The Inevitable Zombie Apocalypse

2009 was a great year for zombie fans, with releases like Pontypool, Dead Snow and Zombieland at the movies, Left 4 Dead 2 in games and lots of other great stuff. 2010 has the potential to be even better. To get you up to speed on the year to come, I’ve compiled a list of ten of the most exciting zombie projects I expect to see in the coming year. Note that I only included things that I think have a solid chance of being released in 2010, so things like Zombieland 2 or The 4th Reich haven’t been included, as cool as they might be. Without further ado, I present my top ten picks for cool zombie shit coming in 2010. Make sure ot vote in the poll or leave me a comment with your thoughts!

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A daily roundup of all the undead news that shambles into view… Bookmark the home page or add the RSS feed to your reader for your daily dose of walking dead. Got news tips? E-mail me at cory.casciato[AT]gmail.com.

Go behind the scenes of Zombieland and get an update on the status of Zombieland 2 in this extensive interview with director Ruben Fleischer. (IconVsIcon)

It looks as if Pet Sematary is being revived for another go-round. The remake will be scripted by Matthew Greenberg, who handled the adaptation for 1408, a movie I was thoroughly unimpressed with. I am unenthused. (Hollywood Reporter)

Strike a zombie pose, photograph it and send it to Michael Moreci and you could be immortalized as a zombie in his upcoming graphic novel Quarantine (no relation to the film of the same name). And win an autographed copy of the final book, of course.

Details emerge on the DVD/Blu-ray release of I Sell the Dead (review here), coming March 30. The only extra is a trailer (are you fucking kidding me?) and you can see the cover now. (DVD Active)

If you’re in Philadelphia, you can catch a zombie double feature tonight featuring One Dark Night (never heard of it) and Bruno Mattei’s Night of the Zombies (aka Virus, aka Hell of the Living Dead, aka a terrible piece of shit that ranks as one of the worst zombie movies ever). Better hurry though — it starts at 8 p.m. Eastern time at the International House. (Geekadelphia)

It doesn't get any better than this

There’s never been a better time for zombies — or, more to the point, for fans of zombies.

Everywhere you look, the zombie is making its mark. Not only do fans have a deep and varied back catalogue of great works to choose from, most of it easily available to anyone with the interest and a decent Internet connection, but the walking dead are the subject of of some of the best books, movies, video games and Internet sites being made. We are, at this very moment, living in the midst of the zombie renaissance.

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A daily roundup of all the undead news that shambles into view… Bookmark the home page or add the RSS feed to your reader for your daily dose of walking dead. Got news tips? E-mail me at cory.casciato[AT]gmail.com.

Can’t wait for the TV adaptation of Robert Kirkman’s Walking Dead series? Perhaps a fan film (embedded below) will help tide you over? FYI, SPOILER ALERT if you haven’t read issue 51 of the comic. (Splash Page)

This Halloween weekend (so, October 29-31), zombie lovers get their very own zombie-dedicated convention when the first-ever ZomBCon comes to Seattle.

A few more pics (three, to be exact) trickle out for the zombie-apocalypse-Africa-style movie The Dead. They show some sweet machete action. (Bloody Disgusting)

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A daily roundup of all the undead news that shambles into view… Bookmark the home page or add the RSS feed to your reader for your daily dose of walking dead. Got news tips? E-mail me at cory.casciato[AT]gmail.com.

If a convention with a screening of George A. Romero’s Survival of the Dead sounds like fun, get thee to Irving/Lewisville, Texas (I have no idea where that is either) April 28 through May 1 for the Texas Frightmare Weekend Film Festival. More films to be announced soon. (Dread Central)

On the other hand, if a convention with guest Tom Savini and a Night of the Living Dead reunion sounds like fun, get thee to Indianapolis, Indiana July 9-11 for the Famous Monsters convention. (Horror Squad)

The new UK super-deluxe Blu-ray release of Day of the Dead is coming with a 24-page comic recounting the origins of Bub the zombie. Have a look at this preview, which looks fantastic. (Dread Central)

The novel version of author Timothy W. Long’s  The Zombie Wilson Diaries, chronicling the experience of one man shipwrecked on a deserted island and his female zombie companion, is now available.

