I'm Not Quite as Disappointed in The Walking Dead Anymore

There will be Walking Dead spoilers ahead (for the show and comic). Enter at your own risk.

Season Two of The Walking Dead has been almost universally criticized. In fact, the only show I can think of that got more criticism was the most recent season of Dexter (I'm not counting outright shitty shows, just those that people expect to be good or at least entertaining). The criticism of The Walking Dead couldn't be more appropriate. The show got stuck in the mud that is Hershel's farm and struggled mightily to release itself (and it only took until the last three episodes to get any sort of traction. The characters are paper thin and, in an ensemble this big, you'd think someone might have a character arc over  nineteen episodes. In place of characters, the writers stuck in plot devices to act as conflict producers to create tension regardless as to whether any of it makes sense for the show or the characters (and I recognize the irony in complaining about undefined characters in one sentence and saying the show doesn't stay true to these same people in the next, but one would think the writers would recognize that the two are related. Stronger characters equals stronger conflict. Stronger conflict [should] equal character defining moments).  Instead, we end up with Lori telling Rick to kill Shane in one scene and getting mad at Rick for doing just that a few episodes later.

There is a huge amount of potential in having a television show about a the zombie apocalypse. Endless scenarios and relationships can be examined in this medium than can't be in a movie. That The Walking Dead is content to have characters snipe at each other for now reason is not only disappointing, but a waste of the idea. I hold out little hope of anyone tackling the subject matter again and doing it in a competent way. In the hopes of getting more of what I was looking, I borrowed Compendium One of The Walking Dead comic which features the first eight chapters of the story. Having finished it, I'm not certain The Walking Dead could have ever made a satisfying television series both in terms of what we've seen and what I hoped for.

Firstly, the characters are only slightly more defined than in the show. They still overreact and yell at each other at the drop of a hat. They still let their guard down at ridiculous times. And Lori, who is by far the most fortunate character in the entire series (well... to a point), is still ridiculously selfish and irrational. I don't mean to suggest that characters can't behave irrationally in an irrational world. It just happens way to frequently and Lori, whose husband found her against all odds and still has her son AND has a baby without a doctor or complications, is the worst. On the flip-side, Rick (an antihero in the comic and going that way in the show), Andrea (a sharpshooting non-harpie), Carol (younger and not tied to Sophia all the time), and even Carl (who knows better than to wander around a zombie wasteland alone all the time) are much more interesting. Add to that Tyreese who's not in the show, but kicks all kinds of ass (seriously, why couldn't T-Dog be him?), and the pool of characters is tolerable. They may not be deep, but they don't piss me off so much (sorely missing, though, is Daryl who is the only person on the show worth a damn).

In terms of plotting and momentum, the comic has almost the opposite problem as the TV show. I'm not sure if it's related to the fact that I've only read three graphic novels in my life and don't know how to pace myself, but the story moves along WAY to fast most of the time (at least until they get the prison where it drags to a halt). I enjoyed spending a bit of time with Morgan and Duane (the black father and son) in the show and the interaction in the comic feels like it's done in a matter of minutes. These are the first people Rick meets. You'd think he'd want to hang around them a bit more to get used to this new world he's awoken to. And I know I complained about how long the show got stuck at Hershel's farm, but that comic blows through that, too. it acts merely as an excuse to get some extra characters around so the main characters can exist a bit longer without having to be killed (Hershel's family doesn't last long in the comic). 

The more I read of these familiar moments in the comic, the more I appreciated aspects of the show. No, I didn't need to spend an entire season on the farm (and you can blame the budget if you like, I blame the writers for not overcoming the setting and creating interesting characters), but there are many aspects I enjoyed about the location. And that false sense of security could be used to examine group dynamics in a meaningful way (not that it did). In my perfect world, the first half of season two would have ended with them leaving the farm and finding the jail, which all happened at the very end of the season. That gives us time at the farm, but moves things along so the story doesn't get so stale. And new environs means new obstacles means less time to get bogged down in poorly executed interpersonal drama.

