Craig Mazin has opened up about the pressures of adapting The Last Of Us for television. Mazin spoke to writer John August during the latest episode of the Scriptnotes podcast about the challenge of adapting Naughty Dog’s video game into a TV series, revealing concern to the “anger and judgements” from the online world. Handily, the full quote from Mazin’s interview with August can be found below, transcribed by users on The Last Of Us Part II subreddit.
“I’m adapting The Last of Us. The video game community is not shy. They love and hate in equal parts and with equal abandon. The love part is the wonderful part.” Mazin says. He adds that while in conversation with the game creator Neil Druckmann about the adaptation, he “felt the fear of what would be, you know, some anger and judgments.”
“No matter what you do, someone is not going to like it, of course. You try to do the best you can, but you also don’t want to keep the internet’s emotional state as what you want to take care of.” the Chernobyl creator continues.
Quote from Craig Mazin (HBO series writer) on the video game fandom.
by in thelastofus
Mazin maintains that the most important task at hand is to “take care of the work”, believing that in doing so, the people will love it. “So you must do what you’re afraid of. You can’t allow the internet to win.”
Last year, Mazin talked about the process of adapting the game for television, affirming that the changes made to the show “are designed to fill things out and expand, not to undo, but rather to enhance.”
Mazin adds that the ultimate goal is to “make you fall in love again with The Last Of Us in a different way”, as well as “experiencing more with more characters in more ways.”
Yesterday, The Last of Us added a new character to its cast utterly original from the source material.
