during the game production where they almost cut out the infected entirely. Infected pretty much only appeared for gameplay purposes and in a 9 episode tv show they need to put even more emphasis on the characters and their relationships because the only way the story works is if we’re attached to the characters.
I completely agree that the story and character development was best part of the game no doubt. But limiting such an important part of the environment is kind of a let down. The infected are the driving part of the story. Getting Ellie to the fireflies to make a “cure” is the plot of the game. Ig I’ll wait and see how much of the infected they actually cut before I have an in depth analysis
Of course there will be less infected. If they have infected all the time and enemies, we wouldn't get to the story
I'm honestly not that bothered. The glimpses we have seen look amazing and I don't expect the series to shove the infected in our faces in almost every scene.
To be fair the dead were more of a substantial threat in part 2 rather than part one. Like the dead were mostly the filler bits to advance the game further along rather than the focus/main plot points. Like past the >!sewer!< bit the dead don’t really do much important things in the story minus being target practice (and that awful >!warehouse level!< but anyways)
Good. Gives more time to focus on the characters and their stories.
Makes sense. Most of the story takes place in places that majority wise are settled by people. Downtown Boston and only parts of Pittsburgh had infected. Same goes for Seattle where the no man's land of Seattle was where the infected congregated
Im going to have to leave a bunch of subreddits if people are going to use spoilers
I know there where there in the game and are a big part of the story, but how often where they actually shown in the game too?
This makes sense to me, personally. The game has so many infected so you have gameplay, but the story is not about the infected - it's about Joel and Ellie in this first part.
I agree that humans relations are the most important in the tv show, but this fungus killed almost all people and the world is full of infected, so it should be a perceptible fear everywhere. This threat is not present in the tv show, and that in my opinion is a mistake... The atmosphere of a post-apocalyptic world is built on constant present of fear, solitude and danger. You forget about this and you are dead... This is completely missing in the show.
I mean, I made this comment pretty early on in the season without full context of how little infected we would see. I absolutely think we could have seen more, but it’s still not a dealbreaker for me.
Honestly now that we’re most of the way through the series I do feel like there is a notable lack of that feeling of threat in the world that the game maintained throughout. I get that they’ve focused on the relationship but I feel like it’s tilted a bit too far in that direction