HBO's 'The Last of Us' is a hit. This producer wants to clear the air.

"The Last of Us Part II" attempted to get players to empathize with NPC deaths more so than in the first game through dogs that mourned their masters' deaths or friends of the fallen calling out for them by name. The show continues to intensify death, including early moments during the pandemic's initial outbreak in the pilot, through the addition of tendrils. These thin, stemlike threads slowly grow from an infected's mouth. Upon contact with a human, they too become infected, offering an entirely new method of transmission. Characters can still be bitten by zombies, but spores -- which allowed for the game's disease to be airborne -- were ditched for this first season.