They decided to put huge, radioactive craters in the USA and then went on to write clever ways for the main characters to escape certain death. The only one we knew for sure would walk away was Murphy. Even if he didn’t drive away, something about his changed nature would surely save his hide. Cassandra’s too, now that she’s this mystical Other like Murphy.
What about the Roberta, 10k, and Doc? Sure, they make it to a vehicle—I’m assuming they steal Dr. Kurian’s SUV since Murphy has the van from the drug warehouse—but a car isn’t fast enough to drive beyond the 3-8 kilometer blast radius. Roberta demonstrates some fancy defensive driving techniques, magically finding a tunnel to drive into to spare them from taking the brunt of the impact once the blast catches up with them. The car flips, leaving the trio in a situation we’re all too accustomed to on this show—carless, no supplies, and hardly in any condition to wander around a desolate wasteland to find provisions which haven’t been irradiated. Especially since Doc has a hole in his shoulder. It’s not clear how long they wander around before Doc’s injury prevents him from going on. 10k stays to nurse Doc. Roberta continues wandering aimlessly. Because that’s smart. Just when she’s ready to give herself Mercy, a little girl screams and it’s time for killin’. The effects for this season are far better for the fight scenes. Like some of Roberta’s other fights, this one is done in stylized slow-motion, where each fatal strike is full speed, but everything else is nice and slow. It gives great detail for the zombie makeup and fight choreography. It also distracts one from remembering that Roberta is actually too weak to walk, let alone take out half a dozen zombies. Smart. The girl’s family takes Roberta in for a while, feeds her, and sends her back out with food and water to find the guys.
Mack and Addy are back. The band of sister-wives was decimated after one boy they sent to his certain death grew wise and returned to torch the place. Those who didn’t burn alive were eaten by the zombie bear. Only Addy and Murphy’s baby momma, Serena, survive. Mack picks up Addy on his four-wheeler and off they go. Where? Well, looks like they want to rejoin the “Get Murphy to California” parade. The pair, not a couple anymore given the angsty tension in their solo scenes, find a cell phone tower and set up a signal for the others. They aren’t alone for long. Zombies find them and decide it’s lunchtime. Luckily 10k and Doc just happen to be in the same junkyard. Most of the gang is back together again. Using information Addy gleans from a radio broadcast in Spanish, they head out, picking up Roberta on the way. It’s amazing how these people find each other so easily. I can’t even find my friends in a parking lot if we’re separated while hunting old ladies for dinner.
That just leaves Murphy and Cassandra on their own. Murphy heads to the nearest town. He promptly breaks into a vintage clothing store for a lot of therapeutic shopping. The undead locals are pretty friendly, lending a hand to carry his new wardrobe. Cassandra, on the other hand, has to claw her way out of the crater which was the lab before she tracks down the man who ensured she survived the apocalypse no matter what. She’s a tad feral by the time they meet up in the clothing store. Which is the only way to explain why Cassandra allows Murphy to dress her in gold spandex and a white mink coat. While Murphy plays dress-up, his name is being spread amongst the survivors in the US like wildfire.
Citizen Z—trapped in the NSA’s computer room after a nuke defrosted zombies in the downed airplane from the pilot episode—sends out an all-call to find Murphy and get him to California, going so far as to lie about a bounty and promising first crack at the refined cure once it’s finished. Which is exactly what Addy hears on the radio. The Spanish message she heard is a response, telling survivors to head to the speed-bump sized town where Murphy and Cassandra are holed up in a strip club. Like you expected Murphy to go anywhere else.
The gang catches up with them, and more than a few other people looking for The Murphy. There’s some witty bantering, a zombie strip show, and a gunfight with a gentleman who’s so, so certain he’ll be the one to drive away with Murphy tucked safely in his trunk. Don’t skip the fight’s conclusion. The final zombie death is . . . unique, to say the least.
With everyone in the USA looking for Murphy, the show’s cleverly turned everything on its head even more than when they decided to nuke everything. Instead of relying on internal drama and the occasional accidental run-in with unsavory survivors, the fight is coming to them. Or Murphy, rather. However, Roberta has no plans to abandon the mission now. They’re close to California. Now all they gotta do is beat everyone else to claim the prize.
