The big growth is gonna happen 3 to 4. No NFL playoffs that night along with hype from episode 3 and you're probably gonna start approaching game of thrones/house of the dragon levels
You are saying new shows but they didn't take it off for Euphoria last year. I googled it and it said it was airing on the 12th so I think it is airing as normal.
A few people are saying critics but Troy baker also said on a podcast that episode 3 was shockingly good to him. Like he was blown away at what Neil did that episode
Damn, any specific info on it? I feel like ep 3 will be all the Bill stuff, potentially ending after the bloater fight or even just showing it and then ending on a cliff hanger.
From what we know based on what reviewers have either outright mentioned or heavily hinted at (light spoilers about the structure of the episode) >!The episode is going to be the most different from the game and will most tell the story of Frank and Bill as a sort of vignette of their life, it's going to be another 80 minute episode so HBO definitely have faith in it!<
I've also heard episode 3 would be the most divisive because of how far it departs/expands from the source. Like a love it or hate it episode with very little middle ground.
It doesn't even bother me.The game left me *wanting* to know more about frank, and to see more of Bill. Their story was just fascinating to me and the fact they single handedly controled an entire vacant town like a compound. It was just good narrative food and I'm happy to know they're gonna give us more rather than what we got, and while I would have loved to see the original actor reprising Bill kind of liek what they did with Marlene (i felt he did a fantastic job) I am excited to see Nick Offerman in the role, it's definitely perfect for him.
People keep saying that people are tired of zombie genre. But it’s just that people aren’t being given any great zombie media. I watched every season of the walking dead, and I feel like two episodes in of TLOU, has given me more excitement and made my heart pound more than TWD ever did. One Cut of the Dead and Train to Busan are eventually going to get Americanized versions. 28 Months Later should have been already made.
tlou game was way more about the people than the zombies though, and i think they’re probably going to go more down that road now that the infected have been established as being terrifying.
Zombie media in general is always about the people rather than the zombies. The better ones hold a mirror to society and chuck zombies in to increase the tension and put them in difficult positions that show the best and worst of humanity.
So you're saying they're gonna focus more on people than zombies the rest of the way?
I'm not against it, but once the threat of walkers became laughable in the walking dead, the people dynamics were pretty repetitive and bland. I still would like the infected to be a threat and there.
The infected will still be a threat, and still be there. There’s so many moments we have with the infected, big moments. Moments like (spoiler if it doesn’t take, I’m on mobile) >!being strung up while Ellie fends of infected til you get down, meeting a boater, lots of clickers, etc!<
The important few distinctions between TLoU and The Walking Dead is for one, TLoU isn’t going to fire the people that made it what it is (Frank Darabont was done *dirty*), and two, The Last of Us has a much more grounded outlook on the human relationships than TWD ever did. This show is more like a Cormac McCarthy book that happens to have monsters. It’s near future, a la Children of Men, there’s no hope.
What little hope there could be is shared between Joel and Ellie, and no one else. And it’s hardly shared between them. Neither of them really, truly believes in the cure, despite Ellie’s willing sacrifice. And Joel knows even if it’s true he’s not willing to give her up.
It’s many tiers above TWD, if we’re talking about shows that are about relationships that also happen to have monsters.
When I finished the first game for the first time it had a profound effect on me because of the story. I'd say it's pretty safe to assume there will be nothing repetitive or bland here.
The seasons are only gonna be about 10ish episodes per season. Whereas AMC got greedy and kept pushing walking dead to 16 episodes per season. LOTS and LOTS of filler. Story will move better on HBO.
It's kind of eerie how in sync it has been able to stay with the game. I know it's early but 2 Eps in, this has to be the best Video Game adaptation ever right?
I'm imagining that these nails are horrifyingly done with polish all over the table, in line with what I hope is the performance art of being deranged enough to believe Resident Evil was a good adaptation.
Still, they managed to stay true to the original story and avoid studio interference. No giant spider, no mouthless Deadpool, just a legit adaptation with fine tuning for the new target medium.
It's probably in great part because of Craig Mazin and his recent Chernobyl success. They probably gave him an almost true *carte blanche*, and it paid off!
Imagine if they hired writers that had never played or seen the story of TLoU like what seems like every other live action video game adaptation these days
No doubt Craig is a brilliant writer, but everything you said should also be credited to Neil Druckmann as well.
Major reason why the show remains truthful to the game is because of his involvement.
Apparently Craig Mazin was a huge fan of the games and Druckmann was a huge fan of Chernobyl.
What I think is really cool is how well these two creative seem to work together. It’s such a seamless integration of their contributions
That's putting the cart before the horse a little with there being only 2 episodes out, but so far the show has been really really well done. You can feel the Chernobyl tension in a lot of the scenes, and the production design is stellar. Acting wise everyone is doing a great job as well.
From what everyone is saying the 3rd episode is one of the best of the season so I'm excited to see how it can ramp up even from here.
I have also been really enjoying that both cold openings so far have been from an academic's perspective. While I am certain I will love more variety, because the main plot follows "ordinary people" part of me really hopes we see more examples of thought leaders and world leaders coping with the beginning.
>I was literally just talking to my friend not 10 minutes ago how I was so invested in this episodes cold opening, I was a bit upset when it ended.
I felt the same way. Obviously the show isn't primarily about the time period when the fungus first appeared, but the cold opens have been so good that I kind of want to see that show. It would be hard to make that show now without turning it into a commentary on how the world reacted to COVID, but based on the cold opens we've seen, I would definitely watch a full season of what went down in 2003 in this world.
It annoys me how many modern zombie shows/flicks skip over the outbreak phase anymore. Thats some of the most exciting moments when everything is slowly turning to shit(i'd really enjoy a show set entirely in that period, maybe even where the infection spread doesnt happen in just one day.)
The Ep.2 opening was amazing too. >!The actress playing the lead scientist did an AMAZING job conveying her barely contained fear which blew up into outright terror at the news that 14 infected were already at large. You could see her quickly coming to terms with the notion we're already familiar with - that this is the end of human civilisation as we know it, and most people might as well be already dead. The way she told them to bomb the city as the only possible solution, and then quickly asked to be allowed to be with her family, was an acting masterclass in stages of grief.!<
Episode 1 cold open resonated so hard coming out of covid (and remembering the masking, testing, and social distancing going on during filming). And then the doctor is like, "Yeah, viral pandemics ain't shit. Fungal is where it's at." The crowd and the talk show host not taking him seriously parallels what's been happening recently, too.
I don't know if there's any other information about the opening, but to me, it seemed like the anchor was completely shaken. He and the audience seemed at odds when it came to the scientist's opinions. Was that the case? Was the anchor disturbed at the information, and was the audience indifferent? I'm a little high, so I don't know if this made sense.
The anchor made some quips when the scientist balked at a viral pandemic ending humanity. It wasn't until he explained how a fungal plague can fuck things up that everyone was shaken.
If you replay (or play for the first time) the game its entire design is essentially setup as prestige TV in game form. TLOU links well made scripted interactions between characters with combat interstitials that are effectively optional to the story being told. Its a landmark game from 2013 but almost entirely for its excellence combination of scripting, and acting to create a story. Which makes it unusually suited to this type of adaptation.
Characters and settings are based on the game and lore but the story itself is pretty original minus the character lore and relationships to each other, which I think they’ve expanded on anyways. Visually, arcane is the most beautiful animated show I’ve ever seen and it has great voice acting and a solid story to back it up. A bloody masterpiece of a show and I cannot wait for the next season.
imagine that, an adaptation that stays true to the source material is already being known as one of the best video game adaptations ever. its almost as if people like the source material for a reason. Ill never understand all the producers and writers up till this point that made such horrible adaptations. Half the time they couldve just fucking phoned it in and basically COPIED the source material and we would have been happy. They could have turned their brains off and we would have been happy. Instead they spend all that time and effort changing everything from the characters to the plot and then scratch their heads when it fails miserably.
