The Last Of Us Movie Was Going To Be "Awful," Neil Druckmann Says

Before HBO's The Last of Us TV series, Sony Pictures was working on a movie version of The Last of Us. Neil Druckmann, the writer and co-director of the game, has now said the movie version would have been "awful" were it seen through to release.

Speaking to the rapper Logic (who himself auditioned for Jesse in The Last of Us), Druckmann brought up the film while talking about the HBO series. He said working on the movie helped him understand what he wanted to do with the TV series alongside Craig Mazin.

"The key to making a great show is hire the best people and make it at HBO. That's the key to success. I think it helped that I worked on the film version that would have been awful. It would have been one of those bad adaptations had we finished that one," Druckmann said.

Druckmann said The Last of Us movie would have been "two hours max" and that likely meant the story would have had to play out at a much faster clip than the TV series. "The feedback I got was, 'This will lead it down a bad path,'" Druckmann said.

Druckmann previously said The Last of Us movie would be faithful to the original game but with some major changes, too. Maisie Williams, who played Arya Stark on HBO's Game of Thrones, was reportedly the frontunner to play Ellie in the movie. For the HBO series, HBO cast another Game of Thrones actor, Bella Ramsey, to play the leading role.

Filming is currently underway on The Last of Us Season 2. Kaitlyn Dever joins the cast for Season 2 to play Abby, while Young Mazino portrays Jesse and Isabela Merced portrays Dina. Season 2 is expected to premiere sometime in 2025.