I’ve spent my whole life with a controller in my hands. The first experience with a videogame that I remember with a minimum of clarity goes back to the days of the NES and has as protagonists a not too big tube television placed on a fridge and the eternal ‘Super Mario Bros.’; a handful of elements that marked the beginning of a romance that has spanned a little over three decades.
Since then —especially after the arrival of 32 bits— the medium has given me tremendously emotional moments that have marked my journey as a player and my relationship with audiovisual narrative; Some of the most transcendental being the death of Aeris in ‘Final Fantasy VII’, Harry Mason’s descent into hell in ‘Silent Hill’ or, especially, the journey of Snake and company in ‘Metal Gear Solid’.
Little by little, videogames were getting closer to what the cinema had always given me; to those pure and visceral emotions enhanced in a certain way by the differential factor of interactivity. However, no matter how much David Cage tried with his praiseworthy ‘Heavy Rain’ —and, previously, with ‘Fahrenheit’—, the great link between both formats came in 2013 from the hand of ‘The Last of Us’.
Playing the opening bars of Naughty Dog’s title made it abundantly clear to me that I was facing an industry turning point anticipated by gems like ‘Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune’. His ability to make an impact and his mastery in terms of writing and directing — let alone technique — they surpassed everything seen to date and have found very few direct competitors a decade later.
This was the main reason that made me deeply fear his adaptation to the small screen, no matter how much his responsible partner, made up of Craig Mazin and the author of the original Neil Druckmanninspired me with the utmost confidence. The fear of a watered-down replica, of a soulless copy of what was already perfect, and of wanting to pick up the Dual Shock again to clear up the bad taste in your mouth was very real, but with its first dazzling 80 minutes, ‘The Last of Us’ from HBO has completely dispelled it by giving me a return to what I loved ten years ago from a slightly different perspective.
–From this point on there will be spoilers for both the original video game and the HBO series.–
Not-So-Common Places
The opening scene of ‘The Last of Us’ is shown as a declaration of intent that, in a way, confirms that the promises of expanding the video game universe and providing extra context have been fulfilled For those who already enjoyed it at the time. In a few minutes, Mazin and company skilfully condense the nature of Cordyceps to bring neophytes and regulars alike; and then, after the credit titles to the rhythm of Gustavo Santaolalla, they immerse us in terrain that is undoubtedly known, but not as much as one might expect.
Despite being littered with praiseworthy moments, the Foreword of the playable version of ‘The Last of Us’ stands out as one of the most memorable as it forges the links between Sarah —whom we control— and her father Joel. The dramatic bases of this contact remain intact in the cathodic version.transferred to the new format with the occasional twist of the screw.
While the apocalypse is cooking, and always from her point of view, we accompany Sarah to fix the iconic watch that Joel won’t take off his wrist despite ending up broken, we will see how father and daughter share a birthday night watching a movie on the couch that ends early and, even, we will go in the dark with the teenager through the house while chaos breaks out in the Exterior. A balance between the familiar and the slightly new which not only helps to retain the attention of the seasoned viewer, but also significantly enriches the whole.
This is not achieved only with small details that might seem insignificant, and a good example of this is the first contact with an infected person. While in the game it is articulated through a jumpscare in which one of the creatures goes through the window from the house of our protagonists, in the series an elderly neighbor is used in a truly chilling moment that, in addition to boosting the tone of the sequence, continues to explain how the fungus transmission process works and what is the nature of its hosts.
Emotions, in my case probably enhanced by knowing the original material, are on the surface, and do not lose intensity at any time. Knowing in advance how the tragic introduction will be resolved does not prevent you from enjoying of winks like the English wrench that Joel discards after getting rid of the infected —in the game, blunt objects have a limited number of uses— don’t even surprise me with the spectacular escape in the van surprisingly similar to the original in general terms – here, the van that crashes into them is dodged and replaced by a commercial plane.
The definitive confirmation that we are facing a tremendously special production comes with Sarah’s inevitable death. When an adaptation makes your stomach drop with something that already emotionally battered you at the time is something truly unusual, and all the mime invested in this reconstruction and enlargement is projected in this sceneimpeccably resolved and crowned by an immense Pedro Pascal that has not made me miss Troy Baker’s voice, which I came to consider irreplaceable, at no time.
looking for the light
After the obligatory ellipsis, ‘The Last of Us’ places us in the Boston quarantine zone controlled by the iron hand of FEDRA and put in check by the revolutionary militias of the Fireflies while exhibiting its logistical muscle. Its overwhelming production design serves as an additional resource to revere the video game through the graffiti that reads “When you’re lost in the darkness, look for the light”, through different posters copied from their pixel-generated versions or through an all too familiar color palette.
This second block, less intense but equally necessary, allows us to verify that all the elements that made Naughty Dog’s work great are still present, starting with its true soul: the characters. Little by little, the series develops Joel with his routine in the QZ, introduces key secondary characters such as Tess and Marlene -the latter played by the same actress from the videogames- and, above all, the Ellie of a Bella Ramsey who captures all the essence of its digital counterpart and boasts an enviable chemistry with Pascal in a handful of interactions that include lines of dialogue taken directly from the game.
Through my journey through this first episode of ‘The Last of Us’, the fear to which I previously referred has progressively diminished until it disappeared without a trace, and the great general closing shot, in which we are shown the iconic postcard of Boston with its collapsed buildings and vegetation dominating the concrete and metal only confirms that, most likely, we are facing the series that will forever change our way of perceiving video game adaptations; in the same way that ‘The Last of Us’ collapsed the wall that separated video games from traditional audiovisual narrative.