The Walking Dead was (supposedly*) written first. 28 Days Later came out first.
It was pretty good. Scared my wife, of course.
So you’re in downtown Atlanta and the streets are deserted. You round a corner and half of Little Five Points is in a street, all zombied up, and they’re not making any noise? You couldn’t hear them until you rounded the corner?
We see the scene where the people camping out hear the cop on the CB. As soon as I saw the little boy, I said “Well, there’s the wife and kid.” Got it in one.
Perhaps it’s just me, but if I wake up from a coma 28 DL and the world has been zombied, after I get my shit together and in a relatively safe place, the first thing I’m going to do is find out what happened. Obviously, the cop has a different set of priorities, but still…
After hearing the rant from the LEC in the squad car about women and global warming I was hooked. Clever scripting.
Makeup was well done. There were the beginnings of character development. And it had a few unique touches - something that’s getting more difficult to achieve. Good grief, the horse. Not the horse!
I may have to stop saying I can go a whole week without watching TV.
That just means it’s a Monday morning and Junkman’s Daughter isn’t open yet.
“Oh George, not the livestock!”
Watching it I was thinking that a cattle drive wouldn’t be a terrible way to cleanse an area. Send a few cows in there, which should flush out not all but most of the zombies from whatever hidey holes or dark corners they’re in, then drop the bombs.
So anyone know who was in the chopper above Atlanta and, more to the point, where the chopper took off from? A well stocked top few floors of a skyscraper with choppers atop and some demolished few floors of staircases would probably be the best place to be in Atlanta so long as you could get resupplied by air.
For whatever reason it looks like zombies in this setting enter into some sort of dormant phase. Witness the zombie in front of the house that Rick ends up beating to death (2nd death) with his baseball bat, the zombie soldier in the tank, and the zombies on the wrecked bus. The zombies Rick saw when he rounded the corner were distracted by the helicopter flying over head. In fact, so was Rick.
Personally I think Rick was also surprised by the sheer number of walking dead he encountered. This was the first time he had seen so many at one time.
Well acted and well directed. I like the slower pace, as it builds tension for the scenes to come. It’s probably a generation thing, but non-stop explosions, chases, blood and gore are boring to me. Character development is necessary to sustain any series, particularly one like this. If the audience doesn’t care whether or not the characters live or die, the series won’t make it. I’m assuming there will be some antagonist(s) introduced before long. Good guys + zombies != a series that will last, IMO.
From what we’ve seen so far this is very likely and welcome - in my view. The story from the comic book does need fleshed out - no pun intended, really. It looks like they’re taking the plot beats and then doing their best to improve everything else - especially the drama and dialogue. Great. It’s a good comic, but this show would not be if it took the slavish Sin City route.
Depending how far into the series it gets (at 6 episodes, it seems unlikely to get past the first volume), there’s anything from the standard for the genre cracks and mini-conflicts with not-so-mini consequences within the society the survivors build, to full on evil assholes.
As long as we’re voicing minor nitpicks; the abandoned gas station was still selling gas at $2.999/gal when it ran out. You’d think the price of gas would skyrocket during the initial phase of the outbreak when people were panic buying and the supply chain was breaking down. Remember the price spikes after Katrina?
It’s best not to focus on the hospital too much. It was just a plot device to enable Rick to serve as the audience surrogate. There are alot of small inconsistencies with that. For example Rick’s been comatose for weeks, but apparently wasn’t catheterized. Neither is his gown or bed linen soiled. Clearly he must’ve had a caregiver up until a day or two ago. These same issues also apply with the opening of 28 Days Later except Jim was also completely naked.
Now that we’ve started nit-picking, the thing that took me right out of the show was the deputy’s complete lack of any situational awareness. Hell, he wouldn’t have even gotten shot in the first place if he had been paying attention. I voted “Didn’t like” but will probably keep watching just to see what other jackpots this guy stumbles into and hopefully see that he gets what’s coming to him.
I certainly like to see character development get played out over big slam bang effects, and this is actually where I found the most fault with the pilot. It’s the same basic stock characters we’ve seen in every zombie movie from “Night” on down:
-the sleazy, self-serving bad guy who attempts to throw his weight around & bully all the other survivors (the hero’s partner, no doubt there will be a scene within the next few episodes where zombies are attacking, he will be faced with a choice to either save someone, or run away…and he’ll run away.)
-the frightened, unable-to-cope woman (the cop’s wife; she of course will become a strong-willed, resourceful zombie killer before long.)
