The Last Of Us Season 1 Review

 [WARNING; THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR SEASON 1 OF THE LAST OF US.]

This series, before I finally ended up watching it, had been on my radar for a while, as it was widely regarded as  a great, and one of the best for that matter, adaptations of a video game into a show. Because obviously, the show is based off of the survival horror game of the same name, and, according to people who have played the game and watched the show, quite heavily follows the game’s plot points. I’m not entirely sure about the shows merit as an adaptation, however, as I actually haven’t played the games yet, but I will still be talking about my opinions on the quality of the show as a standalone show, instead of an adaptation, due to the fact I’m not particularly experienced when it comes to the last of us games.

But anyways, the series. I’m just gonna cut to the chase here, it was fantastic. Such a good series of television. It is really gritty, and dark, and definitely doesn’t hold back from bloodshed, and dark themes, such as SA, suicide and more, but the main dynamic between the two main characters, Joel and Ellie, is really damn wholesome. Like, through both their traumas, they warm up to each other slowly, becoming a father-daughter dynamic. Because, at first, Joel only has Ellie, as he has been told to deliver her over to a laboratory, to be studied to help find a cure for the zombie fungus, due to Ellie being the only (known) human alive to be seemingly immune to the infection. And Joel treats her merely as cargo to bring over to the lab, as a means of getting a car as promised, and maybe finding his brother, as he thinks he will ‘save him.’

But of course, events change, and they end up finding Joel’s brother, only to find out that he really didn’t need saving, he was in a self-sufficient settlement safe from the infected. And as Joel’s whole reason to deliver Ellie in the first place falls on its head, we see him slowly warming up to her, and letting down the guard he built to really grow a connection with anyone else, after losing his own daughter to infected. In the end, Joel ends up as a father figure to Ellie, filling the gaps they had been missing in their lives, for Ellie was an orphan. It plays into the found family trope I so love in media, and it is really sweet. 

Something else I love about the show is how it shows backstory for characters. In almost every episode, there’s at least one flashback showing lore for the characters, or the disease. It’s a really clever way of storytelling where, through non-chronological progression in the show, we get to see so much of the main characters' lives, and why they are such jaded and broken people, without just telling us in conversations between characters. They feel like real people, with real traumas that affect them. And I think that shows the main message of the show, you can’t forget your trauma, you can’t erase it, but you can learn to live with it, to heal.

At its core, it is a show about healing from trauma. It’s a really important message, and a really damn great show. I’m feeling a middle 9 for season one of the last of us. I’ll review season two when I watch it too, why not.