Before HBO’s The Last Of Us, An Entirely Different Adaptation Was Proposed

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Naughty Dog’s first effort to adapt The Last of Us for the screen was not as an HBO TV show, but a movie, a fact that recently began doing the rounds again on social media. Like with many Hollywood productions, The Last of Us had a tumultuous, long development period as a movie before it was ultimately abandoned in favor of what is now a hit series. 

While not everyone agrees with the creative departures from the source material for the TV series on HBO, it’s undeniably a success and one of HBO’s biggest hits lately. Let’s look back at how The Last of Us originated as a movie and run through the key developments that led to it becoming a TV show.

The original movie pitch

People across X recently discovered a post from Sony Pictures in 2014 declaring that The Last of Us was “soon to be a major motion picture.” 

This was a real, studio-sponsored image, not a fan mock-up. There was officially produced key art, showing Ellie wielding a knife. There was a “secret panel” at San Diego Comic-Con that year featuring director Sam Raimi, who was originally attached to produce the movie, having already had