The Last of Us is a video game adaptation set in a post-apocalyptic world that is more dramatic story and character based! The franchise started as a 2013 video game from Naughty Dog, also known for the Uncharted franchise. The game is adapted by Craig Mazin, who created the Chernobyl mini-series, and Neil Druckmann, the creative director of the game. It is streaming on HBO Max. I like the involvement of the video game creator especially since the game is already dramatic. 1968, it begins in darkness where we hear a medical personnel, Dr. Schoenheiss, talking about a virus.
We then see that it is a talk show and the doctor mentions a global pandemic, very topical today. The host turns to Dr. Neuman (John Hannah) who shrugs off the host’s suggestion of bacteria, viruses, and instead says fungus. I recognize Hannah from The Mummy (1999). The doctor says that fungi can “alter minds” like LSD. He brings up a fungi that can infect insects, control them, and then take over their bodies. Dr. Schoenheiss groans and says that fungi can’t survive in humans. Dr. Neuman agrees and then poses that if the world’s temperature increased, another topical issue, global warming, then the fungi like Cordyceps would evolve. This quiets the audience.
He says there is no way to make a cure. The host asks what happens. Dr. Neuman says, “We lose.” I like the premise, not a single cause, but a number of factors leading to an apocalyptic future. The opening credits has the yellowish fungi trickling up like a reverse stream against a black background, a very Game of Thrones opener. The fungi forms into a shape like the United States. This makes me think of Stephen King’s The Stand. Next the fungi grows through a skull, into two shadowy shapes, until we get the title. The setting moves to 2003, we get the pink bedroom of a child, Sarah (Nico Parker), who goes to knock on the door of her father, Joel (Pedro Pascal). Parker was in the sci fi movie, Reminiscence (2021).
Pascal, of course, is the lead in the upcoming third season of The Mandalorian. Their relationship is perfect in Pascal's forgetful father and Parker's kind daughter. Uncle Tommy (Gabriel Luna) walks in, they are both construction workers, about to go to a job. Luna was the villainous REV-9 in Terminator: Dark Fate (2019). Joel promises his daughter they will be back by 9 p.m. Sarah takes some money from her father’s drawer before leaving the house. The neighbor busy putting biscuit pieces into the mouth of his mother, Connie. They get into the truck and Tommy drives away, we see on the bumper sticker, Operation Desert Storm veteran. The setting is shown, “Austin, TX - September 26th.”
At school, Sarah notices the twitch of a fellow student’s hand and a cough. She heads to Lone Star Watch & Jewelry by bus. The shopowner examines the watch and charges her twenty dollars to repair it. Some emergency vehicles pass. His wife suddenly enters the store and says they are closed. The shopkeeper has finished the repair and the wife hands Sarah the watch in a box. Sarah goes to the neighbor’s house as Mrs. Adler bakes some cookies, Sarah is checking a bookshelf while the elderly mother starts shaking in her wheelchair! She is about to leave and sees the dog, Mercy, staring at the now calm mother.
Sarah sees three jets streak overhead. Night, at home, Sarah is reading a book while the news reports about the “violent outbreaks.” Joel returns, at 10 p.m., Sarah gives him the watch, and also the DVD of a ninja movie, but falls asleep. Joel gets a call from Tommy thrown in jail for knocking out a man attacking a waitress. He takes Sarah to her bed, she is asleep at 11:03, then there is a flicker of light, a dog barks. Sarah is wakened by a helicopter flying close and goes to check on her father. I like the threat in the background and we focus more on characters than the danger itself like Bird Box (2018).
She turns on the television, the only station is a National Alert warning citizens to stay indoors. Sarah is startled by Mercy and brings him inside. She goes outside to an empty street and sees a helicopter turn. Then Sarah tries to take Mercy home, but the dog runs off. Sarah walks into Mrs. Adler’s house. The door is open, dishes clatter, Sarah slips on some blood! Mr. Adler is bleeding, slumped against the kitchen door, and says, “Help me.” Sarah turns and sees the elderly woman over Mrs. Adler’s body, it is unclear about the scene so it is spooky. She rises up with fungi tendrils in her mouth and then screams!
Sarah runs out and sees her father pull up with his truck. He takes out a large wrench as Tommy has a hunting rifle. Joel takes out the strange grandmother and has his daughter go to the back seat. The possessed victims are like the zombies in Walking Dead, but the fungi origin makes them more interesting. He shouts to a neighbor to get in her house. We get the windshield perspective of the truck, very first person pov, lit by the headlights! The Adlers shamble out and Tommy runs over one. Tommy drives to the intersection, police cars race to Austin, while they turn to San Marcos. Tommy and Joel try to explain to Sarah what they know about what’s happening. They pass a burning two-story house that sent shivers in me.