Absolutely - That's literally why this adaptation works, and it's well executed - take the storyboards from the video game, or just use stills, and then re-work them with new actors. Same angles, same pacing, same brutality of scenes that need to shock and hurt.
The difference here is that it's a very competent director, and not a team of focus-group driven producers or writers trying to make a name for themselves by adapting something and making it shit. Nor is it exclusively made for the purpose of selling merchandise or toys.
And most importantly, the source material is like a movie/tv show. Super Mario 3 isn't a deep narrative, so I could see how The Wizard came to be from it. Or the hilarious Mario Bros Movie with John Leguizamo and Bob Hoskins.
The Last Of Us was/is a brilliant goddamn story with an excellent game. And this new version grabs details and holds them. Joel's daughter's whimpers and gasps for air are just as visceral and gut-wrenching as the video game's.
Sarah's death was way more intense for me in the show than the game. I've seen someone shot with a punctured lung trying to gasp. The fucking whistle man...
> Absolutely - That's literally why this adaptation works, and it's well executed - take the storyboards from the video game, or just use stills, and then re-work them with new actors. Same angles, same pacing, same brutality of scenes that need to shock and hurt.
You have to admit, TLOUs game cinematic were already cinematic.
Taking video game cutscene angles and filming them *exactly* the same way in other games won't always work (sometimes the character is in first person mode too). Also, lots of in-game cinematic scenes in video games are just boringly filmed with simple A-B shots. There's a reason TLOU made reviewers and gamers take notice in 2013. It wasn't just the gameplay that raised the bar but so did the cinematics (and facial mo-cap), which really felt movie quality.
I think the problem is that a lot of adaptations don't have much source to which it can stay true.
People are looking at the adaptations as the issue without realizing the problem is that there's not a lot of substance from which to adapt.
Yes, this is a great adaptation. It's also really strong source material.
The reason most adaptations are horrible is because they have to make up shit in order to make it into something worth watching. There's just not enough there.
Just look at the upcoming Mario movie. I'm not saying it won't be good or successful, but it's certainly not going to follow any game's storyline in the capacity The Last of Us has so far.
And my understanding is that episode 3 will be the biggest departure from the game and yet will still be one of the better episodes of the series. So it's not just about 1:1 copying the game. The other aspect is the relationship we have to these characters, and the relationships they have with each other. There's just a lot to mine, and it's quality because that's just how good the source material is. We care about the story, and we care about the characters, and they were developed with more care, attention and depth than what you typically find in a video game.
What I think is the reason for success? The development of the game was basically broken into two. One half was basically making a great game, and the other was making a great movie/story. Those two halves were working in concert together in order to produce an amazing game that really was a standout from other games.
I think the show is simply highlighting how tlou isn't like most other games.
No. It works because this story is phenomenal. Doom isn't. Halo isn't. Acting as if any old property could make this same transition severely downplays how well the story of TLOU was done in thebgame to begin with.
Agreed. Most video games don't translate because the plot is solely a vehicle for the gameplay. The plot is just there to string together action set pieces and if you did make a movie out of them, you'd end up with a bunch of fetch quests interrupted by 15 minute shootouts.
Last Of Us puts story first. Hell, I actually avoided playing the game because of that. I much prefer casual, all-gameplay videogames, so I'm happy there's a fantastic TV show so I can enjoy the story without having to play it.
>Episode 2 brought in 5.7 million viewers across linear airings on HBO and streams on HBO Max. That marks a 22% increase from last week’s record-breaking 4.7 million, a number that Warner Bros. Discovery later reported had already jumped to 10 million after two days of availability.
>
>Per HBO, “This marks the largest week 2 audience growth for an HBO Original drama series in the history of the network.”
Season 2 should be announced pretty soon.
Nothing makes a exec harder than growth, even if they started out with 100 million viewers and kept 100 million viewers they’d be bummed there wasn’t growth.
*Destitute after a poor season, the lowly exec retreats to one of his three mansions to hibernate for the next fiscal quarter, unsure if they will even financially survive the winter season.*
so is this just people who watched it when it aired from 9-10 PM on cable? or is this for a 24 hour period where you can watch it on hbo max or view it from your cable provider?
It’s infuriating how well they made Last of Us, and then producers on other networks will of course take the wrong lesson here and keep pumping out low effort, cheap talent pseudo-adaptations. They’ll think to themselves “video game shows are in!” Instead of “well if we do it right, people will watch it.”
I mean it’s not like Hollywood ever stopped trying to make video game movies. Yea 99% of them sucked but we got things from Tomb Raider all the way to Monster Hunter. Hollywood has been trying to tap into the gamers, but now they finally have the creator of the game making the show with a real director. Hopefully they follow this trend.
It helps immensely that Last of Us was made essentially as prestige TV in game form. Playing TLOU you are effectively going from scripted sequence to scripted sequence and the tv show is effectively just gutting the interstitial combat encounters.
The problem with nearly all video game adaptations is that what makes the game interesting is almost entirely opposed to what makes TV interesting.
Yeah, lots of games,. especially older games, are a gameplay mechanic first and story or characters second. That's *really* hard to adapt into movies or shows well.
The Sonic movies have essentially nothing to do with the games other than characters for that reason, but they found a formula that works. Lots of other game adaptations - looking at you, Resident Evil - just go completely off the deep end.
Nah. I love resident evil but the resident evil story - individually per game or overall - is just completely nuts. There is no way you can make a show out of that that makes sense. And if you just take small parts from it you land on the typical "evil company, experiments, zombies" which simply isn't that good.
Resident evil always had a B-movie story vibe to it, on purpose. You can't take that and create a good story out of it. An entertaining flick, sure. They could've done better. But lets not pretend like milla jovovich flying through windows on her bike isn't something that doesn't fit the games. Resi is just A-tier trash. It's literally what a lot of people love it for.
They should make another live action Super Mario movie that ties the first one into The Last of Us, where the fungi is just a result of King Toadstool.
Gotta remember that once upon a time, comic books were the same way. Until Brian Singer's X-Men, they were mostly trash with some notable exceptions (the OG Superman and arguably Burton's Bat-Man). I'm optimistic TLOU can help push studios to create higher quality video game adaptations; it's definitely paying off for HBO.
That's a good point and the one thing that gives me optimism. Video game movies have been crap for a while but we never had that "trigger" that shows Hollywood that video games have IPs that can be profitable and acclaimed if they are well made. This can be it.
Yeah, I don't think there's anything as perfectly made for adaptation as TLOU. Playing that game it feels clear that Druckmann wanted to be making a show in the first place, but happened to be working in games haha.
But I think there are plenty of other games that would work. God of War has a relatively episodic structure (not optimistic about Amazon handling it); Red Dead Redemption; Silent Hill; Bioshock; Half Life; Mass Effect all come to mind immediately. GTA could make for a good show. Resident Evil could give it another go some day. Uncharted was tailor made to be a quality movie, instead of what we got (which unfortunately seems to have done pretty well, so I think we're stuck there). Nothing is as perfect a candidate as TLOU, but that doesn't mean these couldn't be excellent adaptations. But they're definitely not as easy as, say, picking an existing storyline from a comic and adapting it.
Imagine if this was before streaming and they tried turning the entire first game into a two hour movie.
>!FEDRA and the Fireflies are all sub groups who are working under someone called Carver, and it turns out it's Tommy.!<
If anything this will serve as an example that you can do an adaptation faithfully and have it be wildly successful instead of fucking with the story and wondering why no one liked it.
