Imagining the future: climate narrative strategies in The Last of Us and Extrapolations

Journal title SOCIOLOGIA DELLA COMUNICAZIONE
Author/s Allegra Sonego
Publishing Year 2026 Issue 2026/71
Language Italian Pages 18 P. 127-144 File size 116 KB
DOI 10.3280/SC2026-071007
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This article presents a comparative analysis of two 2023 television series – The Last of Us (HBO, 2023-) and Extrapolations (Apple TV+, 2023) – examining their divergent strategies for representing climate change. Drawing on framing theory, narrative transportation theory, and affect theory, the author identifies two distinct narrative archetypes: the “indirect apocalyptic frame”, which mediates the climate crisis through a fungal pandemic and an intimate-relational focus, and the “progressive realist frame”, which explicitly represents global warming’s systemic effects through an anthology structure. The multimodal analysis reveals inevitable trade-offs: while The Last of Us generates deep emotional identification but risks psychological distancing, Extrapolations provides informational accuracy but compromises affective engagement through narrative fragmentation. The author argues that effective climate storytelling may require a creative synthesis of both approaches.

Keywords: climate fiction, television seriality, framing theory, narrative transportation, climate communication, affect theory.

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Allegra Sonego, Immaginari del futuro: strategie di narrazione climatica in The Last of Us ed Extrapolations in "SOCIOLOGIA DELLA COMUNICAZIONE " 71/2026, pp 127-144, DOI: 10.3280/SC2026-071007