HBO’s TV series adaptation of “The Last of Us” arrived a decade after the game itself, but plans for an adaptation began many years ago – shortly after the game came out.
For a good portion of that time it had planned to be a film before it turned into a TV series which itself had various iterations until arriving at the current version that’s scored near universal acclaim and broken viewing records for the cable channel.
Actor Jeffrey Pierce, who played rebel soldier Perry in the HBO series and played Joel’s brother Tommy in the original games, was asked by The Direct if he had any hope of reprising his role as Tommy in the HBO series.
He says not in the course of the current series, but at one time he had hoped to be involved in the adaptation:
“There have been a couple of different iterations over time. There was a movie at one point. There was a motion-capture cinematic animated series at one point. And both of those are things that I thought, ‘I got a pretty good shot at being involved to some degree.’ But that was a long time ago and a lot of white beard in the past.”
When the HBO series version came around, he was still in the loop and revealed one Oscar-winner who was up for the lead role before Pedro Pascal ultimately took it:
“I think initially they had talked to Mahershala Ali about playing Joel, which is an obvious cue that I’m not gonna play Tommy… And when they cast Pedro [Pascal], I knew like, yeah, that was certainly not going to happen regardless, I’m older than Pedro Pascal. So I was not under harboring any illusions about that, for sure.”
The role of Tommy eventually went to Gabriel Luna. Pierce’s Perry role was not in the games, one of numerous deviations the series took which have generally been received well.
The show, which has already been renewed for a second season that will likely adapt some of the second game, has two more episodes to air.
