Saturday, December 4, 2010

The walking dead







The zombie apocalypse has been pretty fully explored in two-hour chunks. But no one had really tackled the genre in episodic television until recently. First, Dead Set debuted on IFC on Oct. 25. The survivors are sequestered on the set of a Big Brother house and initially think the whole thing’s a hoax. The five-part series is campy gore, an extension of the many silly and fun zombie b-movies available on Netflix.
The Walking Dead, on the other hand, was done with all the cinematic care director Frank Darabont put into The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile and AMC put into Mad Men and Breaking Bad. With hours at his disposal to develop characters and plot, Darabont spends most of the hour-and-a-half pilot dipping us gently into the scene. The camera stays with the crumpling bedside flowers, the carcass of a woman in the flickering fluorescent light and the fingers poking through the cafeteria door before we see our first zombie since the gut-punch open.
As coma-woken police officer Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) stumbles past rows of dead bodies outside the hospital, we expect them to waken. We keep seeing bodies, and we’re kept guessing whether they’re live, dead or undead.
The first survivors he meets are a father and son, Morgan (Lennie James) and Duane (Adrian Kali Turner) tormented by Morgan’s wife walking the streets outside the suburban home where they’re squatting. Unable to put her out of her misery or move on without her, they’re frozen in place, tormented by loss that hasn’t really gone away. It’s the most nightmarish of scenarios—hunted by the shell of a loved one—the zombies aren’t generic; this one is personal.
Few living souls and little action for a zombie show also leads to good character development. Grimes is shell-shocked by the world he wakes up to and Morgan serves as his shepherd into reality. There are more survivors, and they’ve somehow got to work together and fight the fantastical, but they won’t always work together. It’s the horror version of Lost with fewer smoke monsters and more crawling torsos. The teaser for the remainder of the series is also reminiscent of Stephen King’s mini-series The Stand.
The show’s glacial pace matches the walking dead themselves. There are no threatening zombie chases until the epic final scene. Slow as sleestaks, single zombies aren’t hard to put down. But en masse, they’re terrifying. And there’s a whole city full of them in Atlanta.
It’s strange to see my city after the apocalypse. The downtown connector is a wasteland, abandoned cars packing the south-bound lanes, emptiness heading into the city. Grimes comes in on horse, straight past Marietta Street and Georgia State University and MARTA buses and buildings I drive past often. The tension as he wakes the dead builds until he runs into an undead crowd. Darabont let the tension build slowly all episode long, and any hope for salvation at the CDC comes crashing down as he realizes he’s trapped in a zombie city.
As a voice crackles over the radio, he realizes he’s not alone. And I realize I’m definitely along for this ride.


         
                     
Basicly pretty interesting TV show, IMDB gave it 9.4 out of 10 score 

19 comments:

  1. That was a pretty great movie! Thanks for reviewing it!

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  2. Looks awesome man, I've got to check it out

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  3. was on tv a few days in my country it's a good mini serie

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  4. I'm not trying to be different here, but with only one episode left in this season, I am a little disappointed. It's god, don't get me wrong, but I think I got my hopes up out of proportion.

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  5. ive been hearing about this show with my friends. they all recommend me to watch it. and from the trailer it looks very appealing to me.

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  6. I've never heard of this before, might just try to watch an episoade.

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  7. Seen it. I thought it was pretty good

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  8. I only saw the first two eps, waiting for the season to finish, I hope it can deliver what it promises

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  9. too bad there's only 6 eps this season, but they got picked up for a second season and i think there's gonna be 13 or something

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  10. I'm about to dl this myself. Looks fun! :)

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  11. Fuck man, Shawshank Redemption is one of my favorite movies EVER. Now I really gotta check this show out.

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  12. I have been desperately wanting to see this show, but have yet to have a chance. The comic was always very good so I'd love to see the translation to film.

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  13. Looks like a good watch, ill be sure to tune in.

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  14. definitly need to check out this show sometime, anyone got torrent link?

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  15. my friend, told me it was one the coolest zombie shows evar

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