Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin, who are in charge of The Last of Us on HBO, have answered complaints that Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey have not played the games the show is based on. In this answer, it comes out that the two people were told very clearly not to play the games so that they could make up their own roles.
This information comes from an interview with Mazin that was published in the Washington Post. In the interview, they talk about the backlash they’ve gotten for Ramsey and Pascal not finishing the game. Mazin says, “I didn’t train Ramsey to act like Ellie, and I didn’t train her to dance like Ellie. I didn’t tell her what to do, but within the scenes, I told her what the dialogue and text were trying to say.
In the interview, it was also revealed that Pascal and Ramsey had “Cheated” by watching some gameplay videos on YouTube. However, Mazin wanted them to make the roles their own, so he didn’t say anything about it. Some people started to worry after Ramsey was interviewed by USA Today and said that she had been “encouraged not to” play the game after telling the showrunners in her audition that she hadn’t.
Mazin knows why people are worried, but he says it was “frustrating to know what we had and see people doubting.” He goes on to say, “We know everything about Ellie and Joel. We know them inside and out, not just because Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson brought them to life in such a beautiful way in the game, but because we’ve known them from the ground up.”
Fans were skeptical, but it looks like they had no reason to be, since the first episode of the HBO adaptation has been praised by critics and reached 10 million viewers on HBO and HBO Max in just two days. Many people have already forgotten their worries after seeing Pascal and Ramsey play Joel and Ellie. The next episode will air on Sunday. What we saw was great.
Do you think the people in charge of the show made the right choice? Tell us in the comments, and keep checking back to The Carouser Magazine for more entertainment news.
