lettercanwalk

As a fan of the original game, I approached The Last of Us series with high hopes, especially considering how deeply the characters and emotional storytelling resonated in the game. Unfortunately, the show left me disappointed - not because it tried something new, but because it lost sight of what made the original so powerful.

Joel, as portrayed in the series, feels like a very different person from the character we knew in the game. He comes across as cold and emotionally distant in a way that doesn't feel like natural evolution - just a rewrite. While changes in adaptations can work, here the shift feels unearned and undermines the heart of the story, which is rooted in the emotional connection between Joel and Ellie.

Ellie's portrayal is even more jarring. The casting simply doesn't work for me. From her physical presence to her demeanor, she comes across more as a caricature of a tomboy than the nuanced, vulnerable-yet-tough Ellie we knew. The character in the show feels immature in a frustrating way, not in a believable or endearing one. Instead of evoking sympathy and empathy - crucial for the role - the performance felt off-putting.

At times, I even found myself emotionally detached from the core conflict. If I had only known this version of the story through the series, I might not have cared about Ellie's fate at all - and that's a serious failure for a show that hinges entirely on its characters.

There's no doubt that adapting a beloved game to television is a massive challenge, but here it feels like the essence of the story got lost in translation. A few changes might have worked, but these particular choices around the characters, especially in their tone and delivery, hurt the narrative more than they helped.

The film felt completely empty - shallow on the surface, with no real depth beneath. It's not about people disliking slow-paced or actionless movies - that's not the issue here. The problem is that it's simply not interesting.

The story is painfully basic, the plot twists predictable and uninspired. You don't feel any curiosity about where it's going, because the journey itself is so flat. The characters are just as hollow - there's no emotional connection, no reason to care about what happens to them. You watch them move through the scenes, but there's no empathy, no investment.

Sure, there are a few moments here and there that catch your attention, but they're scattered and disconnected. The overall structure of the film feels broken, as if the pieces never quite come together into a coherent whole.

Fassbender, who has proven himself in similar roles (like his strong performance in the spy series he starred in before), seems completely misplaced here. The story and direction never rise to the level where his talent could shine.

In the end, it's a mediocre film - forgettable, poorly constructed, and lacking the tension or emotional depth that could have made it worthwhile.

While the visuals are undeniably impressive, many of the shorts feel more like teasers or game intros than fully developed stories. The technical execution is top-notch, but the lack of a strong narrative leaves them feeling hollow. It seems the creators prioritize promoting the games over crafting a compelling plot, which is understandably their main goal-but it does come at the expense of deeper storytelling.

Neither meticulous attention to detail nor thoughtful lore can truly save these shorts when there isn't enough time or focus to present a coherent narrative. It's tough to convey anything truly meaningful in such brief videos. Comparing them to something like Love, Death & Robots only highlights the disparity in storytelling depth and creativity.

A good example of this is the Warhammer short. Its plot feels secondary, and it treads familiar ground that's been done before-making it hard to justify revisiting the same ideas. Ultimately, the series could benefit from stronger writing or more time to flesh out its concepts, rather than relying solely on visual flair.