HBO’s The Last of Us Series was Originally a Film

Fans were excited when it was announced that HBO had hired Chernobyl's Craig Mazin to make a Last of Us series, but what they didn't know was that the property was supposed to be a movie.

Mazin revealed during the Scriptnotes podcast (via IGN) that game director Neil Druckmann was working on a movie with Sony, but Mazin was able to change his mind and convinced Druckmann to turn it into a series. Mazin explains, "It was going to be a movie for a long time. Neil was working on it as a movie for one of Sony's divisions, and my feeling was that you can't make a movie out of this thing, it has to be a show, it needs length."

Seeing as how video game movies usually can't encapsulate as much development as a game's story allows, it was a pretty good call for Mazin to bring The Last of Us to television. If you ask me, video game movies should just focus on telling completely different stories, rather than try to retell something that was meant for a game.

For now, Sony is still trying to get PlayStation Productions off the ground, and their first movie is set to be based on the Uncharted franchise. If that film manages to succeed though, we could be looking at a lot more video game titles in the future. While there won't be a Last of Us movie, I can very well see a God of War down the line. How about a Jak & Daxter film, while they're at it?

No release date has been set for HBO's The Last of Us. The Last of Us Part II comes to PS4 on May 29.

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