The reason why the movie "The Last of Us" was shelved was revealed: it focused too much on action scenes that were irrelevant to the plot

According to Neil Dukeman, director of The Last of Us, in a recent interview with the radio program Script Apart, the planned live-action version of the game adaptation was not very satisfactory; because it focused too much on action scenes, which was completely inconsistent with the tone of the original story.

In an interview, Dukeman said: "When I was involved in the film version, a lot of discussions and opinions were about 'How do we make it bigger? How do we make the scene more spectacular?'"

Dukeman did not mention who made these suggestions, but he believes that this production direction is the reason why the film failed. He said: "These ideas were not compatible with The Last of Us, and ultimately led to the termination of the filming plan."

As a video game, The Last of Us also includes a lot of combat in its core gameplay. But the basis for movie or TV adaptation: the plot of this game is more somber and serious than any Hollywood blockbuster. Dukeman mentioned that fortunately, turning to a TV remake helped capture the original intention of the game production team.

"Our plan for the remake was to make it an independent film," Dukeman revealed. "We came to it in an independent film team, using independent film shooting techniques and capturing that small and delicate feeling. And changing to a TV series makes it easier to do this because we don't need to insert too many action scenes into the plot like the game."

Finally, Dukeman added: "In the game, there are some gameplays that exist only for the rhythm of the game; players will be exposed to these gameplays every once in a while, and there needs to be enough combat in the game to make players familiar with these gameplays. (In the TV version) you don't need those parts at all because it's a completely different medium. We should play to the strengths of this medium."

The movie version of The Last of Us was planned to be produced and filmed by Sony and Screen Gems in 2014. Dukeman was responsible for writing the script and Sam Raimi (who filmed the 2002 Spider-Man trilogy) would serve as the producer. However, the production of the film encountered a bottleneck in 2016, which led to the suspension of filming. If this movie can be released, Maisie Williams (who played Arya Stark in Game of Thrones) who has participated in Game of Thrones will most likely play Ellie.

The film version will be replaced by an adapted TV series broadcast on HBO, which will be filmed around the plot of the first game. According to reports, the TV series version will begin filming in July this year.