Having already seen the show, I was pleased to discover there are still plenty of surprises in the comic. I don't know if fans of the comic felt the same way about the show (though I know one person who liked what they did with Shane on the show). Often, the differences from the show to the book wouldn't be a step up or down, but a parallel approach that offers interesting ideas, at the very least. I keep coming back to this, but the limitation of these ideas is solely in the horribly underdeveloped characters (this applies to both incarnations).

The one thing about the comic that prevents me from saying that it is absolutely better than the show (and I should note that I really enjoyed the first season) is that it devolves into comic book territory. Is it unreasonable for me to say that about a comic book focusing on the zombie apocalypse? I don't think so. If we're to get invested in the situation facing the protagonists, we must believe in their danger. Moving into the hyper-real arena loses that investment in reality. For me, that happened with the introduction of The Governor. The man is too cartoony to be believed. I don't deny that there will be bad people who take advantage of the people's fear (we can look at Land of the Dead for that), but there is no need for the man to keep zombie heads in aquariums, have his zombie daughter chained up, unrepentantly rape a prisoner, hack off Rick's hand, surviving having the shit beat out of him, his arm and penis cut off, and his eye gouged out (all with the resident doctor dead). This is a super-villain origin story and it feels intensely out of place. Maybe this is also my personal preference for more subtle villains like Mags from Justified.

I don't think The Walking Dead could ever have been what I wanted in a television show about the zombie apocalypse. Neither the show or the comic have shown the sort of psychology I'm interested. However, talking to the person who loaned me the compendium and his enthusiasm for The Walking Dead as an unending stream of horrifying events to make Rick and his son lunatics, I'm intrigued. If this is the case, I wish it hadn't taken the form of an ensemble-based piece of entertainment. In light of the comic, I'm somewhat mollified that The Walking Dead wasn't blowing it's immense potential by shear ineptness, but because the source is similarly lacking in many ways.

How to Lose Good Will: The Horde

I'm not here to spark age old debates. I think we've all had enough of them. You haven't? Me either, but I'm not going to get into it again (but you can read someone else's zombie thoughts if you like). Just to acknowledge the fact: yes, The Horde features fast zombies and no, I'm not OK with that. So what else does The Horde have for us?



I am a huge fan of the idea that starts off The Horde that there is a narrative completely unrelated to the zombie genre (or horror at all) that gets disrupted by the outside undead force. I almost wish that I could experience a movie in which I didn't know it was a zombie movie until the first zombies showed up 20 minutes in. Can you imagine watching a heist movie where the crew has spent the entire movie planning the heist to the most minute detail only to have zombies screw everything up just as they crack the safe? It sounds amazing! So The Horde had a lot of good will early even in spite of the fact that the hints of the imminent zombie invasion pointed to fast zombies. There are a group of cops who are going to rescue a colleague/friend from the people who killed another one of their own. Opposing sides meet. Some people get killed. Zombies show up.

The plot isn't unlike John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct 13. The two sides must try to put aside their differences if they hope to survive. Through the first 30 minutes, I was totally on board. I loved the set up, had no idea where the movie was going, the movie was looking good, and I totally dug that the zombie menace was unexplained and that the recently killed were rising even though they weren't infected (something that I feel gets lost in some other zombie movies). Then the first zombie attack happens. It's like the directors, Yannick Dahan and Benjamin Rocher, totally lost confidence in their abilities. It looks like they removed frames to make the action quicker and jerky but it looks terrible. Any time something exciting happens, this aesthetic returns to the point where I actively starting disliking the movie. I want my zombie carnage smooth, dammit!

Then there are the characters... I mostly like the lead criminal, Adewale (Eriq Ebouaney), and the lead cop, Ouessem (Jean-Pierre Martins). Actually, the criminals in general get on my nerves the least, but that's not to say I like them. But the female cop, Aurore (Claude Perron) is totally ridiculous. She's just there to be angry and contrary. And being basically the only female in the movie, she has to be pregnant (but not too pregnant so she's still super-thin). I get what they were trying to do, but I don't understand why she's only looking out for herself. The comic relief from Rene (Yves Pignot) starts as mildly amusing and becomes tiresome. Maybe you don't want likable characters in your zombie movie because inevitably, everyone is going to die (or if there is a hopeful ending, the zombie threat is rarely eradicated). Yeah. I don't buy that either.