Look, the gang’s . . . still not all here. Addy and Mack haven’t returned to the group. That’s okay, because the group isn’t too far behind them. Right? Wrong. More car troubles. If the zombies don’t kill these guys, I’m convinced the vehicles will. They’ve got to be Decepticons, or another sentient creature set to make Murphy’s dwindling escort crew hike across the United States. Otherwise, all these transportations issues have become an incredibly boring, predictable way to cause chaos beyond simple zombie antics.
The truck dies, leaving the crew to walk the forest near The Black Hills, SD. Luck is on their side, for now, and the zunami is far behind them. Unluckily, they’re lost, out of contact with Citizen Z—who’s toying with causing nuclear holocaust in order to destroy the zombies; Dog sets him straight on that matter—and about to stumble into a situation far worse than a broken-down truck. First, they accidentally find Mt. Rushmore. Much like the Liberty Bell, it’s been vandalized. Each President is painted to look like a zombie. Roberta isn’t amused.
While searching for a town to settle in, the crew finds what they think is an empty warehouse. A few glowing zombies later, they realize something isn’t right. Enter Wilbur and Amelia Grady, two-thirds of the remaining survivors in the town down the hill from a failing nuclear reactor. Wilbur worked at the reactor. He’s been trying to get past the zombies to figure out what’s preventing the reactor from cooling itself, but with only his daughter to help, they’ve made it exactly nowhere. The logical solution is to ask a bunch of unprotected civilians to wander into an active nuclear event in order to make a path into the facility. Hey, they’re only exposed to moderate radiation levels for a few minutes. What harm can it do?
Wilbur dies from radiation sickness after they get him inside. The reactor is still in crisis. In two days, it’ll blow, covering the area in radiation. Amelia knows a lot about airplanes and nothing about her father’s vocation. The group’s only hope to stop the meltdown so they can leave South Dakota without glowing like the zombies is to track down Homer Stubbins.
Homer isn’t a fan of people. Or zombies. His property is booby-trapped. Roberta leads the crew in a non-violent takeover. Mostly non-violent. 10k diffuses a stand-off by holding a knife to Homer’s throat. It’s surprisingly easy for them to talk Homer into helping. He even arms the crew from his own stockpile. Before they head inside, Homer asks 10k to be his backup after they bond over a knife which looks similar to the one Homer’s son owned. Sure, one knife makes a kid the logical backup when trapped with radioactive zombies, not the woman who sacrificed her family to be with the National Guard, protecting the masses.
10k gets Homer inside. There’s some technical talk which leads to unveiling a nifty little robot . . . armed with the world’s strongest laser cutter. Robby, the robot, manages to take out a few zombies, but is useless as far as stopping nuclear meltdown. The group reconvenes outside to formulate Plan C.
Plan C puts even more people inside with heavy radiation levels. Cassandra and Doc join Homer and 10k inside the plant, where Homer manually moves the rods preventing the reactor from cooling to safe levels. Roberta stays outside to help Amelia solve a different problem—the plane they’d banked on to get Murphy away from nuclear fallout if the worse happens doesn’t actually have fuel in it. They convert the plane to run on the small lake’s worth of vodka Homer squirreled away. Amelia and Murphy take off, heading toward Wisconsin. But not before Roberta and Murphy say their goodbyes.
Murphy tries to cut the awkward moment off at the pass. “Ah, shit. You’re not going to say goodbye, are you?” Roberta replies, “I was going to say, be grateful for all the sacrifices everyone has made.”
The plane makes it ten miles. Amelia doesn’t survive. Murphy’s alive, kicking, and shouting sarcastic quips at whoever or whatever may be in charge of the universe. Oddly, zombie Amelia emulates Murphy’s every move, even following him the ten miles back to the nuclear reactor.
Inside the reactor, Homer is a hero, dropping the last two rods into the cooling tank. Here’s where the bonding moment comes back for the emotional gut-punch. Homer asks 10k to kill him before he becomes a zombie. 10k killed his father. Obviously he should be able to kill a strange man with only vague fatherly feelings for the kid, right? Wrong. 10k hesitates. Homer takes matters into his own hands and cutting his safety line. Zombie Homer flails around in the cooling pool. We assume 10k does the right thing before leaving.
