Zombie Survival Crew

The Unknowns:
Review for Z Nation 405
By A. Zombie

Guess we’ve kinda figured out why people randomly go missing. Someone or something uses a mind-crippling noise to abduct survivors—in the first incident, the seemingly sentient truck broadcasts the noise, from then on it’s used to curb everyone’s attempts to plan an escape. Whether or not all the missing people are shipped to the same facility, we’re given no indication. The current group finds each other eventually, but Sun Mei, Red, and the others are still MIA by the episode’s conclusion. That means more awkward, longing sighs from 10k every time Red is mentioned. Oh goodie.

What do these mystery beings want with the people they’ve abducted? Hard labor in dangerous conditions—a.k.a. this is a slavery ring with the crop being zombies who must be cleared from certain locations in an industrial building for a plan none of the enslaved understand. Roberta and a stranger fix the elevator situation. 10k and Doc nearly asphyxiate shutting off a toxic gas leak. There’s several other small tasks for the crew, as well. Sometimes they work together. Other times they are paired with a stranger. Sarge pulls the short straw, so she gets the random guy who is more interested in raping her than the task at hand. Writers, try harder. Find another way to scare new female characters.

Roberta thinks she’s lassoed the golden goose when their unseen captors paired her with a man in a Zona uniform. Surely if there’s a high-tech mass kidnapping scheme, it’s based with the filthy rich jerks on the doomed island, right? Nope. At least according to the guard. These invisible baddies aren’t picking on one team or another. They’re snatching anyone they can get their hands on in order to find something hidden in the building. Our gang never learns that secret. They’re too preoccupied with surviving the regular Zs, mega-Zs, and desperate prisoners who think Puppy Chow time is the best time of the day.

Despite the countless boxes in the warehouse, we only see a small handful of the captives. None of those make it out the front door when our gang makes a zombie-assisted break for it. I get the time crunch and all, but not one of the crew stops to think for a second to check the other boxes for their missing friends and loved ones. It feels wrong for them to ignore an entire warehouse of people, at least a couple hundred souls, in favor of this vague trip toward the east. Especially when it comes to 10k. For a guy who’s completely distracted by the loss of his love, he sure didn’t seem desperate to find her when he’s smack dab in the middle of a place giving the first indication that she may have also been kidnapped.

Continuity issues aside, there’s a far larger problem on their plates now. During the final rush to escape, Lucy attempts to save her new zombie friend from a fight. Murphy steps in and is bitten. He’s seemingly cured after the stay in Zona, yet recently resumed eating flesh in the form of self-cannibalism. So what’s going to happen when a fresh dose of the Z virus makes its way into his blood stream? Things aren’t looking good for the formally blue guy. We may have to say goodbye to Murphy as we currently know him.