HBO has yet again teamed up with Chernobyl creator Craig Mazin on a dark, depressing, dystopic series about humanity’s capacity to destroy itself. This time it’s an adaptation of The Last of Us, a critically acclaimed PlayStation game that spawned an even grimmer sequel earlier this year. HBO and Sony announced the series order on Friday, which will be co-written and -produced by The Last of Us director Neil Druckmann. The 2013 video game follows a smuggler named Joel who, 20 years after his daughter died in his arms after being shot by soldiers as she fled a zombie outbreak, is tasked with escorting a teenage girl named Ellie who might hold the cure. Really light, cheery stuff.
A Last of Us adaptation has been in the works for years — Sam Raimi was set to produce a movie and Maisie Williams was in talks to play Ellie — but in 2016 Raimi told IGN that the film was at “a standstill” due to disagreements between Druckmann and Sony.