I am but a humble girl born in Pittsburgh’s Allegheny General Hospital. I left the surrounding area when I was ten years old and haven’t moved back (I go to visit) but the Pittsburgh never really leaves you. To this day, I say things in the way that Pittsburghians have mastered where we cut 90% of unnecessary words out of the sentence and you just have to keep up. And I do love seeing my hometown represented in media.
That’s why the game The Last of Us had an added layer of adoration for me. It featured a storyline in Pittsburgh and I got to see my childhood brought to life in the apocalypse. It makes sense given the game’s creator and his own connection to the town (Neil Druckmann went to Carnegie Mellon which is in Pittsburgh).
But I wondered whether or not the HBO series, which was filmed primarily in Canada, would venture into the landscape of Western PA. The short answer? No. Because the aspect of the story that was in Pittsburgh is currently happening in the HBO series—and they are in Kansas City. We get a brief look at Sam and Henry, who feature heavily in the Pittsburgh plot, at the end of the episode and Kathleen is looking for Henry throughout it. So there goes my dreams.
I get it, it makes more sense for their journey. But it doesn’t mean I’m not upset by the lack of “yinz” representation on HBO’s programs. I personally think that Joel Miller would have loved to have a Primanti Brothers sandwich while visiting our wonderful city. Maybe he’d even go “up-bear to da Stillers game.” I hope you all read that with a Pittsburgh accent.
My point is that I know why they didn’t go to Pittsburgh in the HBO series but I wish they would have because I love when I get to see it on television.
Pittsburgh is beautiful, actually
I talk a lot of nonsense about my hometown because I can. I’m from there and I love to celebrate the people who got out and became famous (here’s to you, Ming-Na Wen, Michael Keaton, Jeff Goldblum, and more.) And the city itself does often show up in media. Rarely is it actually Pittsburgh being depicted but it is there. I just hoped that, for once, I’d get to see the city and for it to be Pittsburgh (in Mayor of Kingstown and in The Dark Knight Rises, Pittsburgh was shot as a different city entirely).
I love what we’re getting to see from Kansas City. It’s a fascinating part of the game. I just hoped that we’d get one Pittsburgh accent making it through the apocalypse and then everyone on the internet would be shocked to hear what people in Western PA sound like. Spoiler alert: It’s bad. But we love it.
(featured image: HBO)
