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The Last of Us Television Adaptation Is a Go at HBO

Joel and Ellie from The Last of Us: Part II. Or at least a trailer.
Joel and Ellie from The Last of Us: Part II. Or at least a trailer.
Image: Naughty Dog

From the mind behind Chernobyl and some of the folks at game developer Naughty Dog, The Last of Us, the hit PlayStation series about a fungus-based zombie apocalypse, is officially making its way to television.

As shared by HBO yesterday in a press release, the The Last of Us series, which has been in development since at least earlier this year, is moving forward with a series order. The show will be written by Craig Mazin alongside Neil Druckmann, the director at Naughty Dog who played a significant role in writing and creating the game series. Mazin and Druckmann will also executive produce the series alongside Carolyn Strauss (Chernobyl, Game of Thrones).

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“Craig and Neil are visionaries in a league of their own,” said Francesca Orsi, Executive Vice President at HBO Programming. “With them at the helm alongside the incomparable Carolyn Strauss, this series is sure to resonate with both die-hard fans of ‘The Last of Us’ games and newcomers to this genre-defining saga. We’re delighted to partner with Naughty Dog, Word Games, Sony and PlayStation to adapt this epic, powerfully immersive story.”

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The show is being created by HBO in conjunction with Sony, with it aimed for streaming on HBO Max and airing on HBO. It’ll be interesting to see how the series varies up the content of the games, which are already deliberately cinematic in presentation and storytelling. In a way, the games are perfectly set up for adaptation, but that in and of itself could be a problem. How do you differentiate the series from the original without straying too much?

Guess we’ll find out when The Last of Us hits HBO, sometime in the future. 


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