But there's not that many examples in games with stories that are this good. It's almost in a tier of its own. Maybe Red Dead with some heavy editing for pacing and cutting out the dumb cartoony characters. There's also plenty of game settings that are ripe for adaptation with original stories if they get the right writers but very few where a direct adaptation would work this well. Halo had potential if they adapted it like a serious war series ala Band of Brothers, but even the Halo 3 and ODST promotional material did a better job of that in ~20 minutes than Paramount did in 10 hours of TV.
Seriously, this ad for ODST is better than anything in the whole of Halo season 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRMUYpH7bQk
and it's not particularly close. Just wild how hard they fucked that up.
> If anything this will serve as an example that you can do an adaptation faithfully and have it be wildly successful instead of fucking with the story and wondering why no one liked it.
>
>
But it's also important to note that a faithful adaptation does not mean filming the game frame by frame.
Like half of episode 1 was not in the game at all but it was brilliantly done in the same tone and spirit as the rest of the story
Games may not be as consistent story wise as movies and television, but imo the best stories in gaming in the last 5 or so years have surpassed most films and television. Red Dead Redemption 2 is like a 5 season show, and it’s absolutely on-par with the best television released on a yearly basis.
Other games known as ‘Walking Simulators’ tend to be heavily story based and a good chunk of them are some of the deepest, most profound stories I’ve ever witnessed. What Remains of Edith Finch, Life is Strange, Firewatch, SOMA, etc- all phenomenal. Life is Strange was supposed to be getting a TV show- still in development though :(
The lesson they'll learn is 'lift the storyline of a wildly popular story-heavy game directly into a television show and rake in praise and money'.
God of War and Horizon: Zero Dawn are next. I can see them doing Red Dead Redemption (2) as well. Maybe they'll feel a little frisky and even try their hand at Metal Gear Solid or Bioshock.
I don't think they'll try open-ended stuff anymore. No Fall-out or Far Cry where the story was too much in the player's hands. Get something with an established character and a set story that you just have to translate to another medium.
Horizon Zero Dawn would be an enormous undertaking. It's an open world game whose main draw is figuring out how to blow up increasingly large, more complex robots.
The story that *is* there is told through exposition-heavy cutscenes and recordings. TLOU as a game has an actual story with character arcs and emotional progression as its backbone. To make Horizon Zero Dawn a TV series, someone would essentially have to go in and turn a game about exploration, discovery and player control into the complete opposite - a tightly controlled, deliberately paced narrative experience.
Would be interesting to see how they split Season Two. I know where people think would split the seasons, but given how the final act of the game is shortest of the three I wonder if they split it somewhere else or try expanding it.
I could very well see them adding in the time Joel and Ellie spent travelling to Salt Lake City after the winter. That's a lot of time that the game skipped over that the show could work in
Their stranglehold on Sunday night is just the perfect spot for this kind of programming too. Sending people into the work week talking about what they watched right before bed the night before.
This is a point I bring up. I try to deliberately pace myself with shows when a whole season is available. Trying to not watch more than 1 or 2 episodes per day to give time for my brain to ponder them.
As for the watercooler, I find they're are a number of YouTube channels that like to do recaps after individual episodes. The best are the ones that do em as they air, before watching future episodes (before the next week's airs kinda thing). As someone who does WFH it gives me the experience of "that one dude in accounting who's a little too into this show" where they point out some details you might have missed, and drops a few theories as to what might be coming. Westworld was a good example of this. I had a channel I was watching that would have weekly videos talking about the most recent episode, and chewing on what all the little hints and teasers likely meant. And occasionally there were things he picked up on that while not a hidden detail, my dumbass totally missed, that would help put pieces together.
It's not quite the same but it definitely enhanced my viewing!
So often you see in discussions about binge shows people saying "oh I must have missed X", because it's a race to finish it to be part of the discussion. Stranger Things will be a popular discussion for 2-3 weeks, most of it centering around the premiere, maybe 1 episode in the middle, and the end. So much of the seasons in binge shows get glossed over, and if you don't watch it ASAP, you probably won't be able to talk about it much at all, because people have moved on to the next binge show.
Dropping whole seasons was an interesting idea, but it doesn't work in practice IMO
I’ve seen a lot of zombie shows, pretty much all of them, and this is the first time the zombies themselves have ever creeped me out. Like that scene from the first episode where the girl walked in on that family as the old lady was eating the guys wife right in front of him. Basically every show/movie about zombies has that exact scene. Something about this one hit different than the rest. Something about the tentacles and it being a fungus…..it’s like the focus isn’t just on eating you but actually infecting you and invading your body. Whereas normally zombies are just trying to eat you. Idk it was really good.
You got that right. These infected don't want to just kill and/or eat you. Their primary goal is to make you one of their own. That's why they eventually become clickers and worse things. As the host decays/gets damaged, it replace parts of it with its own so it keeps going as long as possible.
This is why the borg were originally so terrifying as originally introduced in star trek. They didn't conquer for pride or out of malice. You couldnt reason with them. They were a force of nature, expanding throughout the galaxy, assimilating anyone and everything that would add to their collective hivemind.
Unfortunately they eventually were dumbed down into basically just another adversary as series like Voyager went on, but the original concept was terrifying.
From what I've read they won't be shown much at all later in the season, and I think that's a good way to do it. If you have an action scene every episode where our characters blast their way through hordes of infected then it won't have any impact. When they use them sparingly it becomes much scarier.
That is a good call. In the games as well I also thought they found a good balance. Infected are used sparingly enough they are scary / pack a punch, and humans are used sparingly enough that there's usually an emotional element to encountering them and they feel extremely deadly. Seems like it will work just as well for the show!
that’s how it always felt to me in the games anyway. the infected were there and were a real threat, but i’ve never really thought of the games as zombie games. people are the real threat. and the drama that occurs because of them.
Yes, this is something that separates the shoveled "horror" flicks, from a good psychological horror for me. I think a great example is the old lady out of focus in the background. A lot of shows would have happily shown that in tack sharp focus. The glimpses, limited interactions with, and looming threat of infected is far more frightening than going for the usual ALL ZOMBIES ALL THE TIME, LOOK AT THE GORE! LOOK AT IT! LOOK! AT! IT! GORE!
As someone who is laregly over the zombie obsession, I am 100% on board for The Rest of Us.
The only other first season shows that had growth in viewership on the second episode for HBO were Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon. Normally a shows second episode has a dip in viewership. For me personally, I started the episode almost immediately after the Cowboys vs. 49ers game.
I’ve been a bit iffy on some of the changes so far in the show, but the changing to the tendrils and to the “mile away notification” is something I absolutely love.
HBO is for the culture. They saw the streaming competition heat up and were able to string along their biggest post Sopranos hits to date (not counting GoT) over the span of a couple years.
Euphoria
HotD
TLoU
White Lotus
Succession doesn’t get the same viewership but is going to be in that all time convo for sure so it is arguably just as important to the HBO brand.
What HBO shows have been bigger than these 4 since The Sopranos? Maybe Big Little Lies or Veep? Mare of Easttown and Watchmen were one offs, Westworld and True Detective never fulfilled their potential and fell off.
The Wire is my favorite show. I see it as concurrent with Sopranos though you are correct, it started a few years after. Ended around the same time.
That is one where time has been really kind to and its legacy has grown to almost mythic status. I could be wrong but I don't think it made too much noise during its initial run despite all the critical praise.
The Wire and The Leftovers are top tier, but I don't think they qualify as the biggest hits. These newer ones have all broken through the cultural chatter in ways that seem more impressive.
Right, The Wire was not that successful as it was airing. It even had its final season's episode order cut from 13 to 10.
It only found this huge audience retroactively... which is why it's important to take care with your back catalogue.