With no casualties amongst the main crew, it looks like they’re back on the slow road to California. Maybe. Roberta found a battery charger to use on the broke-down truck. It may get them another state closer to the goal. Zombie Amelia isn’t invited along for the ride, though she is left to live out her undead days. Murphy bonded with her during their hike through the woods and defends her right to live by saying, “Maybe it’s time for a different kind of mercy.”
Three episodes left and we still have no clue if there’s anyone waiting in California for Murphy and his miracle cure. A lot can happen between now and the finale. All I’m hoping is they find a car which runs so we’re spared another, “Oops, things happen because we’re forced to find a new ride again.”
Something about the zombie apocalypse makes the weirdos come out to play. For once, I’m not talking about the crew of oddballs the show follows, but the cult hanging out in Hannibal, Missouri. With a city name like that, of course there’s a group of loonies thinking the undead are actually the first wave of the rapture—the Resurrected, as they call them. Didn’t we do our time with cults, already? Cassandra’s people demonstrated well enough what can happen when a man is capable of duping the weak because he says exactly what they want to hear. While this cult takes it a lot further down the religious grey waters, it’s essentially the same type of characters all over again. Six episodes in and they’re repeating ideas.
“Just because he’s dead, doesn’t make him a hero.” Murphy calls it again. Why are they following the map of a dead man who wasn’t very pleasant to be around? Lt. Hammond made some questionable decisions during the half a blink he was in charge of the mission. Talking sense doesn’t work for Charles and Roberta. They have a starving crew to provide for.
Off to the mythical resupply post named Province Town, run by Charles’ old friend, Major Williams. The place seems legitimate. They have a strict no weapons rule within the town’s fences. There’s regular patrols to keep zombies back from the compound. Everyone barters for supplies—Williams feeds the crew on his dime for their first meal. There’s not a lot of privacy, but there’s beds, electricity for four hours a day, fresh produce, and plenty of zombie-proofing.
Sounds too good to be true? It is. The cult leader, Jacob, sends three former town members back inside the fences. “. . . was just a crazy cult leader,” one tells Williams. Another says the magic words every survivor loves, “We brought food.” Within thirty minutes, they’ve snaked their way into everyone’s trust again. Not much longer after, the fun begins. The trio reveal concealed blades and kill themselves, turning into the Resurrected. How did the security staff missed the giant crosses under their shirts? The sudden Z outbreak in town puts a cramp in Roberta and Charles’ plans for alone time in one of the few private rooms. This is where the no weapon policy bites Williams in the backside. Everyone is vulnerable. Roberta and Charles fight their way to the others with heavy books.
Addy mashes a zombie’s face into his brain with an egg beater. Then she freaks out. Again. For the last few episodes, something’s gnawed at the girl’s brain. First, when she and Mack find themselves alone back in Illinois, again during the tornado, and a few times during this episode. Each incident is different. There’s no set trigger for her trauma. No explanation for what’s going on, either. She’ll be just fine, then BAM, a total wreck immobilized by fear and visions of violence. If they don’t explain what’s going on soon, these random visions are going to get annoying.
With the town overrun with undead, Jacob and his people let themselves in through the gate. Systematically, they gather the Resurrected and the living. Of the countless people living in the compound, we’re lead to believe only the crew we’re following survive. 10k and Cassandra find a spot to try to take out the cult. Williams is turned. Murphy is missing . . . until he steps forward in the zombie cage to confront Jacob on his lunacy in order to save Charles. He plays on the cult’s beliefs, exposing his bites, using the zombie’s disinterest in him to portray himself as the Resurrected Messiah. While it made a point, I wouldn’t suggest sticking your fingers in a zombie’s mouth. Ever.
Jacob doesn’t like being proven a liar. He suggests one last test for Murphy—a bullet to the heart. Knowing the risk if Murphy dies, Charles throws himself in the bullet’s path. He dies. The others drag Roberta away while Charles turns zombie. When they’re in a safe place, she forces them to stop so she can give Charles mercy. For good measure, she puts a bullet in Jacob’s heart and leaves him for the zombies running loose in the compound.
Can they make it to California without the backbone of the group? Williams warned them, mega-herds of zombies populate the plains and out west. As far as he knew, there is nothing out there for the living. Then why is this crew so determined to make a maybe-rendezvous? Murphy is slowly turning into something. There’s no telling what’ll happen in the time it takes to fight through the hordes ahead.
