I played the Left Behind DLC on a rainy Sunday in February 2014, a few months after finishing the main game. My expectations were… complicated. The Last of Us had emotionally wrecked me in ways few games ever had, and I wasn’t sure I was ready to dive back into that world. But I was also desperate to spend more time with these characters who’d somehow burrowed into my brain and refused to leave. So I made a pot of coffee way too strong, settled into my favorite chair (the one with the suspicious stain from when Dave spilled beer during a particularly intense Madden match years earlier), and prepared myself for whatever Naughty Dog had in store.
What I wasn’t prepared for was how the DLC’s structure—flashing between Ellie’s desperate attempts to save Joel in the present and her last day with Riley in the past—would create this devastating emotional resonance between two timelines. Playing as Ellie trying to stitch up Joel’s wound while remembering the day she lost Riley… it was masterful storytelling that could only work in an interactive format. So when HBO announced they were adapting Left Behind as a single, dedicated episode without the present-day timeline, I had… concerns. Big ones.
Episode 7 of the show hit me like a brick to the face. And I mean that as the highest possible compliment.
The structural change—focusing solely on the Riley/Ellie backstory without the present-day Joel storyline—was initially the thing I was most skeptical about. The game’s back-and-forth created this perfect thematic mirror: Ellie losing someone she loved in the past while fighting desperately not to lose Joel in the present. But the show’s decision to give Riley and Ellie’s story room to breathe without interruption created a different kind of impact. We weren’t splitting our attention between timelines; we were fully immersed in this perfect day turned nightmare. By the time the episode ended, I understood why they’d made the change. The television format simply works better with this focused approach.
The mall setting translation from game to screen was nothing short of magical. I remember exploring that abandoned mall in the game, the way the space felt simultaneously desolate and full of possibility. The escalators covered in dust, the stores with mannequins frozen in time, the sense that you were walking through a mausoleum of consumerism. The HBO recreation captured that feeling perfectly while adding details that weren’t possible in the game. The production design team deserves every award possible for how they aged that mall, how they told stories through the small details—posters for events that never happened, dried plants in planters, merchandise still arranged neatly on shelves despite the decade of abandonment.
In both versions, the mall functions as this perfect metaphor: a space designed for carefree teenage fun that’s been transformed by the apocalypse, just as Ellie and Riley’s adolescence has been warped by the world they’ve inherited. But they reclaim it, piece by piece, through their exploration and games. There’s something achingly beautiful about watching these two girls find moments of normal teenage life in the shell of the old world.
The carousel scene hit me hard in both versions, but differently each time. In the game, I controlled Ellie as she climbed onto a dusty plastic horse, the quiet joy of the moment amplified by the knowledge that I was actively participating in this rare moment of childhood she was getting to experience. The show’s version, with the two girls riding side by side while bathed in the carousel’s colored lights, captured a different kind of magic. The camera lingering on their faces, the performances communicating so much without words, the slight distance of watching rather than participating—it became less about my connection to Ellie and more about witnessing the connection between these two characters.
And then there’s the Halloween store. Both versions use this space brilliantly, but in different ways. The game allows you to interact with various masks, try them on, get Riley’s reaction to each one. It’s playful, exploratory, the kind of environmental storytelling that games excel at. The show condenses this sequence but keeps its essence, focusing instead on the wolf masks specifically and using them to create a thematic resonance with Joel, who we know will become Ellie’s protector later. The show’s version is more economical, more focused on visual motifs that connect to the larger story, while the game’s version luxuriates in the joy of discovery and interaction.
The relationship between Ellie and Riley—the heart of both versions—is where the adaptation truly shines. In the game, their connection develops through both dialogue and shared experience, through the player’s active participation in their activities. You play the arcade game, you throw bricks at cars, you choose dialogue options. The show necessarily loses that interactive element but compensates with incredible performances from Bella Ramsey and Storm Reid. Their chemistry feels genuine in a way that’s different from the game but equally powerful. The slight changes to their backstory—making Riley’s Firefly recruitment more central to the conflict—streamlines the narrative for television while preserving the core emotional conflict.
The photo booth scene translation might be my favorite adaptation choice. In the game, you actively participate in making faces for each photo, creating a memory that feels partially yours because you helped create it. The show transforms this into something more passive but no less affecting—we watch the girls cycle through poses, their joy infectious, the resulting strip of photos becoming a tangible artifact of their connection. The game gives you agency in the moment; the show gives you perfect performances capturing the essence of teenage friendship. Different approaches, same emotional impact.