More info about the Zombie Combat Manual for you, in case handing out an ass-whupping to a zombie sounds like a good idea to you. (A World on Fire)

I’ve decided to ask a few of my favorite horror bloggers and friends from the online community to share some of their zombie expertise with the site. The first guy I thought of was Jay Clarke, of the excellent blog The Horror Section. Over there, Jay blogs about everything from VHS box covers to the latest releases to horror games. He’s an excellent writer with an encyclopedic knowledge of horror. And he loves zombies, maybe almost as much as I do. He’s contributed a dream-team list of half a dozen zombie-killing badasses he’d want to team up with in case of apocalypse, and it is a fine list. Not all the heroes in the group above made it, obviously — you’ll have to click through to read who did, and why. Without further ado, here’s Jay.

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A daily roundup of all the undead news that shambles into view… Bookmark the home page or add the RSS feed to your reader for your daily dose of walking dead. Got news tips? E-mail me at cory.casciato[AT]gmail.com.

The makers of animated zombie movie A.D. are aiming to make the biggest, baddest-ass, most epic zombie movie of all time. Get ready to pee your pants with joy if they pull it off, and watch them speak about it in a video interview below in the meantime. (ETC)

Zombie and robots in comic book mayhem! It’s Zombies vs. Robots Adventure (that is a title that does not fuck around). More info and a preview here. (Bloody Disgusting)

Here’s an interview with Roxanna Manuel, one of the stars of ’80s direct-to-video zombie movie The Video Dead (review here). (Killer Film)

Are zombie movies racist? That’s what one doctoral candidate at University of California Santa Barbara claims in this article — and he’ll elaborate at a speaking event tonight if you’re in Santa Barbara and want to go. (Daily Nexus)

Need some tips for giving those zombies an ass-whupping? The Zombie Combat Manual, presumably the world’s first guide to hand-to-hand combat vs. the undead, has you covered. (A World on Fire)

When the zombie apocalypse comes, you will still be able to enjoy a nice beverage out of these zombie pint glasses. (Bread and Badger)

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A daily roundup of all the undead news that shambles into view… Bookmark the home page or add the RSS feed to your reader for your daily dose of walking dead. Got news tips? E-mail me at cory.casciato[AT]gmail.com.

If Zombieland writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick get their way, the movie could yet become a TV series (that’s what it started out as, by the way). I would be okay with this. There’s a video interview with the duo after the break. (MTV Movies Blog)

Casting rumors for AMC’s TV adaptation of Walking Dead alert! Three names emerge, including the dude who plays Jacob on Lost. I vote for him. (Big Shiny Robot)

There’s a new Dead Rising 2 gameplay clip making the rounds. It looks a lot like the original game, which is comforting. You can watch it after the break. (Kotaku)

The faux film poster for the new Left 4 Dead 2 DLC “The Passing” is out. And you can get some more details on how the whole scenario fits into the Left 4 Dead 2 story. (Kotaku)

Spain brings us a zombies vs. crooks movie in Dead Dogs. First image looks promising! (Bloody Disgusting)

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When discussing the zombie films of George A. Romero, the 1982 anthology horror entry Creepshow is often overlooked. That’s probably because it offers a very different take on Romero’s signature creature — two of them, actually. The film offers five short stories wrapped in a sixth used mostly as a framing device. Two of these, or a third of the film, are devoted to the walking dead.

The first of the two, and the first proper story segment after the intro/framing device of the kid who loves horror comics, is called “Father’s Day.” It’s a very basic and somewhat slow-starting revenge tale about an overbearing, obnoxious and downright evil father that returns from the grave to kill and eat cake. He seeks revenge on not only the angry daughter that killed him in revenge for him killing her boyfriend, but also on his descendants who he sees as money-grubbing parasites. And, as mentioned, to eat cake — it’s his birthday, see? It does take a while to get going but it’s worth it for both the awesome, moldering zombie that arises from the grave and the slasher-esque kills once he returns.

The father zombie’s head is almost denuded of flesh, maggots and worms squirm in his eye sockets, dirt is encrusted all over him. When he speaks, his voice is grating and rough, like dirt is clogging his throat and his voice box is eroded to almost nothing. He’s pretty much just awesome, and true to the comic-book vision of the film. He strangles one victim, drops a tombstone on one and, best of all, twists another’s head all the way off then serves it as his “cake.”