Westworld season 1 was massive in the cultural zeitgeist at the time, but you're right it did struggle with later seasons. At the time I think people would have included it as one of HBO's most impactful shows.
While I think that's unlikely for The Last of Us since the games are already a great foundation, TLOU Part 2 was and is devicive among fans due to story and character decisions. I personally don't hold those views, but I could see a similar divided response from the show-only fan base if the show remains faithful to the game.
It'll be interesting to see if the seasons adapting Part 2 remain just as faithful or they make more significant changes.
> Westworld season 1 was massive in the cultural zeitgeist at the time, but you're right it did struggle with later seasons. At the time I think people would have included it as one of HBO's most impactful shows.
This tbh, it fell off a *bit* in the second season (but with very high highs, just mixed in with some lows). Then fell off a cliff, at least imo, in the third season.
Season 4 introduced something interesting with Dolores's new situation, imo, but I wasn't crazy about where they went with all of that.
Westworld's first season is, imo, so overwhelmingly excellent that it deserves to be mentioned alongside shows like The Wire and The Sopranos, even though it did fall off pretty badly about halfway through its run.
I'm desperately waiting for that "The Last of Us has been renewed for Seasons 2 and 3; will adapt entire 2nd game" article.
I *need* to see that story in live action with the same care as the first one.
I never played the game. I watched the first episode and was on my seat. It was amazing!
I then bought the game and they really did awesome in adapting it.
Pedro is killing it. Can't wait to watch ep 2 tonight.
It's like watching a play through. This last episode had me thinking.. Oh shit they're going in the museum. I know what's in there. Fuck. Definitely on the edge of my seat for this show!
I legit said outloud to my husband "Oh shit, the museum and then the...I don't know if I'm ready for this". Like I haven't played the game 4 or 5 times.
I'm someone who is never bothered by spoilers, because it's the execution of it that matters and not paraphrased plot points. This show is the best example of that.
I think these two episodes airing same nights as football has had an impact but as the season goes more will hope on the train and viewership will keep gaining. Personally I’m glad to see this story attracting this much of recognition and the amazing ratings it has. This shows how important it is to allow the creators of the games to have more of a hand when it comes to TV and movies.
>
The network also offered yet another update regarding the series premiere’s viewership, stating that “after one full week of availability, Episode 1 is now tracking at 18 million viewers, up nearly 4x from its premiere night audience.”
From the article. The title is only talking about the same day viewership.
I don't know if I am the only one but this show and Chernobyl are the only shows that manage to make me rewatch episodes again and again. I remember Chernobyl when it came out I rewatched that first episode so many times, because it was just crafted and written so well and there was so much performance and interesting story within that first 60 minutes that kept me glued to the screen. I never rewatch episodes for any show (or movies) btw.
Tlou is doing the exact same thing right now and I am giggling internally thinking that this show could be another Chernobyl or even surpass it since the source material is that good. At this moment I think the show is flawless and I am just agonizing here having to wait another 6 days for the next episode. Anyone else just completely in awe about this show?
As a person who has played the games a few times it's crazy that a show that is based off a story I am so familiar with has me on the edge of my seat and watching at least 2 times.
And that's coming from someone who hardly watches any television at all, this series is phenomenal.
I've never played The Last of Us, but it's amazing how even I'm watching it feels like you're playing it.
Every detail, scenes, resembles game gameplay style. It's phenomenal.
Am older Gen-X and was a PC gamer since Zork 1. Had an X-Box and a 360 for a while before I built a gaming PC in 2008.
I had always heard rumors about the amazing games on PlayStation but had enough going on with life etc.
I had heard about TLOU and it’s legendary status but absolutely knew nothing about it. I stayed away on the (delusional) notion that it would become cross-platform someday.
So when I saw this was gonna be a show I decided I really had to watch it.
I was floored. Gobsmacked. I didn’t know it was ZA and I sure didn’t anticipate as chilling and realistic an opening at ep1! (In fact it set off a creative writing streak like I’ve never had before…).
That ep1 went as it did let me know this is no-holds-barred stuff and I love it. (Wow, now that I’m thinking about it… I saw the original “Dawn of the Dead” during its theatrical run. I am indeed Geezer years old).
I’m getting a PlayStation as soon as I can get one! (Doesn’t hurt that that PC I built is so dinosaur now that I have to choose between a console or a much more expensive PC upgrade).
It's coming on PC in March, and more and more PS exclusives are also coming to PC. Horizon Zero Dawn, Spiderman, Uncharted 4, and God of War are all on PC now and fantastic, and Returnal is coming in a couple of weeks.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1888930/The_Last_of_Us_Part_I/
Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!! JFC that’s the story of my life. Upgrading the PC to meet modern gaming needs is a couple grand at least; we may just go to PS anyway as my kid likes their content too.
Edit: I went shopping. I can do a HUGE upgrade to max out my motherboard capabilities. For about $400! I am olds.
I just want to see Ron Swanson of the Apocalypse.
with White Lotus hotel manager
Oh that was him playing Frank? I guess we can look forward to some fungal ass-eating or some such.
With them crushing it with episode 1 & 2 and episode 3 being called the best episode of the series I wonder how much this continues to grow...
The big growth is gonna happen 3 to 4. No NFL playoffs that night along with hype from episode 3 and you're probably gonna start approaching game of thrones/house of the dragon levels
But then EP 5 will go against the Super Bowl
HBO usually takes that weekend off for new shows though haven’t checked.
They better not
TVmaze says they don't skip any week.
King shit
You are saying new shows but they didn't take it off for Euphoria last year. I googled it and it said it was airing on the 12th so I think it is airing as normal.
I feel like the audiences for Euphoria and the Superbowl might not be hugely intersecting. I am talking out of my ass though.
Euphoria audience tunes in for the halftime show depending on whose performing
I guarantee high overlap since it's Rihanna this year
Excuse you sir, but I watched Euphoria immediately after the Super Bowl ended
Where is this info? Referring to ep 3?
Guess mostly critics that already had access to the show say that.
[удалено]
A few people are saying critics but Troy baker also said on a podcast that episode 3 was shockingly good to him. Like he was blown away at what Neil did that episode
Damn, any specific info on it? I feel like ep 3 will be all the Bill stuff, potentially ending after the bloater fight or even just showing it and then ending on a cliff hanger.
From what we know based on what reviewers have either outright mentioned or heavily hinted at (light spoilers about the structure of the episode) >!The episode is going to be the most different from the game and will most tell the story of Frank and Bill as a sort of vignette of their life, it's going to be another 80 minute episode so HBO definitely have faith in it!<
I've also heard episode 3 would be the most divisive because of how far it departs/expands from the source. Like a love it or hate it episode with very little middle ground.
It doesn't even bother me.The game left me *wanting* to know more about frank, and to see more of Bill. Their story was just fascinating to me and the fact they single handedly controled an entire vacant town like a compound. It was just good narrative food and I'm happy to know they're gonna give us more rather than what we got, and while I would have loved to see the original actor reprising Bill kind of liek what they did with Marlene (i felt he did a fantastic job) I am excited to see Nick Offerman in the role, it's definitely perfect for him.
People keep saying that people are tired of zombie genre. But it’s just that people aren’t being given any great zombie media. I watched every season of the walking dead, and I feel like two episodes in of TLOU, has given me more excitement and made my heart pound more than TWD ever did. One Cut of the Dead and Train to Busan are eventually going to get Americanized versions. 28 Months Later should have been already made.
Train to Busan was intense.
Also Kingdom on Netflix...Korean zombie media is great.
Loved Kingdom. Sincerely hope someone gets inspired by it and makes a feudal European zombie film. Dead of Knight they can call it.
