The success of apocalyptic saga The Last Of Us has given us video gamers hope that, finally, screen adaptations of our fave titles might now be enjoyable.
Mortal Kombat, Assassin’s Creed, Hitman, Tomb Raider, Silent Hill… the list of attempts to make wonderful games into wonderful stories? More chequered than the Croatia football team’s strips at a chess convention.
The Last Of Us did look like an aberration but then Tetris came along, courtesy of Apple TV+. Tetris, unlike The Last Of Us, though, doesn’t have a strong plot to rely on.
You’ve probably played it: blocks of different shapes relentlessly fall from the top of the screen, and you arrange them to form a solid line, which will disappear if you’re successful.
I worried when this was announced that Taron Egerton, its star, would be playing some sort of heroic monoblocker, but thankfully the story focuses on the creation of what is probably the most successful game of all time.
This is an energetic origin story of how Egerton’s software publisher tries to buy the rights for Tetris while gimlet-eyed capitalists and shifty Soviet apparatchiks, 1980s Cold War-style, play their own sort of manic game.
The score, and remix of the earworm Tetris soundtrack, carry along a tale nearly as frantic as the rapidly falling blocks which made the game so much fun.
Tetris Apple TV+
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