Zombie CSU (58 page)
The Zombie Cheerleader
TV, cable, and the Internet abound with horror-themed shows hosted by a variety of ghouls, vamps, mad scientists, and, in one case, a cheerleader turned zombie. The Zombie Cheerleader (a.k.a Nicole M. Brooks) is the hostess of her own online show,
The Zombie Cheerleader’s School of Horror
, and can be seen in the first two seasons of
Monster Madhouse
. Her mission in
un
-life is to “educate the zombie masses so they may learn how to survive the impending fleshy onslaught.” Fleshies are humans, and in her view they’re the bad guys.
Eat My Brains (EMB)
One of the coolest zombie websites is www.eatmybrains.com, run by Mike “Rawshark” Hewitt, Jim Smith, and Russell “Zomblee” Lee. It’s raw, raunchy, and riotous, and features some of the best commentary, reviews, and zombie news anywhere; and they have a pedigree that sets them apart from most fans.
EMB: We met as zombie extras on the set of
Shaun of the Dead
. There were a lot of weirdos around, but some really nice zombies, too. It was only a matter of time before the three of us hooked up in our free time to watch as many horror flicks as we could before getting the last train home. The eatmybrains thing happened because everyone seemed to know their stuff, but the great thing was that we all had a passion for different areas. At the time, Jim was into a lot of Japanese horror, Rawshark loved Deodato’s cannibals, and Zomblee dug anything Fulci or Carpenter. Eatmybrains was a logical consequence of watching and talking horror—the site was built just so that we could share this with like-minded horror fans who we hoped would like what we had to say.
ZCSU: What makes a good zombie movie?
EMB: This depends on whether you’re looking for one of those zombie flicks that delve into social commentary and the human condition faced with the insurmountable challenge of an undead apocalypse, or whether you want to see a balls-out, gore-soaked, severed-head gut-muncher. For the former stick to Romero’s works (
Dawn of the Dead
is probably the first on everyone’s list), but for the latter you have options. You can go for the blood soaked Italian movies that came out in a rush straight after
Zombie Flesh Eaters
(aka
Zombi 2
, 1979); or you can catch one of the gore-drenched American comedy horror zombie movies from the mid-’80s instead (
Return of the Living Dead
and
Re-Animator
spring to mind). Alternatively there’s a couple of top offerings from Asia if you fancy something different, with
Junk
(1999),
Versus
(2000), and
Wild Zero
(2000) being strong contenders for your time. I doubt if you’ll be disappointed with any of those.
ZCSU: What makes a bad zombie flick?
EMB: What makes a bad zombie movie is even simpler; when there aren’t even any zombies in it. Troma’s god awful
Zombie Island Massacre
(1984) is one such culprit (they weren’t zombies after all!) but
Zombie Aftermath
takes the biscuit as Steve Barkett and Sid Haig defend themselves from an undead horde of two that aren’t really undead, they’re more like radioactive mutants. Also stay away from the later
Zombie Flesh Eaters
movies after
Zombie Flesh Eaters 2
(aka
Zombi 3
, 1988) they either feature former porn stars or don’t have any zombies in them, neither of which is good enough.)
This franchise tells the story of a multinational conglomerate called The Umbrella Corporation that, among other things, messes around with bioweapons technology. Naturally these things always get out of hand, first in the corporation’s underground research complex, The Hive, and then above ground as an infection spreads to the closest large urban center, Raccoon City. Soon the dead are everywhere, along with all sorts of mutant critters.
Unlike most first-person shooter games,
Resident Evil
was actually very well written and pretty frightening. Terrific high-end graphics caught the right kind of Romeroesque mood, and the sales skyrocketed past 30 million units.
Eric S. Brown on Writing the Zombie Novel
Zombies II
by Eric S. Brown
Cover Art by Donna Burgess
Eric S. Brown is the author of over 300 short stories and the recent novel,
Zombie II: Inhuman
(Naked Snake Books, 2007). I asked him to comment on the process of crafting zombie stories:
“I started out writing Romero type zombies but in the wake of
28 Days Later
and
The Rising
I began to break away from that type of zombie. I like the idea of the dead being intelligent enough to truly become the Earth’s dominant species and create their own civilization. In my novella,
The Queen
(Naked Snake Books, 2006), the dead have set up breeding camps to raise their own humans as food and have rediscovered the ability to not use but also manufacture in a limited capacity technologies we take for granted.
