10 Shows Like the Last of Us That Are Worth Watching
Given the volume of video game adaptations, it’s a little shocking how few of them are actually good. The Last of Us managed to make a big breakthrough, becoming a critical hit as well as a crowd favorite. It surpassed The Walking Dead in its depiction of our zombie-infested future (well, in this case, our fungal future).
A third season of the show has been confirmed, but there’s no release date yet, and the way things are going, I wouldn’t expect it to come out before 2027. In the meantime, here are 10 shows you’ll enjoy if you’re missing Joel, Ellie, Dina, and all the rest of your post-apocalyptic friends.
Silo (2023 – , two seasons)
There are no zombies here, but this futuristic neo-noir (which begins, appropriately, with a murder mystery) is part of the dystopian post-apocalyptic atmosphere you’ll encounter in The Last of Us . Rebecca Ferguson plays Juliet Nichols, an engineer who finds herself caught up in an investigation involving the local sheriff (played by David Oyelowo). It’s business as usual — except that all the characters inhabit a massive bunker, 144 levels deep, protecting the remaining 10,000 people from a supposedly poisoned world above. Those who run the bunker have managed to convince everyone left that only strict adherence to rules and procedures will keep them safe from the dangers outside. Like The Last of Us, it’s a prestige drama that incorporates elements of horror, mystery, and sci-fi to tell very human stories about fear and control. You can stream Silo on Apple TV+ .
Chernobyl (2019)
If the dark aesthetic of the historical drama Chernobyl feels familiar, that’s no coincidence: Both shows are from writer/director/producer Craig Mazin, and they really do feel like two sides of the same coin. Sure, one is a dystopian fantasy, and the other is based on a true story, the 1986 nuclear disaster in Ukraine. There’s a sense of dread building from the very first moments, which only intensifies as the series progresses, and, like The Last of Us , the personal becomes political as a crumbling Soviet culture of deception, censorship, and cover-up first enables the disaster and then hampers the response to it at every turn. Thankfully, we don’t have to deal with that kind of political incompetence and institutional collapse in modern America! You can stream Chernobyl on HBO Max or buy it on Prime Video .
Primitive America (2025)
Mark L. Smith, the writer of The Revenant , created this historical miniseries, which might give you an idea of its tone. Set during the Utah War of 1857, an armed conflict between Mormon settlers and the U.S. government, the series stars Taylor Kitsch as Isaac, a mountain climber who, against his better judgment, agrees to help shepherd a disabled boy and his mother (Betty Gilpin), who is wanted for the murder of her husband, through harsh terrain. The gritty setting and the shadowy nature of the characters will be familiar to fans of The Last of Us , as will the sense that other people pose a greater threat than the wilderness. You can stream American Primeval onNetflix .
Kingdom (2019 – 2021, two seasons and a bit more)
Another series that looks at zombies (or “infected”) from a completely different perspective, Kingdom is set in a fictional version of 17th-century Korea and follows the struggle to contain a viral outbreak in the years following a series of Japanese invasions. With real-life historical trappings, it turns the themes of The Last of Us on their head in a number of ways – we didn’t encounter anything like formal political power in that HBO series, whereas Kingdom focuses almost entirely on the elite, the destabilizing impact the outbreak has on the ruling dynasty, and how decisions made at the top spill over into the general population. The zombie plague is initially believed to be smallpox, which serves as a good enough analogy, and the show cleverly combines horror and medieval political intrigue, making it something entirely unique to both genres. Based on a webcomic series created by show creator Kim Eun-hee, it’s Netflix’s first original South Korean series. You can stream Kingdom onNetflix .
The Underground Railroad (2021, mini-series)
Based on Colson Whitehead’s award-winning 2016 novel, this heart-wrenching miniseries combines real history with fantasy (or at least a sense of magical realism) to present the historical Underground Railroad as a literal railroad rather than a metaphorical one. Thuso Mbedu stars as Cora Randall, a Georgia slave who makes her way through the underground network, with each episode featuring a different stop. Directed by Moonlight ’s Barry Jenkins, the series features lush production values and is often gorgeously shot, and feels incredibly evocative of the experience of someone like Cora, a young woman navigating an unfamiliar and almost entirely hostile America. The Underground Railroad makes a compelling case that the dystopian trappings of The Last of Us have long been a reality for many Americans. You can stream The Underground Railroad on Prime Video .
