Editor's Note: The following contains spoilers for The Last of Us tv show.HBO's The Last of Us has presented a new take on the end of the world, with a frighteningly realistic outbreak known as Cordyceps. This is a fungus that mutated to survive in humans and turns them into zombie-like infected. One interesting thing about this story is that it isn't set in the distant future but in 2023. The game, on which the show is based, had the initial outbreak set around the time the game was released, making the bulk of the story take place in the future. The show chose to play with the timeline, so the main story aligns with the release year, and the flashbacks are set in the past. Despite the story's 2023 setting, much of what defines the year in our world is notably missing. In The Last of Us, "Outbreak Day" occurred on September 26, 2003, and afterward, the world stopped. Up to that point, the world in the show is similar, if not identical, to our own. But with the end of the world in 2003, The Last of Us' universe was forced onto a different path.
With twenty additional years of non-apocalyptic existence, we have quite a few developments that never made it to the world in the show, many of which we take for granted. The lack of modern technology, culture, and even history makes the show almost feel like it's set in the past. The Last of Us isn't shy about referencing the world before Cordyceps, proving the similarities to the real world. But, since all developments abruptly stopped when the outbreak hit, these references feel dated to a modern audience. The 2023 in The Last of Us is unrecognizable to us because the world has changed so much in twenty years, making several important differences between our world and the one seen in the show.
GPS, Smart Phones, and Social Media Never Became a Part of the Everyday World
Technology is the most dramatic difference from our world, besides the clickers, of course. Things that are a part of everyday life in the real world were never invented in The Last of Us. One example is iPhones. The first iPhone wasn't released until 2007, and development didn't start until 2004, so there isn't even a prototype before Outbreak Day. Even iPods would have been relatively new to The Last of Us, with the third generation releasing just a few months before the end of the world. Something that would be more directly useful to Ellie (Bella Ramsey) and Joel (Pedro Pascal) on their journey would be GPS systems.
Though the technology was developed in the 70s, GPSes weren't accessible to other public until 2000, and it took several years until they were widespread. So as the characters trek across the country, they will have to navigate on their own. Another day-to-day part of life, which won't feature in The Last of Us, is social media. The crazy that has drastically altered the last few decades didn't have the chance to take hold before Outbreak Day. Facebook (then FaceMash) launched in October 2003, just after the world fell apart in The Last of Us. MySpace would have been around for almost two months before Cordyceps hit, hardly enough time to make a name for itself.
Other common websites were never created in The Last of Us, such as YouTube, which launched in 2005. Netflix never became a streaming service. So far, it seems as though the internet fell apart entirely after the outbreak, which would make sense for, what was then a new technology. Joel communicates through radio rather than a more recent technology, and even old phones have yet to play a part. Another change in technology that never occurred is video games. Video games have come a long way since 2003, one important development being motion controls which were introduced in 2006 with the Wii. Of course, that never happened in The Last of Us.
Episode 3 shows Ellie coming across an old arcade game that she's familiar with. It's not as if it were the most recent sort of game. By 2003, gaming consoles like PlayStation were common enough, but the arcade game Ellie sees is not quite as dated in that world as it may seem. Overall, the lack of new technology shows how far things have come in a relatively short time.
Differences in Pop Culture
The twenty years have also seen a lot of new pop culture. The show has made use of music in the radio code and throughout Episode 3 in general, but it is all distinctly pre-2003. Many of the popular artists who are so well known today never took the stage in this world. People like Taylor Swift or Ed Sheeran never released a single song. Heck, Beyoncé only had one solo album before 2003, which means many of her most famous songs never happened. And that's just the beginning. Only one of today's top twenty highest-grossing films was released before 2003, that being Titanic. Widely recognized films like James Cameron's Avatar were never made in The Last of Us. This world never had the MCU or the final six Harry Potter films. The pop culture classic Shrek 2 never got to see the light of day. No one in the show is singing "Let It Go" because Frozen didn't make it to theaters.
Many TV shows that have reached the level of common knowledge are also missing from the world or The Last of Us. It's not even limited to recent shows. The final season of Friends came out after 2003 and, therefore, never happened. Game of Thrones never made it to screens, nor did The Office, Breaking Bad, or Big Bang Theory. These things may seem trivial and are compared to the apocalypse, but they are so recognizable to the vast majority of people today that it's strange to think about a world where they don't exist.
Changes to History
The Last of Us is obviously an alternate history, but everything falling apart in 2003 means that a lot of historical events never occurred. While governments were clearly preoccupied, many laws we see today were never passed in The Last of Us. Notably to Episode 3, gay marriage wouldn't have been legalized, but that's just the beginning. Natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina may still happen, but they would look drastically different without the news coverage or any ability to evacuate without the infected posing a threat. The Iraq War began in 2003 but would have ended with the outbreak. Covid-19 doesn't seem to factor in, but The Last of Us has its own pandemic problems.
But despite these differences, it is clear that other historical events were the same. Climate change plays a big role in the origins of Cordyceps, and Episode 3 references 9/11, which would be one of the final major historical American events before Outbreak Day. The differences between the real world and the one seen in The Last of Us fluctuate between not-so-different and nearly unrecognizable. But in doing so, it highlights how much has changed in the last twenty years while acknowledging that human nature never truly changes.