Without the helicopter Citizen Z failed to provide them with, the crew continues the trek west on the dim hope there’s still scientists left to take over caring for Murphy. They make a pit stop in Illinois to play at normalcy, taking over an abandoned house which just so happens to have . . . an electric fence? Pretty sure it’s something they rigged, taking advantage of the low chain-link fence around the house to secure it for some rest and relaxation time. How does one relax with zombies banging on the gates?
Addy and Mack frolic in the front yard before vanishing into one of the bedrooms to try and fail to have alone time. Roberta and Charles get cozy in the kitchen, drinking coffee. Murphy and Doc play poker, the stakes including whatever pills Doc has left after miraculously treating the burns he suffered during the fight with McCandless. 10k and Cassandra perfect the art of brooding in the living room, ignoring the poker game. Pretty normal, until someone has to go outside and kill the zombies frying on the fence.
Physics takes another vacation on this episode. The crew uses a blunt broom stick to pierce zombie skulls. Doable? Yes. However, it takes significant force to puncture a skull. Any time someone staked a Z, it never felt like enough force to do the damage shown through the zombie’s sudden demise. Lightning kills whatever system they set up to charge the fence. That’s pretty believable. But when the tornado shows up, stuff gets weird.
“Hang on, am I missing something? You did not drag my ass this far so that mankind’s hope can get sucked up by a tornado, did you?” Murphy sums up the plot problem perfectly, as usual.
They hole up in a nearby city, where Roberta and her husband Antoine lived before she shipped to New York to help with the outbreak. The house is a standard size with a basement she swears will protect them from the storm. Seeing as there’s windows down there, my faith in its protective abilities would’ve been shaken from the get-go. The tornado chases a horde of zombies toward the city. Slower zombies become part of the twister. Yes, there is the required Sharknado joke thrown in when the first Z takes flight.
At one point, they split into groups to find medical supplies to patch up the walking head wound and his girlfriend who’d been hiding in the house before Roberta’s homecoming. The newcomer’s head trauma leads to another round of “Doc isn’t a real doctor” but he goes on to perform a rather invasive procedure to relieve pressure on the guy’s brain. And screws up. Of course. During the same time, 10k and Cassandra think it wise to hide from the tornado in a sedan. I still can’t fathom how these people made it out of New York.
Once they reach Roberta’s home, she loses some of her fight. There’s no clear sign from her husband to tell her if he’s still alive—aside from testimony from the people in her house saying “the fireman” sent them to stay there. During the supply run, she discovers nearly the entire fire department staff locked in the station, all undead. Included in the group is her husband’s best friend. By the time they’re done giving mercy to the department staff, the tornado is on top of the town. She gets Charles to safety, locks him in the basement with the others, and sits in her living room, waiting to die or be saved by Antoine. Someone—Antoine or another faceless firefighter—covers her when the ceiling collapses, taking all four walls of the house with it. Miraculously, she survives. The basement crew survive. Even 10k and Cassandra’s less-than-bright hiding spot somehow keeps them alive. Suddenly, Roberta is okay with moving on. She talks to Charles as though she didn’t just try to kill herself via tornado. Someone remind the show’s writers that this is not how suicide attempts work, even if it’s death by failing to protect oneself from a natural disaster.
Murphy may have pluck, but his body is slowly giving up the fight with the combination of Z-virus cure and the bites suffered shortly after they pumped him full of it. He’s rotting. It’s the best word for what happens in the episode. Teeth grosser than they should be—they’re on the run, but still capable of brushing teeth—eyes jaundiced, skin mottled, and his hair is falling out.
To stop the others from noticing, he takes the time to shave his head. While a tornado is practically on top of them. Makes total sense. The empathy Murphy shows for the zombie flung through the basement window is striking. It’s one of few times we’ve seen anything other than amused contempt on his face. What does his degeneration mean for the cure overall? Does it work, or does the cure merely push back the symptoms? If so, everything they’ve done, all the bodies they’ve dropped since New York, is for nothing.
A. Zombie Reviews . . . Z Nation S1E2 – “Fracking Zombies” By A. Zombie
We’re back with the ragtag group of survivors from SyFy’s Z Nation. At the end of the last episode, a bunch of folks who ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time were tasked with bringing the oh-so-charming Murphy to California so they can make more of the zombie vaccine floating in his veins. Pretty straight forward. If the plot got too complicated, viewers might think they tuned into the wrong channel. Can’t have that from the masters of cheesy late-night movies.