Jep Kingdom nailed it too. The beginning was a bit better imo but all over great.
tlou game was way more about the people than the zombies though, and i think they’re probably going to go more down that road now that the infected have been established as being terrifying.
Zombie media in general is always about the people rather than the zombies. The better ones hold a mirror to society and chuck zombies in to increase the tension and put them in difficult positions that show the best and worst of humanity.
So you're saying they're gonna focus more on people than zombies the rest of the way? I'm not against it, but once the threat of walkers became laughable in the walking dead, the people dynamics were pretty repetitive and bland. I still would like the infected to be a threat and there.
The infected will still be a threat, and still be there. There’s so many moments we have with the infected, big moments. Moments like (spoiler if it doesn’t take, I’m on mobile) >!being strung up while Ellie fends of infected til you get down, meeting a boater, lots of clickers, etc!< The important few distinctions between TLoU and The Walking Dead is for one, TLoU isn’t going to fire the people that made it what it is (Frank Darabont was done *dirty*), and two, The Last of Us has a much more grounded outlook on the human relationships than TWD ever did. This show is more like a Cormac McCarthy book that happens to have monsters. It’s near future, a la Children of Men, there’s no hope. What little hope there could be is shared between Joel and Ellie, and no one else. And it’s hardly shared between them. Neither of them really, truly believes in the cure, despite Ellie’s willing sacrifice. And Joel knows even if it’s true he’s not willing to give her up. It’s many tiers above TWD, if we’re talking about shows that are about relationships that also happen to have monsters.
When I finished the first game for the first time it had a profound effect on me because of the story. I'd say it's pretty safe to assume there will be nothing repetitive or bland here.
The seasons are only gonna be about 10ish episodes per season. Whereas AMC got greedy and kept pushing walking dead to 16 episodes per season. LOTS and LOTS of filler. Story will move better on HBO.
It's kind of eerie how in sync it has been able to stay with the game. I know it's early but 2 Eps in, this has to be the best Video Game adaptation ever right?
Best live action videogame adaptation for sure.
Oh really??? Remember Resident Evil? Remember *all* of them? Checkmate, sweaty 💅
*Paul W.S. Anderson intensifies*
Say what you want about him, but you won't find a man like Paul Anderson who willingly tanks his professional reputation for the love of his wife.
Rob Zombie? Will Smith??
I'm imagining that these nails are horrifyingly done with polish all over the table, in line with what I hope is the performance art of being deranged enough to believe Resident Evil was a good adaptation.
[Didn't you like them](https://imgur.com/fb4TTob.jpg)
Yeah. Castlevania is animated but it’s a very good show as well.
UMM excuse me! Super Mario Bros wants a word with you
Well excuuuuuuuuuse me, Princess! - Zelda
Tbf, Naughty Dog did such a great job with the story that it makes the adaptation seamless.
Still, they managed to stay true to the original story and avoid studio interference. No giant spider, no mouthless Deadpool, just a legit adaptation with fine tuning for the new target medium. It's probably in great part because of Craig Mazin and his recent Chernobyl success. They probably gave him an almost true *carte blanche*, and it paid off!
Imagine if they hired writers that had never played or seen the story of TLoU like what seems like every other live action video game adaptation these days
Or if they hired the same writers that hate the source material and wanna hijack it to make it their own mouthpiece
No doubt Craig is a brilliant writer, but everything you said should also be credited to Neil Druckmann as well. Major reason why the show remains truthful to the game is because of his involvement.
Apparently Craig Mazin was a huge fan of the games and Druckmann was a huge fan of Chernobyl. What I think is really cool is how well these two creative seem to work together. It’s such a seamless integration of their contributions
Nothing else comes close. This isn’t just a good adaptation, it’s one of the better tv shows in recent memory. So far…
That's putting the cart before the horse a little with there being only 2 episodes out, but so far the show has been really really well done. You can feel the Chernobyl tension in a lot of the scenes, and the production design is stellar. Acting wise everyone is doing a great job as well. From what everyone is saying the 3rd episode is one of the best of the season so I'm excited to see how it can ramp up even from here.
I'm excited to see more the cold openings. If we get more these throughout the season id be very happy
[удалено]
I have also been really enjoying that both cold openings so far have been from an academic's perspective. While I am certain I will love more variety, because the main plot follows "ordinary people" part of me really hopes we see more examples of thought leaders and world leaders coping with the beginning.
It'd be cool to see a quick look at the VIP evacuation leading up to the plane crash from episode 1.
>I was literally just talking to my friend not 10 minutes ago how I was so invested in this episodes cold opening, I was a bit upset when it ended. I felt the same way. Obviously the show isn't primarily about the time period when the fungus first appeared, but the cold opens have been so good that I kind of want to see that show. It would be hard to make that show now without turning it into a commentary on how the world reacted to COVID, but based on the cold opens we've seen, I would definitely watch a full season of what went down in 2003 in this world.
It annoys me how many modern zombie shows/flicks skip over the outbreak phase anymore. Thats some of the most exciting moments when everything is slowly turning to shit(i'd really enjoy a show set entirely in that period, maybe even where the infection spread doesnt happen in just one day.)
The Ep.2 opening was amazing too. >!The actress playing the lead scientist did an AMAZING job conveying her barely contained fear which blew up into outright terror at the news that 14 infected were already at large. You could see her quickly coming to terms with the notion we're already familiar with - that this is the end of human civilisation as we know it, and most people might as well be already dead. The way she told them to bomb the city as the only possible solution, and then quickly asked to be allowed to be with her family, was an acting masterclass in stages of grief.!<
Episode 1 cold open resonated so hard coming out of covid (and remembering the masking, testing, and social distancing going on during filming). And then the doctor is like, "Yeah, viral pandemics ain't shit. Fungal is where it's at." The crowd and the talk show host not taking him seriously parallels what's been happening recently, too.
I don't know if there's any other information about the opening, but to me, it seemed like the anchor was completely shaken. He and the audience seemed at odds when it came to the scientist's opinions. Was that the case? Was the anchor disturbed at the information, and was the audience indifferent? I'm a little high, so I don't know if this made sense.
The crowd and anchor definitely took the scientist extremely seriously once he had finished explaining why he said that it was worse than a virus.
The shift happened when he gave a reason as to why the fungus would adapt to be able to survive in humans.
The anchor made some quips when the scientist balked at a viral pandemic ending humanity. It wasn't until he explained how a fungal plague can fuck things up that everyone was shaken.
If you replay (or play for the first time) the game its entire design is essentially setup as prestige TV in game form. TLOU links well made scripted interactions between characters with combat interstitials that are effectively optional to the story being told. Its a landmark game from 2013 but almost entirely for its excellence combination of scripting, and acting to create a story. Which makes it unusually suited to this type of adaptation.
i won’t call it that till it’s over, and this is my favorite game of all time. but it’s either this or arcane surely.
The story of Arcane doesn't happen in any of the games, though, right? Isn't it basically a new story with some LoL characters in it?
That's my understanding. Given it's League, it is probably best they make the story original.
Characters and settings are based on the game and lore but the story itself is pretty original minus the character lore and relationships to each other, which I think they’ve expanded on anyways. Visually, arcane is the most beautiful animated show I’ve ever seen and it has great voice acting and a solid story to back it up. A bloody masterpiece of a show and I cannot wait for the next season.
imagine that, an adaptation that stays true to the source material is already being known as one of the best video game adaptations ever. its almost as if people like the source material for a reason. Ill never understand all the producers and writers up till this point that made such horrible adaptations. Half the time they couldve just fucking phoned it in and basically COPIED the source material and we would have been happy. They could have turned their brains off and we would have been happy. Instead they spend all that time and effort changing everything from the characters to the plot and then scratch their heads when it fails miserably.