Aftermath (2024–, renewed for second and third seasons)
Like The Last of Us , Fallout is a pretty shockingly effective video game adaptation, albeit with a lot more color, vibrancy, and quirky humor (the 1950s aesthetic has held on a lot longer in Fallout’s world than it has in ours). The backstory is a little complicated, but not overused in the show itself: the year is 2296, and Earth has been devastated by a nuclear war between the United States and China two centuries earlier. Lucy MacLean (Ella Purnell) emerges from the underground fallout shelter where she’s lived her entire life to find her father, who’s been kidnapped by raiders. The above-ground wasteland is in the grip of warring factions, each of whom views the others as cults and believes that they alone know the right path for humanity. In the midst of this conflict, the landscape is also overrun with Ghouls, Gloopers, and other savage radiation monsters, and Lucy is just about the only person with any lingering faith in humanity. You can stream Fallout on Prime Video .
The Leftovers (2014–2017, three seasons)
The premise of The Leftovers is brilliantly understated: About 2% of the world’s population disappears without explanation, enough to upend almost everything. Politics has adapted to a new normal, religions have collapsed and reformed, and families have had to come to terms with the inexplicable loss of loved ones. The first season revolves around the Garvey family, led by Kevin (Justin Theroux), a sheriff whose wife (Amy Brenneman) left him to join a cult, while subsequent seasons expand the scope, introducing other characters in other places. Showrunner Damon Lindelof also co-wrote Lost , and the two shows share some similarities (including a relatively dark tone), but where Lost got out of hand, The Leftovers acknowledges that complex plotting and the search for answers are actually the point. You can stream The Leftovers on HBO Max .
Z Nation (2014 – 2019)
If The Walking Dead and The Last of Us made prestige television out of the zombie apocalypse, then this SyFy original is all about zombies as a campy, gory pastime. It all starts with a soldier tasked with transporting a package across the country. The package in question is actually a zombie bite survivor who can help create a vaccine (sound familiar?). The show comes from the schlock masters at The Asylum, purveyors of infamous B-movies like Sharknado , which should tell you everything you need to know about the tone. You can stream Z Nation on Tubi, Peacock , Shudder, and AMC+, or buy it on Prime Video .
Station Eleven (2021, mini-series)
The miniseries, based on Emily St. John Mandel’s novel, was released at either the best or worst time — the story of a flu pandemic hit HBO Max smack in the middle of the first wave of COVID. The show follows Kirsten Raymond, a young stage actress whose performance in a production of King Lear is interrupted by the emergence of a virus with a 99% fatality rate. We meet Kirsten as a child at the start of the pandemic, protected by her reluctant guardian Jeevan (Himesh Patel); then we jump 20 years into the future, and the world has changed a lot. It’s a slow burn, but the series ultimately makes a moving case for the value of the arts, even (or especially) in moments when survival is on the line. You can stream Station Eleven on HBO Max .
Decameron (2024)
I’m taking a bit of a risk with this one, which is completely different from The Last of Us in tone and has no zombie analogs whatsoever. However, I think it’s a near-perfect thematic match. It’s a funny, very dark, yet surprisingly humane show that loosely adapts Giovanni Boccaccio’s 14th-century short story collection with hints of Bridgertons’ swagger. When a plague ravages Florence, a group of nobles and servants make their way across a dangerous landscape to take refuge in a country villa to wait out the emergency, draining the supply of liquor. Rules and mores are turned on their heads in this small-scale apocalypse, especially by the maid Lichiska (Tanya Reynolds), who casually kills her lady on the way to the villa and then decides to take her place. Despite the show being about how hellish other people are, it makes for an utterly engrossing binge-watching experience. You can stream The Decameron onNetflix .