They need to find something to do with Citizen Z. His character essentially sits around twiddling his thumbs until it’s time to drag the plot along to the next step. He’s all alone. Has enough supplies to last at least ten years. And he’s losing his marbles. Somehow poor writing and direction turned what could’ve been a rather interesting look at isolation in the apocalypse turned into a wild dog chase. Or rather, a wild zombie dog chase. Citizen Z’s fellow NSA personnel didn’t stay dead—of course. At least one made it to his back door, along with a stray dog. Apparently the zombie dog materializes out of thin air around this time. The graphics for the dead dog weren’t bad. But once the “action” started, they’d ruined the effect. The dogs never really engage each other while fighting. There’s no real danger for Citizen Z as he sits perched atop a shipping crate. During the climax of the fight, it cuts out and comes back later to a blacked-out Citizen Z next to a mutilated zombie dog, denying viewers even a taste of action from the character. You know, the one who sits around doing nothing all day. Talk about compelling television.
The rest of the characters aren’t doing much better. Garnett, Warren, and the rest escorting Murphy run out of gas. There just so happens to be a guy they pick up who knows where to fill up their vehicles. Lucky them. Of course, the place is overrun by undead. And they can’t use guns because of the gas. And there’s a mysterious noise drawing zombies closer. Oh and don’t forget, the helpful new guy has this weird thing with Cassandra. See where this is going? Massive failure all around. The characters are too dumb to work out a plan to distract the zombies. They almost get blown up in the process, losing not only the gas they’d come for, but one of their vehicles as well. It’s like watching three-year-olds trying to put together a three-thousand piece puzzle. Eventually they end up mashing the pieces together, even though they don’t fit, and call it a masterpiece.
There was one interesting zombie gag. Early in the episode, the group must cross a zombie-infested bridge. In the process, one of the undead end up stuck in the wheel well of their truck. It’s one of the most detailed scenes in the show so far and one of the few practical effects not completely ruined by added computer-generated gore. The makeup for the frozen zombie was another highlight. Maybe I’ll watch episode three on mute and see if that makes me like it more.
Z Nation starts three years after the zombie virus has gutted the country, a team of everyday heroes must transport the only known survivor of the plague from New York to California, where the last functioning viral lab waits for his blood. Although the antibodies he carries are the world’s last, best hope for a vaccine, he hides a dark secret that threatens them all. With humankind’s survival at stake, the ragtag band embarks on a journey of survival across three thousand miles of rusted-out post-apocalyptic America.
Does that plot sound vaguely familiar? Some guy is tasked with dragging another guy across the country who may just have a cure for the zombie virus and therefore heralds the end of the nightmare these people have lived in for the last three years. The answer is on the tip of my tongue . . . and now my tongue is on the ground. Rotten luck, that.
Don’t plan to go into the 13-episode season and expect brilliance. Remember, the people responsible for this show gave us Sharknado and its sequel, on top of many other poorly executed horror movies. Straight off the bat, this show is all cheese. The typical “news clip” introduction laying down the essentials—government is in shambles after three years fighting the zombie infestation and there’s still no cure. Computer-generated wounds on the zombies that look like a kid with Movie Maker painted them in while bingeing on Hot Cheetos. Horrible dialog that’s spelling out everything we’re already seeing on the screen. Beyond basic practical zombie makeup, save for one or two rather neat effects—which were computer graphics.
We jump into the story head-first. No time to know any of the characters. No time to develop a bond with them so the zombie attack in the first five minutes has any impact. It’s an attack just to film an attack and push the very thin plot forward. Once we’re sure Murphy (Keith Allan), the unwilling guinea pig, and Lt. Hammond (Harold Perrineau) are out of the overrun prison, there’s a time jump. Moving forward a year, suddenly we’re at what feels like a funeral. Filled with characters we haven’t met yet. And, oh yeah, the 64 year old woman being mourned isn’t dead yet. Society has established what’s called “the 8th”, an act that boils down to assisted suicide for terminally ill people or the elderly who fear they’ll die soon. It is supposed to prevent the ill from dying and turning zombie inside the ramshackle towns that have popped up.