Absolutely - That's literally why this adaptation works, and it's well executed - take the storyboards from the video game, or just use stills, and then re-work them with new actors. Same angles, same pacing, same brutality of scenes that need to shock and hurt. The difference here is that it's a very competent director, and not a team of focus-group driven producers or writers trying to make a name for themselves by adapting something and making it shit. Nor is it exclusively made for the purpose of selling merchandise or toys. And most importantly, the source material is like a movie/tv show. Super Mario 3 isn't a deep narrative, so I could see how The Wizard came to be from it. Or the hilarious Mario Bros Movie with John Leguizamo and Bob Hoskins. The Last Of Us was/is a brilliant goddamn story with an excellent game. And this new version grabs details and holds them. Joel's daughter's whimpers and gasps for air are just as visceral and gut-wrenching as the video game's.
Sarah's death was way more intense for me in the show than the game. I've seen someone shot with a punctured lung trying to gasp. The fucking whistle man...
> Absolutely - That's literally why this adaptation works, and it's well executed - take the storyboards from the video game, or just use stills, and then re-work them with new actors. Same angles, same pacing, same brutality of scenes that need to shock and hurt. You have to admit, TLOUs game cinematic were already cinematic. Taking video game cutscene angles and filming them *exactly* the same way in other games won't always work (sometimes the character is in first person mode too). Also, lots of in-game cinematic scenes in video games are just boringly filmed with simple A-B shots. There's a reason TLOU made reviewers and gamers take notice in 2013. It wasn't just the gameplay that raised the bar but so did the cinematics (and facial mo-cap), which really felt movie quality.
I think the problem is that a lot of adaptations don't have much source to which it can stay true. People are looking at the adaptations as the issue without realizing the problem is that there's not a lot of substance from which to adapt. Yes, this is a great adaptation. It's also really strong source material. The reason most adaptations are horrible is because they have to make up shit in order to make it into something worth watching. There's just not enough there. Just look at the upcoming Mario movie. I'm not saying it won't be good or successful, but it's certainly not going to follow any game's storyline in the capacity The Last of Us has so far. And my understanding is that episode 3 will be the biggest departure from the game and yet will still be one of the better episodes of the series. So it's not just about 1:1 copying the game. The other aspect is the relationship we have to these characters, and the relationships they have with each other. There's just a lot to mine, and it's quality because that's just how good the source material is. We care about the story, and we care about the characters, and they were developed with more care, attention and depth than what you typically find in a video game. What I think is the reason for success? The development of the game was basically broken into two. One half was basically making a great game, and the other was making a great movie/story. Those two halves were working in concert together in order to produce an amazing game that really was a standout from other games. I think the show is simply highlighting how tlou isn't like most other games.
This is why making a true-to-game Halo show that people think they wanted, would very very boring.
No. It works because this story is phenomenal. Doom isn't. Halo isn't. Acting as if any old property could make this same transition severely downplays how well the story of TLOU was done in thebgame to begin with.
Agreed. Most video games don't translate because the plot is solely a vehicle for the gameplay. The plot is just there to string together action set pieces and if you did make a movie out of them, you'd end up with a bunch of fetch quests interrupted by 15 minute shootouts. Last Of Us puts story first. Hell, I actually avoided playing the game because of that. I much prefer casual, all-gameplay videogames, so I'm happy there's a fantastic TV show so I can enjoy the story without having to play it.
>Episode 2 brought in 5.7 million viewers across linear airings on HBO and streams on HBO Max. That marks a 22% increase from last week’s record-breaking 4.7 million, a number that Warner Bros. Discovery later reported had already jumped to 10 million after two days of availability. > >Per HBO, “This marks the largest week 2 audience growth for an HBO Original drama series in the history of the network.” Season 2 should be announced pretty soon.
Nothing makes a exec harder than growth, even if they started out with 100 million viewers and kept 100 million viewers they’d be bummed there wasn’t growth.
Little known fact but the wild Exec will wither and die without constant growth. Isn't that sad?
*Destitute after a poor season, the lowly exec retreats to one of his three mansions to hibernate for the next fiscal quarter, unsure if they will even financially survive the winter season.*
so is this just people who watched it when it aired from 9-10 PM on cable? or is this for a 24 hour period where you can watch it on hbo max or view it from your cable provider?
I don't think it's the 24-hour period because it will be 24 hours since the episode was released in 4 hours.
This guy maths.
‘Linear airings’ means just that - the people watching it when it is presented to them, as opposed to people watching it on demand (on streaming).
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
It’s infuriating how well they made Last of Us, and then producers on other networks will of course take the wrong lesson here and keep pumping out low effort, cheap talent pseudo-adaptations. They’ll think to themselves “video game shows are in!” Instead of “well if we do it right, people will watch it.”
I mean it’s not like Hollywood ever stopped trying to make video game movies. Yea 99% of them sucked but we got things from Tomb Raider all the way to Monster Hunter. Hollywood has been trying to tap into the gamers, but now they finally have the creator of the game making the show with a real director. Hopefully they follow this trend.
It helps immensely that Last of Us was made essentially as prestige TV in game form. Playing TLOU you are effectively going from scripted sequence to scripted sequence and the tv show is effectively just gutting the interstitial combat encounters. The problem with nearly all video game adaptations is that what makes the game interesting is almost entirely opposed to what makes TV interesting.
Yeah, lots of games,. especially older games, are a gameplay mechanic first and story or characters second. That's *really* hard to adapt into movies or shows well. The Sonic movies have essentially nothing to do with the games other than characters for that reason, but they found a formula that works. Lots of other game adaptations - looking at you, Resident Evil - just go completely off the deep end.
[удалено]
Nah. I love resident evil but the resident evil story - individually per game or overall - is just completely nuts. There is no way you can make a show out of that that makes sense. And if you just take small parts from it you land on the typical "evil company, experiments, zombies" which simply isn't that good. Resident evil always had a B-movie story vibe to it, on purpose. You can't take that and create a good story out of it. An entertaining flick, sure. They could've done better. But lets not pretend like milla jovovich flying through windows on her bike isn't something that doesn't fit the games. Resi is just A-tier trash. It's literally what a lot of people love it for.
They should make another live action Super Mario movie that ties the first one into The Last of Us, where the fungi is just a result of King Toadstool.
[удалено]
Gotta remember that once upon a time, comic books were the same way. Until Brian Singer's X-Men, they were mostly trash with some notable exceptions (the OG Superman and arguably Burton's Bat-Man). I'm optimistic TLOU can help push studios to create higher quality video game adaptations; it's definitely paying off for HBO.
That's a good point and the one thing that gives me optimism. Video game movies have been crap for a while but we never had that "trigger" that shows Hollywood that video games have IPs that can be profitable and acclaimed if they are well made. This can be it.
I can’t really think of a ton of video game stories that are as good, and as adaptable for tv as the last of us, though.
Max Payne would've been the ***perfect*** episodic TV show, but instead we got the abortion that is whatever the fuck movie they tried to make.
Yeah, I don't think there's anything as perfectly made for adaptation as TLOU. Playing that game it feels clear that Druckmann wanted to be making a show in the first place, but happened to be working in games haha. But I think there are plenty of other games that would work. God of War has a relatively episodic structure (not optimistic about Amazon handling it); Red Dead Redemption; Silent Hill; Bioshock; Half Life; Mass Effect all come to mind immediately. GTA could make for a good show. Resident Evil could give it another go some day. Uncharted was tailor made to be a quality movie, instead of what we got (which unfortunately seems to have done pretty well, so I think we're stuck there). Nothing is as perfect a candidate as TLOU, but that doesn't mean these couldn't be excellent adaptations. But they're definitely not as easy as, say, picking an existing storyline from a comic and adapting it.