“Marvel comics recently did a mini-series called Marvel Zombies which imagines the zombie virus as something that hops from world to world infecting the resident meta-humans and using them as the means to transfer the virus and keep it alive. In my latest book,
Zombies II: Inhuman
, I blend superheroes with zombies in a totally different way. With the human race facing extinction, it just makes sense that God, nature, or evolution would step in and try to come up with a way for the race to survive. So in my book, you have telepaths, speedsters, and many other types of super powered people who have developed powers in order to survive.”
The first film in the series was the most effective, with a good cast fleshed out by Michelle Rodriquez at her snarling best, Eric Mabius looking stalwart, a sly and villainous James Purefoy, and a compelling Colin Salmon (underused and killed off too quickly). The movie moves like an
Aliens
-style bug hunt that turns into a zombie chase flick. Some of the action scenes, particularly in the earliest scenes when the zombies are first introduced, are genuinely creepy and had the film not tried to do so much of the video game plot (as in introducing slimy CGI monsters called “lickers”), it might have become a real classic of zombie cinema.
The story line that links all the films together and amplifies the zombie plot deals with the T-virus, a treatment created to cure a degenerative cell-destroying disease by reactivating the dead cells. That might be fine for those suffering from the disease for which it was intended, a plotline explored in the second film, but when introduced to uninfected humans, it first kills them and then reanimates them as the living dead. One wonders why a treatment used to treat tissue death would cause death before turning the dead into walking (and decaying) corpses. Why the virus works so antithetically is never adequately explored; instead they use those storytelling minutes to have the characters—good and bad, living and dead—kill lots and lots of people.
The virus story line ties the series to the zombie movie genre even though the films tend to use zombies as a setup before veering in the third act into fights with mutant monsters. And there are some zombie inconsistencies, such as the speed of the zombies. Mostly they are the kind of growling, shambling zombies we’ve come to know and love from the Romero films, and it’s established that humans are faster and (it would seem from the fight scenes) a little stronger. However these zombies seem to speed up whenever the plot requires it, as shown with them sprinting up a flight of stairs after a potential victim early in
Resident Evil: Apocalypse
(2004). Of course, once the hero arrives to try and save the helpless female victim, the ghouls slow down again so he can kick the asses of a whole bunch of them. If you’re just tuning in for the fun of it, the speed changes don’t seem to matter, but if you’re trying to suspend disbelief so you can make some degree of sense out of the story, these errors jump out. As a result some zombie flick purists dismiss the films. However, whether they fit in as true zombie films or not, they did contribute significantly to the momentum of the genre in the twenty-first century. Without it
Shaun of the Dead
(2004) might never have been made and probably would never have found the huge audience it did; and the same could be said of the remakes of
Dawn of the Dead
and
Day of the Dead
. This, too, has been the subject of extensive debate.
Jamie Russell, author of
Book of the Dead: The Complete History of Zombie Cinema
and an outspoken critic on the zombie genre, sees a link between the zombie pop culture and the larger world culture. “I think the recent resurgence in zombie movies definitely has something to do with the way in which we’ve become a more secular society. Once upon a time people went to church, they believed in heaven and hell, the soul and an afterlife. These days, especially in the West, we’re less certain about such things and I think zombie movies are an expression of that. The zombie as a monster, as a reanimated corpse poses all kinds of questions about God, the afterlife and the soul. Are the living just zombies with brains, or are zombies the living without souls?”
The Worst Zombie Films of All Time, Part 3
Nudist Colony of the Dead
(1991): How could you possibly bore an audience with zombies and nudity? One answer: put all the nude actors into body stockings! Sheesh.- One Dark Night
(1982): Meg Tilly, a haunted house, Carrie-like telekinetic powers, and floating zombies. Just as silly as it sounds and not as much fun as it should have been. - The People Who Own the Dark
(1976): A mishmash inspired by
The Omega Man
that has a bunch of blind people laying siege to a house in which sighted people are holed up. Clearly nobody thought that through. - Shadow: Dead Riot
(2005): Love Tony Todd, hate the movie. Plot’s not even worth talking about. - Nights of the Day of the Dawn of the Son of the Bride of the Return of the Terror
(1991): Looks like it was shot on a dare. And lost.