This is how we meet Roberta Warren (Kellita Smith), our lead female character, as she’s shooting a kindly old woman in the head. Shortly after, we meet her partner in leading the people in this town, Charles Garnett (Tom Everett Scott). And with him come the bad pennies, Murphy and Hammond—who’ve somehow stumbled across the town while canoeing down the river on their way to a rendezvous for Operation Bitemark. Yes, that’s right. The most obvious name for the operation is, indeed, what the NSA chose before most of their command structure died in a random plane accident, leaving behind P.F.C. Simon Cruller (DJ Qualls) a.k.a. Citizen Z. It’s like the writer’s didn’t even try to hide how ridiculous this show will be.
Hammond commandeers the town’s truck, along with Warren and Garnett. Before they make it ten minutes out of town, a ton of zombies float down the river and attack the town. There’s no survivors, save a handful of folks—Doc, Mack, and Addy—who weren’t in the town’s walls during the attack. Everyone is now along for the ride, because, why not? Right? Sure. You guys know how this will go . . . they arrive at the designated spot to find it in ruins. The NSA men are dead. Civilian zombies litter the ground.
Then there’s the baby.
A baby which Warren cannot fathom handling. Why? Because she’s written to be the cold, hard-as-nails female zombie slayer. Obviously that means she has not one maternal bone in her body. It’s either guns or diapers—never both. The world would come to an end. Oh, wait. Too late.
You guys get the gist. Z Nation will end up being a 13 episode series of bad dialog, poor character development, and maybe, just maybe, a couple decent horror moments—similar to the prisoner-turned-zombie during the opening scene. Like The Asylum’s movies, your best bet to survive this show is to grab a couple friends to torture and watch/heckle as a group. Tell them to bring drinks. You will need it.
Look at that, it’s time for another round of torture the zombie. I know. Don’t look the gift horse in the mouth. I could be lying on the cold ground with a machete in my skull, yada, yada, yada . . . . But could the ZSC gift horse stop dredging up SyFy films for me to review? Obviously they didn’t learn their lesson after I reviewed 2012: Zombie Apocalypse. As a matter of fact, the plots for the two films were so similar, I stopped to make sure I hadn’t watched the first one again by mistake. So, what is Rise of the Zombies about?
Starring:Mariel Hemingway, Chad Lindberg, LeVar Burton, Heather Hemmens, and Danny Trejo. Rated: TV-14 (Violence, gore)
Synopsis: In the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse, a ragtag group of people finds save haven in Alcatraz, until the undead manage to swim to the island and put them all in danger. Driven from the prison, the survivors of the attack hunt down a scientist who is working on a vaccine for the zombie virus. He may be their only hope to survive in a zombie-filled San Francisco.
I had to write that synopsis myself. SyFy assumed the fans didn’t need to know what the film was about beyond “zombie” being in the title. Because in their world, there is only one zombie film. They just rotate out locations and actors. Gotta say, the casting for Rise of the Zombies caught me by surprise. In a good way. If the cast hadn’t been so wonderful, the awful cheesy dialog would’ve been completely unbearable. How many times did they honestly need to shout, “There’s another zombie!” Yes, we see the zombies. They aren’t exactly ninjas. And there were a lot of them. Over an hour of the film was pure zombie attack scenes with little or no dialog. Which may be why, by the end of the film, I had no clue who the characters were. They had no history. No back story. We catch up with them at the prison and as far as viewers are concerned, every single character had been born there from two rocks rubbing together vigorously.
The blood and gore for the zombies themselves was pretty good, aside from a few understated background zombies who got too close to the camera and looked like Cousin Joey who happened to be in town that day and sneaked onto the movie set. Again, SyFy abused the hell out of computer-generated blood splatter. Why does anyone go that route for easy-to-rig FX gags? CG blood looks cheap and only really works as filler. Not the entire effect. Then it looks like someone handed a kid frames of the film on MS Paint and let them use the spray paint brush on it willy-nilly. All of the FX makeup budget went on to the zombies. The gags rigged for humans were seriously lacking, downright laughable at points. Apparently they were an afterthought.
SyFy tried to make Rise of the Zombies edgy. They even ripped off some of the philosophical issues brought up on The Walking Dead —Suicide, children born in the apocalypse, and what God thought about them killing zombies. The problem is, the script sucks. So while the writers thought they were being deep, the actors had nothing to deliver other than a hazy conviction that they were right. We get no emotional attachment to the characters. When they die, oh well. What’s the point of watching a post-apocalyptic film when you’re watching the clock so you can move on to something else? The film is not engaging for fans.