Tommy veers past cars going the wrong way and the line of cars packs the road. Joel tells him to drive across the field. I think the combat part of Joel is kicking in, a sergeant?, with Tommy reacting in this combat situation. They find the army has blocked that direction with a temporary camp and vehicles. Tommy veers right to a small town, Joel hopes they can reach Mexico, but Sarah says it could have spread everywhere. They are surprised by low flying jets! More police cars block the street, Tommy turns, and street is crowded with running people. He drives past them into a chaotic street, this is more intense than the opening of A Quiet Place Part II (2021).
Then, the street is filled with infected people attacking others and others running in panic. An audience runs from a theater, one woman with a bleeding neck, Joel yells at Tommy to back up even over people! Sarah warns her father as a jet nosedives into the street! A fragment flies from the explosion through the car, then, darkness. Sarah wakes up in the firelight with the truck overturned. Joel hugs her as Sarah is just overwhelmed. Tommy is there, but a police car slams into the truck separating them! Sarah’s ankle is wounded so Joel carries her. They reach an alley with the Infected feeding on victims! One rises up, Joel turns and kicks in a door running into a 50’s diner with the enraged infected man leaping after them. Joel runs outside with Sarah and there is a gunshot.
They are under the weapon light of a soldier’s rifle. Joel tells him repeatedly that they are not sick. The soldier lifts up his rifle, automatic fire, Joel and Sarah tumble down a hill. The soldier apologizes and then is shot! It is Tommy with his hunting rifle. Joel has a gunshot in his side. Tommy is shocked. Sarah is gasping as she holds the wound in her torso! Joel tries to put pressure on the wound and then lift her up. Tommy just stands there and says Joel’s name. Joel hugs his daughter. Then, we get “Twenty years later”, a bright forest with a boy in a pink shirt shuffling past a street sign. He makes his way to a clearing with crumbled buildings and a wall like a fortress in front of her. This is “Boston, 2023.” Vines drape a traffic signal and the boy walks towards an officer in tactical gear, then he collapses. There are other guards atop the wall of the Quarantine Zone.
Doors open for a Biological Contamination Area. It is fuzzy as we see officers bring in the boy on a wheelchair. His wrists are bound, but she holds an officer’s patch. He looks up to see a chart showing areas on the body and the time it takes of the Cordyceps infection. A female officer checks on the boy and sees his leg wound. Another officer makes a scan of the boy, his screen shows red, and then he is injected with a needle. Armed soldiers are monitoring masked men carrying bodies from a truck to throw into a fire. A woman unmasks and goes to another truck. She taps the shoulder of another worker dressed in denim, Joel, and says, “I can’t.”
Joel takes a bound victim in a pink shirt, the girl, and drops her into the fire. He goes to pick up his pay and takes the sewer maintainence job. Joel walks over to an execution of victims who trespassed the Quarantine Zone to be hanged. Joel sees across the silent crowd, a soldier in a black, tactical uniform. He nods to the side at Joel. This is the North Square. The soldier gives him ration cards and Joel has Hydro pills, that may be from Atlanta. Joel asks about a truck with a missing battery and makes a deal. The soldier tells him that the Fireflies have been using explosives at night. He leaves and Joel walks to a building with some graffiti on its wall, "When you're lost in the darkness look for the light."
A bearded man, Robert, tries to apologize to Tess (Anna Torv), she has a bashed up right eye. Torv played Dr. Wendy Carr hunting serial killers in the drama Mindhunter. He has taken her car battery and spent the money. Robert is worried about her “guy”, but Tess says she will tell him that she was attacked by others. She just wants to drink off her beating by Robert’s men. He agrees to let the situation pass and then there is an explosion! Tess sees the others are dead and staggers out as the FEDRA authorities announce everyone to leave the area. Tess sees the burning truck. Soldiers are walking towards her when one is shot by a gunman on the roof, a Firefly. Tess raises her arms, but is knocked down and taken into custody. There is a girl in a red sweater in chains.
This is Ellie played by Bella Ramsey who like Pascal was also in Game of Thrones. She looks at a patch of sunlight in the darkened room. Ellie stands up and kicks a bowl at a woman with a clipboard. She is told to slowly count to ten and defiant about it. The woman asks her name and the girl replies Veronica. She says FEDRA will come for her and the others leave with a Firefly symbol on the door. Joel walks through a line of people to reach a room with a radio operator. He gives the soldier’s foil-wrapped cigarettes to ask about Tommy, but there has been nothing for three weeks. Joel wants to know the location of the tower which the operator uses to communicate. It is the Cody Tower in Wyoming. Joel, connected to Tess, will do anything to find his brother and gets involved with a surrogate daughter. The Last of Us is a strong drama with actors playing memorable characters!
Five Fungi out of Five!
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