You’ve most likely observed by now that the fungus in HBO’s The Final of Us present works a bit in another way than it does within the video games — notably in how the Cordyceps fungus, primarily based on the real-life fungi of the identical identify, spreads amongst people. Spores are out, and the mushroom community is in.
Spores within the video games serve the sport’s ambiance: With the precise mild, you’ll be able to see spores spilling out from cracked doorways, a warning of the hazard that lies inside. It’s the sign that the characters, usually Joel, should put their masks on so as to keep away from an infection, although Ellie’s immunity means she’ll solely ever want the masks to mix in. However there’s no manner the fuel masks might work within the present. You may’t have your important characters’ faces hidden behind a cumbersome masks; this isn’t The Mandalorian, in spite of everything.
“The present [is] taking a extra practical method to the story and the world,” The Final of Us author and creator Neil Druckmann informed Polygon. “If we wished to deal with it realistically, and there are spores close to, characters would put on fuel masks on a regular basis. Then we lose a lot, which is perhaps crucial a part of the journey is what’s occurring inside behind their eyes, of their soul, of their beings. For that logistical purpose we have been like, Let’s discover a totally different vector.”
The vector Druckmann and The Final of Us’ writers selected was the mushroom community. It’s an idea primarily based on the real-life science of mushrooms: We see mushrooms after they burst via filth. The items we see are the fruiting our bodies of the entire organism, the remainder hidden beneath the floor of the Earth. That half is known as the mycelium, the threads that unfold underground and join mushrooms and timber right into a “mycorrhizal community,” a pure community not not like the web — some mushroom specialists name it the “woodwide net.” Bushes, mushrooms, and different crops use these networks to move water and different vitamins and to “talk” in numerous methods, typically prolonged for miles and miles.
The mushroom networks, made up of sprawling tendrils, work the identical manner in The Final of Us on HBO, however as a substitute of transferring details about the place vitamins have to go, it alerts the community of contaminated to a possible host: people. Particular person contaminated folks be a part of the “community” as spindly tendrils develop into a gap of their physique, typically a chew. (In episode 2, we see a extra distinctive technique of spreading: An contaminated physique leans into Tess for a kiss, tendrils sprouting from his mouth into hers.) The fungus spreads shortly and overtakes all features besides the urge to unfold.
“[We wanted] to really feel like this stuff are interconnected. They will come out in opposition to us as a mass,” Druckmann stated. “But additionally how they go it from one individual to the opposite, it simply grew to become this actually disturbing factor, which was like, Oh, that is scrumptious. We’ve got to make use of this.”
The change from spores to tendrils and the mushroom community provides one other layer of pressure to the best way the contaminated work. It’s now not sufficient merely to remain stealthy and quiet — one improper transfer might imply activating a community of monsters that transfer en masse and know your precise location.
It’s a great change — within the online game, spores themselves don’t pose a menace. You may’t select when to placed on a fuel masks or when to take it off; builders made that call for you, and the participant is simply alongside for the journey in that sense. Take the fuel masks away, and the sport wouldn’t change very a lot. It’s simply one thing that occurs: fuel masks on after which fuel masks off.
There’s additionally the consideration of framing the present round an airborne pandemic, like gaming web site Kotaku wrote after the primary episode premiered. The Final of Us generally is a laborious watch in that regard, and doubtlessly a purpose why the idea of spores was axed in favor of a mushroom community. In spite of everything, there’s nonetheless that very same sense of thriller with the tendrils, however with the added pressure of the communication between contaminated. Mushrooms have a map of the world that’s invisible to anybody else; their solely purpose is spreading the fungus.