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Sam Raimi Reveals Why We'll Probably Never See That Last Of Us Movie

Less than a year after the video game became a smash hit in 2013, Naughty Dog's The Last of Us landed a film deal and was rushed into development. So three years later, why is there still no Last of Us movie?


Sony and Screen Gems started working on the film adaptation in March 2014 with a script written by the game's original creative director, Neil Druckmann. Genre film legend Sam Raimi (Evil Dead, Spider-Man) was also locked in to produce. There were rumblings the project was stalled in development hell earlier this year, but no concrete intel in regards to what had potentially gone wrong. But now, Raimi has pulled back the curtain on why we might never see a big-screen version of The Last of Us.


Raimi told IGN the film is at a "standstill" over creative direction, explaining Sony and Druckmann have reached an impasse, and until that's resolved, the project will almost certainly remain in purgatory. Not even Raimi's considerable pull can get it moving.


"Neil's plan for it is not the same as Sony's. And because my company doesn't have the rights, I actually can't help him too much," Raimi added. "Even though I'm one of the producers on it the way he set it up, he sold his rights to Sony, Sony hired me as a producer by chance, and I can't get the rights free for him so I'm not in the driver's seat and I can't tell you what Sony and Neil together will decide on."


The game itself is one of the most decorated titles in history, and racked up dozens of Game of the Year awards from publications including IGN and Kotaku. It's truly a shame that development can't get on track, because if there was ever a video game ripe for a film adaptation, it's the survival horror tale of a man and young girl trying to survive a trek across a ravaged version of the United States. The game is truly cinematic in and of itself, and the developers at Naughty Dog took full advantage of next-generation hardware to make it look positively gorgeous. The cutscenes and angles within the game could practically be lifted for live action.


What do you think? Would you like to see The Last of Us on the big screen?