The Last of Us - HBO *Spoilers* See warning in post #1

That is a pretty bad take all round. Granted not everyone has the same views on tv shows/movies as me and people are allowed to have their opinions but it currently sits at 9.5 on imdb, despite the backlash of part 2 and from anecdotal evidence from friends who do not like the genre or play games, they all said it was remarkable. I thought it had some pacing issues but I knew where the story was going so I held tight. The next few episodes will be the make or break of the show. If you didn't like the first one you won't like the rest.

I’m glad they didn’t end the ep with Joel burning that body. I think it’s important for as an introduction to the story that we see Joel meet Ellie and the rest of the show is set up from there.

I can understand non game players when they say they’re somewhat disoriented after the time jump. There’s FEDRA, the fireflies and new characters introduced in fairly short order. Ultimately though it’s not that important right now and I can’t imagine there being any similar issues in future episodes.

Similarly to Chernobyl the accompanying podcast was fairly enjoyable with a nice bit of insight from Mazin and Druckmann regarding the transition from game to TV

Just me ....but i didn't think it was great at all ,

The black girl who was the "terrorist " acting was absolutely brutal ,

For people like me who didn't play the game have no idea how you become infected, is it airborne , is a bite, when they bite you are you dead or do you come back or what , Very little explanation as to what happens with regard to the zombies,

After all the hype i found the first 30 minutes good then it was a bit of a boring mess after the jump ,

I did enjoy that. It was close enough to the game (The exact same music, Having Marlene played by the same actor as the game, the shots of dust-motes, the initial panicked flee... the foul mouth on Ellie) but different enough to be interesting to non-players.

However I can understand how this could potentially be seen as a higher-quality "Meh" to those who have not played the game and have no interest (And that's fair enough). As I mentioned previously, I think it will have a tough time separating it from lesser zombie shows such as The Walking Dead and its spinoffs etc. The anticipation has been insane and, Some down to simply going to others "Hey, did you play that TLoU thing?" " Oh my God, yeah. Amazing". And some of that is down to some seriously heavy advertising. Some of the.... hysteria?... is down to the fact that this was from a grown-up, well written and directed game. And all the articles are about "Hey, a game adaptation that worked". But for people who have no interest in the game? What's the BFD?

But for me, I keep comparing it to The Walking Dead. I watched that until about season 4 or 5. Then gave up. There was a bit where one guy (Glen?) was separated from another member. Swamped by zombies. BUT, because this was about 2 episodes into the season, you KNEW he was gonna turn up again in, like the last episode (TWD was ALL about the first 2 and last 1 episode of the season. Everything else was filler for commercials). It just went on and on and on.....

However I thought the acting and writing on this was great. I'm a big fan of Pascal anyway (He even SOUNDS like Joel) and, like most, I really only know Ramsey from Game of Thrones (Where she was comically bad-ass) and a single episode of His Dark Materials. But she NAILED Ellie (especially the foul mouth 😀). BUT I can understand if some are a bit jaded with yet another post-pandemic zombie show

There are hints in this first episode that the fungal infection came from flour, hence why it spread so quickly but Joel, Tommy and Sarah weren't infected. They don't have pancake batter, when Sarah is in the neighbour's house the carer makes cookies but Sarah leaves before they're baked, Joel forgot to get a cake. I don't remember anything like that from the game so I think they added it to the show to try give an explanation.

With regards how you get infected, it can happen from bites. There were tendrils coming out of the infected mouth which pass on the infection, though it's also likely if the infected get hold of you they'll just kill you. Even the shot of the infected guy growing against the wall in the Outbreak zone when Joel and Tess were coming out of the sewers, that's the fungus trying to grow and spread after the guy died. That's also why they were burning the bodies of infected.

For those people who hadn't played the game and are underwhelmed by the second half of the pilot - that was all just set up really, and the proper journey that the game went on starts in the next episode. The first episode was essentially the tutorial of the game, to put it in some context. You haven't even really seen any proper infected yet(apart from the start of the outbreak, it's very different 20 years on), they've only left the quarantine zone so the real threat starts now.

And for those comparing it to The Walking Dead etc, the real heart of TLOU is the relationship between Joel and Ellie, so it's not a traditional zombie show in my mind. Them nailing that relationship here is the key, most reviews I've read said that they have, but sure we'll see.

It's for all audiences. It'll be mostly retelling the story and events from the game (some scenes are pretty closely shot-for-shot or same dialogue), but even for people who've played the game there's going to be a lot of new stuff and changes to make it suit a TV show rather than a game. So you can watch it without knowing anything about the game. It's practically the same as a book being made into a TV show.

Obviously not everyone has the same tastes but even friends who haven't played the game enjoyed that first episode.

It's the first episode, some people on this thread think it should all be wrapped up and finished now 🤣

You weren't paying attention. There's literally a poster showing bite locations and incubation times, and the mechanism is explained in that 60's show intro. And the worst thing is that this is not too far removed from reality, there are actual viruses and fungi that affect behavior

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavior-altering_parasite

I thought it was simply magnificent. The quality of acting was largely top drawer and it was a humdinger of an opener. I was impressed with the amount of story set-up they were able to get through in the first 80 minutes without it feeling laboured or too high-level. I don't think the episode was particularly slow at all but I suggest those who think it was slow have a bit of patience as the story needed that world-building to fully encapsulate the mindset of the major characters shown so far (and those to come).

The opening scene with John Hannah was a brilliant choice to provide some lore. Pascal is a brilliant Joel so far and his descent into brutality was well told (and assumedly will continue). Bella Ramsey was excellent too and is a worthy Ellie. I'm looking forward to seeing how the clickers and the more significantly affected are portrayed.

Sitting there with my other half who has zilch interest in video games, it was a joy to see the rollercoaster (albeit one with few 'highs') that it brought her on from her devastation at the incident with Sarah to her shock at some of the later brutality. She adored it too and had her gripped.

I think all but one of my friends absolutely loved it and the one that didn't has always had some condescension towards video games so it was to be expected.

It's such a treat to have some event television of such high quality. Roll on the next 8 weeks.

Didn't the daughter wake up and make pancakes for herself & Joel ? They would surely be made from flour

They were going to make pancakes but were out of pancake batter, so they had eggs instead. The neighbours in the morning offer Joel something but he claims to be on the Atkins diet (edit: just rewatched that scene and the male neighbour is feeding the disabled woman 'biscuits' (ie. American version of scones or whatever) and offers Joel some but he says no). Sarah leaves the neighbours' before eating the cookies the carer was making. Joel forgets to pick up a birthday cake.

There may be others, or it may be nonsense. I'm not sure. It's definitely not something I picked up on while watching. But looking back, there are definitely a few likely intentional references to Joel & Sarah not eating things with flour.

i think your right , way to much of a coincided for all them other things to be mentioned ,