Let’s talk about that water gun fight, though. In the game, this sequence is full-on gameplay—you’re actively hunting Riley, dodging her attacks, strategizing your approach. It’s fun and tense in the way only interactive experiences can be, with the added layer that you’re playing as Ellie experiencing a rare moment of childhood joy. The show’s version is necessarily abbreviated—a quick montage of the girls chasing each other through the mall. It captures the spirit but can’t possibly recreate the experience of actively participating. This is one area where the game’s version has a clear advantage, where the medium itself enhances the storytelling in ways television simply can’t match.
The kiss—that beautiful, heartbreaking moment—hits differently in each version as well. The game builds to it through hours of interaction, through the player’s growing connection to both characters, through the mechanical shift from gameplay to cutscene that signals “this is important.” When Ellie surprises both Riley and herself with that impulsive kiss, it feels earned because you’ve been on this journey with them every step of the way. The show builds more explicitly toward this moment, making the romantic tension clearer earlier on, relying on the performers to carry the emotional weight. Both approaches work, but they create somewhat different readings of the relationship—the game’s version feels more like a spontaneous realization, while the show’s feels like an inevitable culmination.
The infected encounter and its aftermath represent the most significant structural difference between the two versions. In the game, you’re actively fighting for survival, switching between controlling Ellie in the past and present timelines, the gameplay creating a visceral connection to her fear and determination. The show’s version is more streamlined but no less impactful, focusing entirely on the immediate aftermath of their bites, on the devastating realization of what’s happened. Without the present-day timeline as counterpoint, the show leans entirely into the tragedy of the moment, giving it a different kind of weight.
What struck me most about both versions is how they handle the theme of choice in a world that offers so few real choices. Riley’s choice to join the Fireflies, Ellie’s choice to spend one last day with her friend, their joint choice to “lose their minds together” after being bitten—these moments of agency in a world that routinely denies it are what make this story so powerful. The game expresses this theme through mechanics (the choices you make as a player) and narrative, while the show relies entirely on dialogue and performance, but both capture the essential tragedy: sometimes having a choice doesn’t make the outcome any less devastating.
As someone who experienced both versions, I’m struck by how they complement rather than compete with each other. The game’s version benefits from interactivity, from the player’s direct involvement in these pivotal moments of Ellie’s life. The connection I felt to her character was deepened by actively participating in her story, by controlling her movements, by making choices within the constraints of the narrative. The show’s version benefits from the uninterrupted focus on a single timeline, from the nuanced performances, from the cinematic language of television that can communicate volumes through a well-composed shot or a lingering close-up.
There’s a moment in the game where you can just sit with Riley on a counter, listening to music, choosing when to move on. I remember staying there longer than necessary, knowing that advancing the story meant approaching the inevitable tragedy waiting at the end. The show can’t recreate that specific experience of reluctance, of the player’s complicity in advancing toward heartbreak. But it creates its own version of that feeling through pacing, through the lingering scenes of happiness that we know can’t last.
What both versions understand perfectly is that Left Behind isn’t just backstory—it’s the key to understanding Ellie’s character, her motivations, her fears. Her relationship with Riley shapes everything that comes after, from her bond with Joel to her eventual quest for revenge. The loss of Riley is the wound that never fully heals, the ghost that follows her through every subsequent relationship. Whether experienced through the interactive medium of games or the passive medium of television, this story remains the emotional anchor of The Last of Us universe.
I’ve played through Left Behind three times now, and each playthrough reveals new details, new emotional layers. I’ve watched episode 7 twice, and the same is true—small moments I missed the first time around, subtle performance choices that add depth to scenes I thought I understood completely. That’s the mark of great storytelling in any medium: the ability to reward repeated engagement, to reveal itself more fully over time.
The adaptation from game to screen wasn’t perfect—no adaptation ever is. Some sequences lost impact in translation, some narrative choices streamlined complex relationships. But the core emotional truth remained intact, the essential story of two girls finding love at the end of the world only to have it snatched away by the cruel randomness of infection. Whether experienced through controller or remote, that story retains its power to break hearts and illuminate the human capacity for connection even in the darkest circumstances.
And ultimately, that’s what matters most about adaptations—not whether they’re slavishly faithful to every detail, but whether they capture the emotional truth of the original. By that measure, HBO’s version of Left Behind stands alongside the game’s DLC as an equally valid, equally moving telling of one of gaming’s most poignant stories. Different in form, identical in emotional impact. And really, what more could we ask for?