I’m going to give Rise of the Zombies two ruptured eyeballs out of five. Like all SyFy original movies, this is best viewed while surrounded by friends and a keg of beer. Maybe two kegs.
What about the Roberta, 10k, and Doc? Sure, they make it to a vehicle—I’m assuming they steal Dr. Kurian’s SUV since Murphy has the van from the drug warehouse—but a car isn’t fast enough to drive beyond the 3-8 kilometer blast radius. Roberta demonstrates some fancy defensive driving techniques, magically finding a tunnel to drive into to spare them from taking the brunt of the impact once the blast catches up with them. The car flips, leaving the trio in a situation we’re all too accustomed to on this show—carless, no supplies, and hardly in any condition to wander around a desolate wasteland to find provisions which haven’t been irradiated. Especially since Doc has a hole in his shoulder. It’s not clear how long they wander around before Doc’s injury prevents him from going on. 10k stays to nurse Doc. Roberta continues wandering aimlessly. Because that’s smart. Just when she’s ready to give herself Mercy, a little girl screams and it’s time for killin’. The effects for this season are far better for the fight scenes. Like some of Roberta’s other fights, this one is done in stylized slow-motion, where each fatal strike is full speed, but everything else is nice and slow. It gives great detail for the zombie makeup and fight choreography. It also distracts one from remembering that Roberta is actually too weak to walk, let alone take out half a dozen zombies. Smart. The girl’s family takes Roberta in for a while, feeds her, and sends her back out with food and water to find the guys.
Mack and Addy are back. The band of sister-wives was decimated after one boy they sent to his certain death grew wise and returned to torch the place. Those who didn’t burn alive were eaten by the zombie bear. Only Addy and Murphy’s baby momma, Serena, survive. Mack picks up Addy on his four-wheeler and off they go. Where? Well, looks like they want to rejoin the “Get Murphy to California” parade. The pair, not a couple anymore given the angsty tension in their solo scenes, find a cell phone tower and set up a signal for the others. They aren’t alone for long. Zombies find them and decide it’s lunchtime. Luckily 10k and Doc just happen to be in the same junkyard. Most of the gang is back together again. Using information Addy gleans from a radio broadcast in Spanish, they head out, picking up Roberta on the way. It’s amazing how these people find each other so easily. I can’t even find my friends in a parking lot if we’re separated while hunting old ladies for dinner.
They need to find something to do with Citizen Z. His character essentially sits around twiddling his thumbs until it’s time to drag the plot along to the next step. He’s all alone. Has enough supplies to last at least ten years. And he’s losing his marbles. Somehow poor writing and direction turned what could’ve been a rather interesting look at isolation in the apocalypse turned into a wild dog chase. Or rather, a wild zombie dog chase. Citizen Z’s fellow NSA personnel didn’t stay dead—of course. At least one made it to his back door, along with a stray dog. Apparently the zombie dog materializes out of thin air around this time. The graphics for the dead dog weren’t bad. But once the “action” started, they’d ruined the effect. The dogs never really engage each other while fighting. There’s no real danger for Citizen Z as he sits perched atop a shipping crate. During the climax of the fight, it cuts out and comes back later to a blacked-out Citizen Z next to a mutilated zombie dog, denying viewers even a taste of action from the character. You know, the one who sits around doing nothing all day. Talk about compelling television.
The rest of the characters aren’t doing much better. Garnett, Warren, and the rest escorting Murphy run out of gas. There just so happens to be a guy they pick up who knows where to fill up their vehicles. Lucky them. Of course, the place is overrun by undead. And they can’t use guns because of the gas. And there’s a mysterious noise drawing zombies closer. Oh and don’t forget, the helpful new guy has this weird thing with Cassandra. See where this is going? Massive failure all around. The characters are too dumb to work out a plan to distract the zombies. They almost get blown up in the process, losing not only the gas they’d come for, but one of their vehicles as well. It’s like watching three-year-olds trying to put together a three-thousand piece puzzle. Eventually they end up mashing the pieces together, even though they don’t fit, and call it a masterpiece.
