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Zombies: Sick of the Living
Dead
Tired of the undead? Us too. Here are a few reasons why zombies
should stay dead
By David Walker
Special to MSN Movies
Everything changed one Saturday afternoon in 1983 when, quite by accident, I
changed the channel and stumbled upon "Night of the Living Dead." My mind was blown by director George A. Romero's 1968 film about a group of survivors
defending themselves against the walking dead. But now, after four decades of
countless movies, books, video games and comics, I am sick of the living dead.
The walking dead have overstayed their welcome, and the time has come to put a
bullet through the brain of the genre, and let it rest in peace.
"Night of the Living Dead" gave birth to the Great Almighty Romero Zombie
Apocalypse Genre (GARZAG for short), and by the time Romero's follow-up "Dawn of the Dead" (1979) had come out, the genre had fully
matured. A mix of blood-spattering special effects and social commentary with a
dash of satire, "Dawn of the Dead" found humanity on the brink of extinction in
a cautionary tale for the post-Vietnam generation, and in the process became the
Bible of zombie lore. In decades earlier, giant irradiated monsters and
emotionless pod people served as metaphorical warnings against the threat of
communism and nuclear conflict. But in the wake of the turmoil experienced in
the 1960s, it had become clear that many of America's greatest threats came from
within, and shambling, flesh-eating ghouls became the perfect allegory for a
disillusioned, ideologically divided country. A new era of film steeped in
nihilism that rebuked the happily-ever-after sentiments of Hollywood played well
to a cynical generation that was falling in love with the antiheroes of films
like "Easy Rider," "Bonnie and Clyde" and "The Wild Bunch."
Thirty years after "Dawn of the Dead," GARZAG is still going, stronger than
ever, with a seemingly never-ending parade of the living dead in theaters and
direct-to-video, due in large part to a resurgence that started in 2002 with the
video-game-inspired "Resident Evil." Over the past several years we have been
bombarded by theatrical releases that range from very good ("Shaun of the Dead"), to good (Romero's "Land of the Dead"), to not-that-good (Romero's "Diary of the Dead"), to terrible (the second and third
"Resident Evil" movies). There have been both reimaginings of Romero
films, including Zack Snyder's entertaining "Dawn of the Dead," Steve Miner's terrible "Day of the Dead," and Jeff Broadstreet's even worse "Night of the Living Dead 3D." Home video has been flooded
with titles like "Zombie Wars," "Flight of the Living Dead," "Gangs of the
Dead," "The Zombie Diaries," "Zombie Honeymoon," "Fido," "Dance of the Dead" and
"Day of the Dead 2: Contagium," most of which are just plain bad. And then you
have "Dead Snow" (in theaters); Romero's sixth zombie film, "Survival of the Dead," coming in the near future; and the
upcoming "Zombieland," which looks like it would have been better
suited for Chevy Chase 25 years ago.
All of these zombie movies might make some fans happy. But too much of a good
thing done badly is not good at all, and it is clear that something has gone
terribly wrong with GARZAG. Part of problem is that, for the better part of
three decades, the genre catered almost exclusively to horror movie fans, seldom
venturing into the mainstream. The genre thrived in the world of Italian
exploitation flicks during the 1980s, where filmmakers like Lucio Fulci, Umberto Lenzi and Bruno Mattei pushed the envelope
of gut-churning gore (and quality cinema). Even films like 1985's classic "Return of the Living Dead" (which introduced GARZAG to
fast-moving zombies that talked) and Romero's own "Day of the Dead" (which introduced GARZAG to intellectual
discourse) stayed within the confines of the horror world. And then there was
the slew of direct-to-video movies like "The Dead Next Door" and "the Dead Hate
the Living," all of which kept the genre going into the 21st century.
The big change came in 1996 with the release of the first "Resident Evil"
video game, which essentially took the zombie apocalypse into a new medium and
expanded the scope of the genre, becoming a major franchise that included video
games, novels, comic books and a series of movies that kicked off in 2002.
"Resident Evil" represented what was fun about GARZAG, while conveniently
avoiding anything that resembled intelligence or social commentary. Following on
the heels of the first "Resident Evil" movie was "28 Days Later" (technically not a zombie film, but close
enough), and the combined financial success of both movies helped take the genre
from a special place for fans of classics like Peter Jackson's "Dead Alive" and Stuart Gordon's "Re-Animator" to a money-maker for mainstream Hollywood.
Suddenly Hollywood realized that there was money to be made in a genre that was
nearly 40 years old, meanwhile aspiring filmmakers still struggled to recapture
the same lightning of the original "Night of the Living Dead" and "Dawn of the
Dead." And this is when things started to fall apart.
While the endless parade of films has drained the life out of the living
dead, video games have taken the soul. As fun as games like "Left 4 Dead," "Dead
Rising" and the countless versions of "Resident Evil" may be, they have helped
transform zombies into little more than moving targets for video games. This
transformation has become reflected in most films, which have lost sight of the
fact that zombies can serve as the perfect metaphor for just about anything, and
not just something to shoot through the head. Where Romero's "Dawn of the Dead"
was a cynical comment on consumer culture, Snyder's remake in 2004, entertaining
though it may have been, was little more than a video game come to life (much
like "Resident Evil" and "House of the Dead") with nothing to say.
The world of comic books, which is known for draining the last vestiges of
originality from anything and everything, has also been going to work picking at
the rotting corpse of GARZAG. A perfect example would have to be "Marvel
Zombies," a line of comic books set in an alternate Marvel universe where heroes
like Spider-Man and the Hulk are flesh-eating zombies. Of course, now that
Disney owns Marvel, things could get worse with "Disney Zombies." Still, the
comic world and its fans treat the zombie genre as if it just started in 2003,
when writer Robert Kirkman's "The Walking Dead" debuted. Entertaining at times, "The
Walking Dead" owes whatever originality it has to the 30-plus years of other
zombie tales that came before it. Soon to be a television series on AMC, "The
Walking Dead" could allow the genre to evolve within a medium that has yet to
really yield anything significant, or could simply provide proof that the
creative well has gone dry.
GARZAG reached its crowning moment in, of all places, the world of literature
with Max Brooks' brilliant "World War Z." Expanding on the mythology that was
born in 1968 with "Night of the Living Dead," "World War Z" took the genre to
levels no film, video game or comic book has ever gone, with an incredibly
detailed "oral history" of the zombie apocalypse told from a global perspective.
And short of Romero's original three living dead films, there has been no better
zombie story told in any medium than the epic tale of human survival recounted
in Brooks' book, which is headed for the big screen in the near future.
An idea that started with a group of Pittsburgh-based filmmakers in the 1960s
has transformed into an iconic genre that fuels multiple mediums of
entertainment and has spawned a thriving subculture. Like so many other fans, I
have seen my beloved Great Almighty Romero Zombie Apocalypse Genre interpreted
well and shamelessly ripped off. We have seen zombies used as metaphors for
societal ills, and as a substitute for original thought. We have watched great
zombie movies, played great zombie games, and read great zombie books, just as
we've weeded through total garbage of the living dead. But now is the time to
leave it all alone. Even if there is a remote chance the genre can be improved
on, it really isn't worth sitting through all the trash it will take to get
there, because one more "House of the Dead" movie is one too many. Now is the
time as to put the walking dead out of their misery.
Moviefone: Funniest zombie movie scenes
Has the zombie fad run it's course? Are you sick and tired of zombie
movies? Write us at heymsn@microsoft.com
David Walker is the editor and publisher of BadAzz MoFo.
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