The Shoemaker Bugle

By Andrea Alfaro

Now streaming only on HBO Max, a live action show based on the hit video game The Last of Us has released its first season starring Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey.

The Last of Us was an award winning video game with thousands of fans. Both the show and game follow the journey of a man named Joel and a teenage girl named Ellie in the midst of an apocalypse that has ravaged the world.

In my opinion, this show was great. It was perfectly cast, impeccably shot, and very well written. However, although every episode was good, some were better than others and with the bar set so high it wasn’t as satisfying when I was greeted with just a good episode rather than a great one.

No spoilers here, but I will say the final episode (and probably the most important) was a total of 43 minutes long. Comparing that to some of the earlier ones, it’s a whole 20 minutes short. For a season finale it was a bit rushed and sort of underwhelming. As I said before, it was a good episode but not great.

The show did offer a more in-depth look on characters found in the game and even incorporated more into their stories, which I loved. There were some great practical effects when it came to the creation of the monsters and the scenery which formed a great immersion into the world of The Last of Us. Basically anybody could tell that the budget for this show was used to its fullest potential.

Overall, the show was a 9.5 out of 10. It would be perfect if it was more consistent with the quality and prioritized the end of the season. Despite that, it was a pretty solid adaptation and I would recommend it to anybody interested in apocalyptic dramas where the relationships between characters is the focal point.