How The Prosthetics Designer For “The Last Of Us” Made Makeup Magic

In an Instagram post, Gower said that his team “drew inspiration from fungal and mushroom reference” along with artwork from the original video game as the inspiration behind the design. He shared a photo of an intricately painted fungus prosthetic (which he credits to Victoria Holt), noting that the designers mocked up “thousands of infected appliances” throughout the show’s first season.

When it came to the Runners, Gower told Entertainment Weekly that the “raised veins” seen on the recently bitten are meant to show how the infection makes its way from the bite mark to the brain. “We had to show some kind of travel in the vein network coming up through the body,” he told the outlet. “We looked at lots of different organic shapes for veins. We looked at things like worm larvae burrowing under the skin. We looked at jellyfish, the scars that you get in these random organic patterns, and we also looked at leaf miners, which you can see sometimes on leaves and plants. It’s a parasite, a termite, which burrows under the skin of the leaf and creates all these swirls.”

While Gower wanted to honor the video game’s original design, he also saw the opportunity for creativity. In his interview with Entertainment Weekly, he said that because the show expands beyond the confines of the game, he sought to incorporate a wider range of colors when creating the Clickers.

Specifically, he imagined the environment would have an impact on the Clickers’ appearance. A lush setting might result in “vibrant, rich colors”, while a drier climate might make them look muted. “There was the benchmark – traditional orange and yellows and grays that we had in the game – but we were gonna be in lots of different environments during ‘The Last of Us’ season 1,” Gower said. “Maybe as the franchise progressed, we might find climate changes; locations are gonna change; and heat, whether you are in dry or moist environments. It could also be a seasonal change. So we just said, ‘Could all this have an impact on the color, the finish, and the texture of the Infected?'”

Undoubtedly one of the most terrifying moments on “The Last of Us” so far happens in episode 5, when an underground population of Infected is released, igniting a deadly battle. The blood-thirsty brigade is led by a “Bloater”, a gargantuan, fungus-covered zombie with superhuman strength. The monster came to life thanks to 6’6″ stuntman Adam Basil, an 80-pound costume, and post-production special effects. According to Gower, the team started by taking a cast of Basil’s entire body and then used modeling clay to create the prosthetics.

“We cast it out of a foam rubber and foam latex, which is very lightweight,” he told Variety. “It’s almost like an upholstery foam, a very spongy sort of material. That was all molded and cast in separate sections: top half, head, arms, legs. We had a team who fabricated all these parts together. We had a zipper up the back and around the waist that we could zip them together. He had all these pendulous folds of fungus which hid zippers and poppers.”

In an Instagram caption, Gower elaborated on the process, which he says was “a happy marriage of digital and practical effects.” The team, which consisted of sculptors, painters, and stitchers, was tasked with creating an authentic-looking character that would translate well with special effects added in later.

“To get the shapes to read, we had to cover them in a gloss,” Gower said in his interview with Variety. “It was like a texture that we were building up, so we were constantly going in and slathering them in this gloss, just so the shapes would pick up in the silhouettes. We were repeatedly going in and gelling him up more, covering him in this lube so he was nice and shiny.”

Along with Basil, “The Last of Us” features a slew of other essential stunt performers. Variety reported that the Bloater scene included 10 to 15 other stunt people (as well as up to 60 extras), all of whom had to be transformed into Clickers by the makeup team. The outlet says that the nighttime scene required five hours of prep by a team of 65 prosthetic artists.

The horror elements of “The Last of Us” kicked off in episode 1 when an elderly woman transforms into an Infected and brutally attacks her family. Though you would never know it from simply watching, Gower revealed via Instagram that the actress playing “Nana”, Wendy Gorling, is wearing a full face of old-age prosthetics.

“Not only did we get the chance to create some incredible beasties for HBO’s ‘The Last of Us,’ but we also had some subtle aging and character makeups. Here’s wonderful actress Wendy Gorling as ‘Nana’ in episode 1,” the artist wrote in the caption. “She’s wearing silicone cheeks, chin and neck appliances, with bondo upper lip pieces and moles. She also has a vinyl bald cap and we used stippled around the eyes and forehead.”

Gower also points out the unexpected challenges of life-like prosthetics. “I think in some ways these makeups are far trickier to pull off than extensive creature makeups,” he added.