Earlier this year, it was revealed that a TV adaptation for Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us was in the works for HBO, with Chernobyl director Craig Mazin on board to direct the series.
Through the TV series, Naughty Dog and Mazin could use this opportunity to revisit scenes that were initially considered but ultimately dropped from the game’s final release in 2013, as Mazin revealed in an interview with BBC Must Watch.
“Neil, at one point he was like, ‘You know, there’s one thing we were talking about for a while, and then he told me what it was, and I was like, GONK! OK, jaw drop, that’s going in,” Mazin said, laughing. “We have to do that. You couldn’t stop me from doing that, you will have to shoot me to stop me from doing that, so we’re doing that.”
According to Mazin, the new moments they have decided are not simply at random and instead serve to enhance the story they wish to tell.
“And there’s quite a few things like that, where it’s not like we just decided, ‘wouldn’t it be cool if Joel and Ellie got on motorcycles and confronted a motorcycle gang?’ That’s not what we do. There’s no episodic nonsense here. This is all very much curated, but the things that are new and enhancing of the storyline we’re doing are connected in organic, serious ways that I think fans of the game and newcomers alike will appreciate.”
Currently, the HBO TV series is still in its writing phase, as production is still very much limited due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, but Mazin promises we’ll get to “see it as soon as it is done, I promise you that”
Germaine is a fun-sized introvert who loves nothing better than sleeping in on rainy days. She can be found reading fanfiction and manga while still waiting for her Hogwarts acceptance letter. It’ll come eventually.
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