By the time The Horde is ramping up to the climax, it's just an endless stream of people doing stupid things. A grenade is ignored, people struggle to close a door that zombies are blocking but don't think to shoot at them, unnecessary sacrifices are made, and NO ONE FIGURES OUT THAT HEAD SHOTS KILL THE ZOMBIES EVEN THOUGH THEY'VE ALREADY DETERMINED THAT THAT WORKS. Seriously. They don't even try to aim for the head in most cases. It's so aggravating to watch.

When I was still enjoying The Horde, I was going to talk about the themes running through it and examine if there was any commentary on violence or crime. Instead, I got angry. I thought the film was going to blow me away, fast zombies and everything, but it's a shit sandwich.

Revisionist Zombies: Dead Snow

I don't know what it is about zombies that inspires passion. Of course, I speak of the age old debate, fast zombies vs. slow zombies. Simon Pegg (the eponymous Shaun in Shaun of the Dead) wrote about just this subject with much more thought and insight than I'll go into here. I fall firmly into the slow zombie category. It doesn't make sense to me that zombies can run. They are rotting flesh. Their limbs would go flying off. And running implies coordination. Why not have them climb trees? Don't think I can't enjoy a fast zombie every now and then. The Return of the Living Dead is fantastic fun and not only has the zombies run and think, but also talk (for the record, 28 Days Later does not have zombies and I wholly reject the term "zoombies").

Which brings us to Dead Snow, a film that seems to ignore the fact that Romero ever made Night of the Living Dead. A group of med students are off on a snowbound holiday at a remote cabin. And well, you can guess where it goes from there. To the films credit, the characters aren't annoying and while they are different personalities (well, the guys... the girls are mostly indistinguishable) there's a repartee and camaraderie that drives home why they are friends. It also makes it fun to be with them. I also dug that the trip isn't just about drinking and sex. They spend a lot of time playing in the snow and being disappointed by Twister. The vacation felt like a real vacation and not what Hollywood thinks young people do on a trip.



Of course, as with seemingly every horror movie made these days, one of the characters is a huge movie nerd. I struggle with this type of character (because I see too much of myself represented? Nah) because it feels like a cheap way for the director and writer to tell the audience that, "yeah, we know you've seen this before. But since you know we know, it's not derivative, it's referential." And references abound, though they mostly stick with Raimi. At this point, I think it would be a mistake to ignore the impact of zombies on culture at large. It's common knowledge how to kill zombies and the movie nerd tells everyone not to get bitten, but at no point do the explicitly try to destroy the brain. Sure, lots of zombie skulls get crushed, but there's just as many that get shot or chainsawed in the chest that die just the same.

None of that really matters anyway because, as I've said, these aren't you mother's zombies. These are Nazi zombies. And they aren't driven by a desire for brains. Oh no. They want the gold that they hid 60 years ago. They're more concerned with tearing you apart than eating you, though they'll have a nibble if it comes to it but only after a nice form tackle. Nazi zombies think. They fuck with you. They use tools. And yes, they climb trees. But they die easier, so there's that. Why they aren't affected by the freezing cold? Because they're revisionist zombies, that's why.

Believe it or not, I mostly enjoyed Dead Snow. It's shot very well and doesn't have an overly processed look that so many movies these days have. Because the zombies are so formidable, tension is pretty consistent and there are some pretty amazing scenes of carnage (the final, big showdown is my favorite). It's pretty funny, though there are times that the attempts at comedy are inappropriate (note to screenwriters: it's appropriate to have a character complain, "I told you we should have gone to the beach" while they are under attack but NOT as a button line to a scene where two of his friends died. It comes off as unsympathetic and tells the audience that the characters aren't worth caring about.)

Some final quibbles. I really wish the Wandering Expositioner was a skilled zombie hunter. That could have ramped up the movie a bit. And what is the deal with the zombies just lying under sheets of snow? Do they have to be summoned? What happens when the snow melts? How were they not discovered earlier? Once again, "the plausibles." If you get by your preconception of what a zombie is, Dead Snow is pretty fun. As with most movies, there's stuff that doesn't make sense, but the horror genre is very forgiving as long as the movie delivers the goods and this one mostly does.