-the precocious kid. (the black kid.)
-the grieving secondary character who sees a loved one turned into a flesh-eating zombie. (his father - who doubles as the worldly-wise “magical black man” (as TV Tropes calls it) to counsel the white characters.
Even the zombies seem a well-worn group. The heroes ALWAYS stumble upon a little lost girl with long hair who turns out to be a zombie that attacks them. In the 30 years since the original “Dawn”, there has never been a wittier, more satirical zombie than the Hare Krishna zombie or the nun whose whimple gets caught in a door and she keeps trying to stumble forward, going nowhere.
All this I’ll give a pass to, since this is the pilot and the main point of any pilot is to establish the scenario & main characters of the series, leaving further episodes to expand upon. But the next couple episodes had better show something new for this to justify further viewing.
I’ll second this. Tachistoscope presentation of a film, way too common now, is distracting from the plot. Sometimes I wonder if that isn’t the pupose - to drop a few “goodies” in hopes of forgiveness of tired old cliches and poorly thought out story lines.
That’s not to even mention what it is doing to a person’s body. Does anyone ever pay attention to the increased heartbeat, adrenaline flow, (and probably raised blood pressure) when they are bombarded with this rapid flashing noise and alarming visuals? Shades of crowd conditioning.
A steady diet of this kind of stimulation would provide an explanation of why so many young people have trouble sleeping these days.
Spouse and I thought we may be losing some hearing and/or have heart attacks during a viewing of “Saw VII” this weekend. And if it’s too loud for us I can’t imagine what it’s doing to all those tender, pubescent ear cilia.
Yes, this series has promise. Maybe even thoughtfulness.
The first half hour was too slow. I’m curious how they will edit it in replays to an hour long episode. I imagine drop the prelude with the little girl, cut down the scene with his partner and go right into the incident that got Rick into the coma. Then cut down the exploration of the hospital and just go right into Rick meeting the father and son.
I thought it was really odd that the dead wife/mother was in nightgown. It made me think that at one point in the script or during filming the father and son weren’t squatters but just neighbors who Rick didn’t know and it was changed later. It seemed to “at home” for them to be squatters y’know?
A common idea in zombie fiction is that zombies don’t “think” they “do.” If they did it in life they stick to that pattern. Romero used it to explain why the undead went to the mall in Dawn of the Dead and he played with it in Land of the Dead with some zombies actually being able to learn and start to think again…which was to make them more sympathetic. With the mom going up to the door and trying to open it- that implies that there must be some intelligence left and not just habitual behavior. It will be reallly interesting to see how they use that in the series.
What did people think of the lead’s accent?
I was surprised when I saw him in the trailer, him being British.
Something odd I noticed was at the dinner table when the father corrected the son’s Ebonics. Later I noticed that both he and the son are using the language style again.
Any insights into what the purpose of that was to move the script or to give insights into the character?
Once again an English actor (Andrew Lincoln) does a much better job with a southern accent than most American actors. RADA’s dialect coaches must be near mentats.
Regarding gas being $2.99/gallon, maybe that’s why they ran out.
In the event of a Zombapocalypse, what would be the most likely buildings still to have power due to generators and propane? The sheriff’s station had some, the hospital had lights in a couple of rooms from generators, but what about military installations? The staff housing would obviously be just like any other neighborhood pretty much but the command offices perhaps.
The Greenbrier Resort Congressional bunker had generators and air filtering systems and broadcast technologies in 1962, so I’m guessing that 50 years later there has to be some place even more immune to Worst Case Scenario.
And another question, if anyone is willing to give me the answer. Shambling in a zombie (what’s the word for a group of zombies? A shudder?) is on my bucket list.
I noticed that the producers of this series are offering an opportunity. Did anyone catch the code? I watched the whole thing but only saw the URL.
I’d be on a plane so fast if I was chosen.
The code was “SURVIVOR” I believe (I’ll double check when I get near my DVR tonight). I won’t compete with you, since I’ve already completed that off my bucket list. Nyah!
Yes I had issues with the “walking from a coma” as well in how they played it out. How long was he in a coma and how long have people been gone? The hospital is completely deserted and damaged, so some time has passed.
Yet he somehow remains undisturbed while in a coma, and magically lives without food or water. It just doesn’t make sense.
As for the rest I rather enjoyed it, although like some other comments, I would like to see the issue of blood spatter addressed.
Survival.