Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
Cast: Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, Anna Torv, Lamar Johnson, Melanie Lynskey, Nico Parker, Merie Dandridge, Keivonn Woodard, Jeffrey Pierce, John Getz, Gabriel Luna, Samuel Hoeksema, Olivier Ross-Parent. Scott Shepherd, Storm Reid, Troy Baker, Ashley Johnson, Nick Offerman, Rutina Wesley, John Hannah, Terry Chen, Christine Hakim, Murray Bartlett, Ari Rombough, Yayu A.W. Unro, Graham Greene, Sonia Maria Chirila, Josh Brener, Ruby Lybbert, Sharon Crandall, Christopher Heyerdahl, Nelson Leis, Elaine Miles.
Never has the genre of the zombie apocalypse ever been so in tune with major environmental concerns as the television adaptation of The Last Of Us has managed to portray.
You can be scared and fearful of the genre thanks to the early films that captured the sentiment such as Victor Halperin’s White Zombie, George A Romero’s cascading deluge of fine horror in the Dead series, and even Danny Boyle’s classic 28 Days Later has the power to leave shivers tingling at the spine. However, the genre itself, with the odd occasion where novelty of setting has prevailed, has found itself languishing, forced to morph into the realm of comedy, romance, even venturing into alternate history and classic English Literature.
The Last Of Us may have been conceived originally for a computer game, but it makes the transition to television series with ease, its message forcibly hammered home that we have ruined a beautiful home, and that nature will fight back anyway it can, even it means using us, deforming us, to annihilate us off the face of the planet.
It is not just down to the sublime acting and powerful writing, the love shown between two people as they faced their own mortality and moment of choosing their own death, presented with great charm by Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett as Bill and Frank in the third episode of the series, the softening of Pedro Pascal’s character of Joel as he comes to understand Ellie’s own history, nor in the tremendous effect in which the viewer is torn as the ever gracious Anna Torv’s rendition of Tess Servopoulos is taken from the living; it is in the moments of great fear of what humanity has wrought on the planet and itself as we continue to believe and act as though we as a species are invulnerable.
There can be no doubt that the timing of the series has also been enhanced in its reaction due to our own brush with a global pandemic, the fear and concern of a disease which seems indiscriminate will always leave a lasting impression on the conscious of the populace, and as The Last Of Us reveals in horrors, from mutated humans, to cannibalism, from toxic, almost bestial behaviour to the knowledge that it only takes one thing to happen in another country, one slight deviation from the perceived norm, for everything to fall apart.
The Last Of Us is arguably one of the great television series of the year, if not the last decade, and it is with excitement in the heart that fills the viewer to know that a second series will arrive to drive the story of Joel and Ellie onwards. Disturbing, honest, full of horror and exposure, The Last Of Us is perfect television drama.
Ian D. Hall