The second zombie vignette, “Something to Tide You Over,” is the third episode of the film. It’s also one of the best over all, second only to perhaps “The Crate.” In this one, Ted Danson’s character and his girlfriend suffer the wrath of a psychotic Leslie Nielsen, who’s married to Danson’s girlfriend. To punish his straying wife and her lover, he buries them both neck-deep in the sand and lets the tide drown them, filming the whole thing for his video collection. To punish him, they return as waterlogged zombies and return the favor, burying him on the same beach to suffer the same fate.

The waterlogged zombies of this entry look incredible. They have puckered, mottled grey-white and greenish black visages with seaweed hanging from their hair. The use of lighting in this entry is noteworthy as well, as Romero uses bright, primary colored spots that invoke both a comic-book flavor and recall the lighting and colors of Suspiria. There’s also a clever nod to his primary zombie work, when Nielsen’s character shoots one of the zombies in the head and they barely react apart from the trickle of greenish-black ichor that emerges. It seems to be his way of saying, “We’re not at the mall anymore, folks.”

The rest of the episodes contain no zombies but are generally entertaining, especially “The Crate” which concerns a weird monster hibernating in a long-lost crate (and more revenge, naturally). The second episode, “The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill” is silly yet still effectively invokes some of the same themes of isolation and self-loathing/fearing transformation into the Other that is one of the centerpieces of the “Dead” films. The final episode, “They’re Creeping Up On You” about paranoia, self-isolation and a really bad case of roaches is probably the weakest and an unfortunate choice to end on. Finally, the framing story is worth a mention — it has no zombies, but it does have a little voodoo, so it ties in nicely with the origins of the zombie.

While it doesn’t hold the same importance in zombie history as Romero’s primary zombie canon, it’s not a film to be overlooked. It’s entertaining and reveals some of Romero’s early influences (i.e. horror comics) and shows his usual skill at blending dark themes with humor, this time with an emphasis on the humor. Personally, it’s also noteworthy as it was  definitely my first Romero movie and almost certainly my first zombie film (I may have seen parts of Phantasm before this, but definitely not the whole thing). It was a childhood favorite and a film I watched many, many times on cable. It’s aged remarkably well and is worth seeing — or seeing again — for zombie fans seeking a bit of contrast and insight into the mind of the zombie master.

Creepshow/US/1982

A daily roundup of all the undead news that shambles into view… Bookmark the home page or add the RSS feed to your reader for your daily dose of walking dead. Got news tips? E-mail me at cory.casciato[AT]gmail.com.

The writers of Zombieland 2 are chock full of ideas: adding new characters, following Abigail Breslin’s character as she grows up and maybe giving Tallahassee a girlfriend are just a few of the possible items on the menu for the sequel. Oh, and it’s all going to be 3D. (MTV Movies Blog)

Shooting of the pilot episode of the TV adaptation of the Walking Dead starts May 15 in Atlanta, Georgia. Does this mean it’s been cast already? I want details, damn it! (Bloody Disgusting)

There’s a big ReAnimator reunion convention happening May 21-23 in Los Angeles. So far, Stuart Gordon, Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton, Robert Sampson and Dennis Paoli are set to appear. (Dread Central)

Speaking of ReAnimator, there’s a new movie coming soon called Exquisite Corpse about a doctor who comes up with a serum to revive the dead. Naturally, he uses it on his just-killed girlfriend. Just as naturally, it has some issues, like the fact that it only lasts a day and each time it’s used a little of the subject’s humanity is lost. Trailer after the break. (Dread Central)

Buy the corpse-stealing comedy I Sell the Dead (review here) on DVD, get a free forty-page comic as a bonus. (Bloody Disgusting)

Players of the iPhone’s FPS Call of Duty: World at War: Zombies will get a new map pack tomorrow called “Verruckt.” It’s set in an insane asylum and costs $5. (Kotaku)

A blogger ponders the all-important question: can the freezing cold and snow stop (or at least slow) the zombie apocalypse? (A World on Fire)

It looks as if PC gamers looking to shoot zombies in space with Dead Space 2 will be out of luck. No PC version for you! (Blues News)

Some wacky movie pirates in the Dominican Republic got creative with the faux movie poster for the Left 4 Dead campaign “Dead Air.” Wonder if the movie inside was the Corbin Bernsen-directed zombie flick of the same name? (Kotaku)

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