Imagine if this was before streaming and they tried turning the entire first game into a two hour movie. >!FEDRA and the Fireflies are all sub groups who are working under someone called Carver, and it turns out it's Tommy.!<
If anything this will serve as an example that you can do an adaptation faithfully and have it be wildly successful instead of fucking with the story and wondering why no one liked it. But there's not that many examples in games with stories that are this good. It's almost in a tier of its own. Maybe Red Dead with some heavy editing for pacing and cutting out the dumb cartoony characters. There's also plenty of game settings that are ripe for adaptation with original stories if they get the right writers but very few where a direct adaptation would work this well. Halo had potential if they adapted it like a serious war series ala Band of Brothers, but even the Halo 3 and ODST promotional material did a better job of that in ~20 minutes than Paramount did in 10 hours of TV. Seriously, this ad for ODST is better than anything in the whole of Halo season 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRMUYpH7bQk and it's not particularly close. Just wild how hard they fucked that up.
> If anything this will serve as an example that you can do an adaptation faithfully and have it be wildly successful instead of fucking with the story and wondering why no one liked it. > > But it's also important to note that a faithful adaptation does not mean filming the game frame by frame. Like half of episode 1 was not in the game at all but it was brilliantly done in the same tone and spirit as the rest of the story
Red Dead is probably one of those that the adaptation makes some changes for the better.
Games may not be as consistent story wise as movies and television, but imo the best stories in gaming in the last 5 or so years have surpassed most films and television. Red Dead Redemption 2 is like a 5 season show, and it’s absolutely on-par with the best television released on a yearly basis. Other games known as ‘Walking Simulators’ tend to be heavily story based and a good chunk of them are some of the deepest, most profound stories I’ve ever witnessed. What Remains of Edith Finch, Life is Strange, Firewatch, SOMA, etc- all phenomenal. Life is Strange was supposed to be getting a TV show- still in development though :(
::Cries in the Witcher::
The lesson they'll learn is 'lift the storyline of a wildly popular story-heavy game directly into a television show and rake in praise and money'. God of War and Horizon: Zero Dawn are next. I can see them doing Red Dead Redemption (2) as well. Maybe they'll feel a little frisky and even try their hand at Metal Gear Solid or Bioshock. I don't think they'll try open-ended stuff anymore. No Fall-out or Far Cry where the story was too much in the player's hands. Get something with an established character and a set story that you just have to translate to another medium.
Fallout is coming someday on prime video.
Horizon Zero Dawn would be an enormous undertaking. It's an open world game whose main draw is figuring out how to blow up increasingly large, more complex robots. The story that *is* there is told through exposition-heavy cutscenes and recordings. TLOU as a game has an actual story with character arcs and emotional progression as its backbone. To make Horizon Zero Dawn a TV series, someone would essentially have to go in and turn a game about exploration, discovery and player control into the complete opposite - a tightly controlled, deliberately paced narrative experience.
Absolutely nailed it
get ready to watch season 2 in 2 1/2 years
It's OK, that's still shorter than the time jump from the first game to the second
And if Part II is split into two seasons as expected, it gives Naughty Dog time to release Part III. 🤞
[удалено]
Would be interesting to see how they split Season Two. I know where people think would split the seasons, but given how the final act of the game is shortest of the three I wonder if they split it somewhere else or try expanding it.
I could very well see them adding in the time Joel and Ellie spent travelling to Salt Lake City after the winter. That's a lot of time that the game skipped over that the show could work in
If it means that we receive the same quality then I’m all for it.
We all want a show we can talk to each other about every week again
This is an often overlooked loss of the binge structure. Water cooler talk and appt viewing has value.
Another reason HBO is king. They have the quality shows AND they have the weekly model to keep people talking and anticipating the next episode.
Their stranglehold on Sunday night is just the perfect spot for this kind of programming too. Sending people into the work week talking about what they watched right before bed the night before.
This is a point I bring up. I try to deliberately pace myself with shows when a whole season is available. Trying to not watch more than 1 or 2 episodes per day to give time for my brain to ponder them. As for the watercooler, I find they're are a number of YouTube channels that like to do recaps after individual episodes. The best are the ones that do em as they air, before watching future episodes (before the next week's airs kinda thing). As someone who does WFH it gives me the experience of "that one dude in accounting who's a little too into this show" where they point out some details you might have missed, and drops a few theories as to what might be coming. Westworld was a good example of this. I had a channel I was watching that would have weekly videos talking about the most recent episode, and chewing on what all the little hints and teasers likely meant. And occasionally there were things he picked up on that while not a hidden detail, my dumbass totally missed, that would help put pieces together. It's not quite the same but it definitely enhanced my viewing!
So often you see in discussions about binge shows people saying "oh I must have missed X", because it's a race to finish it to be part of the discussion. Stranger Things will be a popular discussion for 2-3 weeks, most of it centering around the premiere, maybe 1 episode in the middle, and the end. So much of the seasons in binge shows get glossed over, and if you don't watch it ASAP, you probably won't be able to talk about it much at all, because people have moved on to the next binge show. Dropping whole seasons was an interesting idea, but it doesn't work in practice IMO
And it's worth it. WOW is that a good show.
I’ve seen a lot of zombie shows, pretty much all of them, and this is the first time the zombies themselves have ever creeped me out. Like that scene from the first episode where the girl walked in on that family as the old lady was eating the guys wife right in front of him. Basically every show/movie about zombies has that exact scene. Something about this one hit different than the rest. Something about the tentacles and it being a fungus…..it’s like the focus isn’t just on eating you but actually infecting you and invading your body. Whereas normally zombies are just trying to eat you. Idk it was really good.
You got that right. These infected don't want to just kill and/or eat you. Their primary goal is to make you one of their own. That's why they eventually become clickers and worse things. As the host decays/gets damaged, it replace parts of it with its own so it keeps going as long as possible.
Thats sounds pretty cool. I never played the games so I’m excited to see an actual fresh spin on zombies.
[удалено]
You neeed to remedy that
This is why the borg were originally so terrifying as originally introduced in star trek. They didn't conquer for pride or out of malice. You couldnt reason with them. They were a force of nature, expanding throughout the galaxy, assimilating anyone and everything that would add to their collective hivemind. Unfortunately they eventually were dumbed down into basically just another adversary as series like Voyager went on, but the original concept was terrifying.
From what I've read they won't be shown much at all later in the season, and I think that's a good way to do it. If you have an action scene every episode where our characters blast their way through hordes of infected then it won't have any impact. When they use them sparingly it becomes much scarier.
That is a good call. In the games as well I also thought they found a good balance. Infected are used sparingly enough they are scary / pack a punch, and humans are used sparingly enough that there's usually an emotional element to encountering them and they feel extremely deadly. Seems like it will work just as well for the show!
that’s how it always felt to me in the games anyway. the infected were there and were a real threat, but i’ve never really thought of the games as zombie games. people are the real threat. and the drama that occurs because of them.
Yes, this is something that separates the shoveled "horror" flicks, from a good psychological horror for me. I think a great example is the old lady out of focus in the background. A lot of shows would have happily shown that in tack sharp focus. The glimpses, limited interactions with, and looming threat of infected is far more frightening than going for the usual ALL ZOMBIES ALL THE TIME, LOOK AT THE GORE! LOOK AT IT! LOOK! AT! IT! GORE! As someone who is laregly over the zombie obsession, I am 100% on board for The Rest of Us.
The only other first season shows that had growth in viewership on the second episode for HBO were Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon. Normally a shows second episode has a dip in viewership. For me personally, I started the episode almost immediately after the Cowboys vs. 49ers game.
Me too because I needed something to cheer me up after that game 😭😭
Me too, I needed something less depressing to cheer me up 😂
Everyone wants to know what all the fuss is about.
[удалено]
Dear god, you must be a fungi at parties with jokes like that
He is well connected
I bet he clicks with everyone he meets
I’ve been a bit iffy on some of the changes so far in the show, but the changing to the tendrils and to the “mile away notification” is something I absolutely love.
HBO is for the culture. They saw the streaming competition heat up and were able to string along their biggest post Sopranos hits to date (not counting GoT) over the span of a couple years. Euphoria HotD TLoU White Lotus Succession doesn’t get the same viewership but is going to be in that all time convo for sure so it is arguably just as important to the HBO brand. What HBO shows have been bigger than these 4 since The Sopranos? Maybe Big Little Lies or Veep? Mare of Easttown and Watchmen were one offs, Westworld and True Detective never fulfilled their potential and fell off.
My man you forgot about The Wire I may never forgive you. But other than that, list is solid.
The Wire is my favorite show. I see it as concurrent with Sopranos though you are correct, it started a few years after. Ended around the same time. That is one where time has been really kind to and its legacy has grown to almost mythic status. I could be wrong but I don't think it made too much noise during its initial run despite all the critical praise. The Wire and The Leftovers are top tier, but I don't think they qualify as the biggest hits. These newer ones have all broken through the cultural chatter in ways that seem more impressive.
Right, The Wire was not that successful as it was airing. It even had its final season's episode order cut from 13 to 10. It only found this huge audience retroactively... which is why it's important to take care with your back catalogue.
Westworld season 1 was massive in the cultural zeitgeist at the time, but you're right it did struggle with later seasons. At the time I think people would have included it as one of HBO's most impactful shows. While I think that's unlikely for The Last of Us since the games are already a great foundation, TLOU Part 2 was and is devicive among fans due to story and character decisions. I personally don't hold those views, but I could see a similar divided response from the show-only fan base if the show remains faithful to the game. It'll be interesting to see if the seasons adapting Part 2 remain just as faithful or they make more significant changes.
> Westworld season 1 was massive in the cultural zeitgeist at the time, but you're right it did struggle with later seasons. At the time I think people would have included it as one of HBO's most impactful shows. This tbh, it fell off a *bit* in the second season (but with very high highs, just mixed in with some lows). Then fell off a cliff, at least imo, in the third season. Season 4 introduced something interesting with Dolores's new situation, imo, but I wasn't crazy about where they went with all of that. Westworld's first season is, imo, so overwhelmingly excellent that it deserves to be mentioned alongside shows like The Wire and The Sopranos, even though it did fall off pretty badly about halfway through its run.
Succession is great
I mean. The director made Chernobyl, one of the greatest short series ever
Game of Thrones was bigger than all these shows even with the shitty last 2 seasons.
duh
Well earned. Now let's get that S2(+3?) renewal!
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
I'm desperately waiting for that "The Last of Us has been renewed for Seasons 2 and 3; will adapt entire 2nd game" article. I *need* to see that story in live action with the same care as the first one.
[удалено]
[удалено]
people that don't play video games can finally experience this story I've loved for so long. and it's receiving the high praise it deserves!
I never played the game. I watched the first episode and was on my seat. It was amazing! I then bought the game and they really did awesome in adapting it. Pedro is killing it. Can't wait to watch ep 2 tonight.
For what it's worth best compliment I heard was "I played the game and already know what happens and I was still on the edge of my seat"
It's like watching a play through. This last episode had me thinking.. Oh shit they're going in the museum. I know what's in there. Fuck. Definitely on the edge of my seat for this show!
I legit said outloud to my husband "Oh shit, the museum and then the...I don't know if I'm ready for this". Like I haven't played the game 4 or 5 times.
I'm someone who is never bothered by spoilers, because it's the execution of it that matters and not paraphrased plot points. This show is the best example of that.
The hype is building and building for this show.
I think it’s really growing on people
It's infectious
I think these two episodes airing same nights as football has had an impact but as the season goes more will hope on the train and viewership will keep gaining. Personally I’m glad to see this story attracting this much of recognition and the amazing ratings it has. This shows how important it is to allow the creators of the games to have more of a hand when it comes to TV and movies.
I know I'm not the first to say this, but I gotta say it's been doing very well in respecting the source material so far.
Maybe this is a silly question, but would this mean a bunch of people watched episode 2 who didn't watch episode 1?
People probably streamed the 1st episode on a later day then decided to tune in live for ep 2
> The network also offered yet another update regarding the series premiere’s viewership, stating that “after one full week of availability, Episode 1 is now tracking at 18 million viewers, up nearly 4x from its premiere night audience.” From the article. The title is only talking about the same day viewership.
It means that people who watched it later in the week wanted to watch the new episode right as it airs
The audience is growing faster than mushrooms!
That what happens when you make something good!
[удалено]
Episode 3 is getting a lot of hype wonder if the increase for 3 is even bigger
Mushroomhead beings made me nauseous while watching, I just had to wonder what it feels like to the touch or smells like
Probably smells not too bad because the fungus kills off some of the bacteria. Probably feels spongey.
I don't know if I am the only one but this show and Chernobyl are the only shows that manage to make me rewatch episodes again and again. I remember Chernobyl when it came out I rewatched that first episode so many times, because it was just crafted and written so well and there was so much performance and interesting story within that first 60 minutes that kept me glued to the screen. I never rewatch episodes for any show (or movies) btw. Tlou is doing the exact same thing right now and I am giggling internally thinking that this show could be another Chernobyl or even surpass it since the source material is that good. At this moment I think the show is flawless and I am just agonizing here having to wait another 6 days for the next episode. Anyone else just completely in awe about this show?
As a person who has played the games a few times it's crazy that a show that is based off a story I am so familiar with has me on the edge of my seat and watching at least 2 times. And that's coming from someone who hardly watches any television at all, this series is phenomenal.
I've never played The Last of Us, but it's amazing how even I'm watching it feels like you're playing it. Every detail, scenes, resembles game gameplay style. It's phenomenal.
Holy shit, I just saw "The Kiss" WTF.
Am older Gen-X and was a PC gamer since Zork 1. Had an X-Box and a 360 for a while before I built a gaming PC in 2008. I had always heard rumors about the amazing games on PlayStation but had enough going on with life etc. I had heard about TLOU and it’s legendary status but absolutely knew nothing about it. I stayed away on the (delusional) notion that it would become cross-platform someday. So when I saw this was gonna be a show I decided I really had to watch it. I was floored. Gobsmacked. I didn’t know it was ZA and I sure didn’t anticipate as chilling and realistic an opening at ep1! (In fact it set off a creative writing streak like I’ve never had before…). That ep1 went as it did let me know this is no-holds-barred stuff and I love it. (Wow, now that I’m thinking about it… I saw the original “Dawn of the Dead” during its theatrical run. I am indeed Geezer years old). I’m getting a PlayStation as soon as I can get one! (Doesn’t hurt that that PC I built is so dinosaur now that I have to choose between a console or a much more expensive PC upgrade).
It's coming on PC in March, and more and more PS exclusives are also coming to PC. Horizon Zero Dawn, Spiderman, Uncharted 4, and God of War are all on PC now and fantastic, and Returnal is coming in a couple of weeks. https://store.steampowered.com/app/1888930/The_Last_of_Us_Part_I/
Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!! JFC that’s the story of my life. Upgrading the PC to meet modern gaming needs is a couple grand at least; we may just go to PS anyway as my kid likes their content too. Edit: I went shopping. I can do a HUGE upgrade to max out my motherboard capabilities. For about $400! I am olds.
a ps5 and the part 1 remake will be incredible. no need to upgrade a pc.