Much like Bruce Campbell the second he hit the San Diego Comic-Con stage, I cannot and will not contain my giddy fangirl squeal over Lee Majors joining the cast for AvED’s second season. A few scant years ago, Campbell told fans he would play Ash again when monkeys flew out his backside, and now he’s got the Six Million Dollar Man playing his pops on TV. Campbell did look a tad sheepish when someone toward the panel’s end brought up that very statement. I’m sure many, many fans are grateful he was wrong.
A surefire way to make a buck at the con over the weekend was to either sit on the panel with Campbell, or sic your children at him from the front row. The star first bribed his costars to say the right things, even Majors and the panel moderator. Then once the questions started, he paid three children to take off their DC villains costumes and get jobs. Yes, folks, Bruce Campbell took several moments to stop and parent someone else’s kids after discovering the first, a ten year old, watched the show. Pro tip: Don’t be that dad. You can see which one in the panel footage Starz posted.
On to the juicy details. Really juicy. Creator Sam Raimi says season two has more intensity. Which in their language means more blood. Good thing Starz is cool with whatever these good people want to put on screen. Campbell praised the cable network for staying hands-off. If Raimi, Tapert, and Campbell attempted to revive the franchise with another film, it wouldn’t have happened, according to the star. Sam Raimi elaborated on the Starz topic. “They want to provide something that’s not just out there, but can’t be found anywhere else on television, anywhere on cable. They want it to be a unique experience so that nobody is providing anything like it.” Well, ain’t that an understatement? Not seeing many networks lining up to show Campbell’s ass or someone smoking weed from a shotgun.
Lucy Lawless returns as Ruby. This season she’s finally a fleshed-out character and in need of Ash and his team. Or as she put it, “…fully in this ferocious second season.” While, yes, Ruby played a large part in season one, they created her as they went. Lawless said the character didn’t even have a last name until episode nine. Having Ruby along will make things a little more balanced for Kelly. We can expect to see some, “girl power thing,” from the ladies this season.
Ted Raimi rejoins the Evil Dead crew. He plays Chet Kaminski, Ash’s childhood friend. When discussing why they brought Ted back, Campbell said, “This is stupid. Where’s Ted? We’ve got to torment someone else on this show.” Aside from the apparent 30 year-old Kick Me sign on Ted’s back, he brings a fun dynamic to the crew missing in the previous season. The energy they had during the panel was insane. Except Majors. He seemed content to take it all in quietly. I don’t blame him. Those panels are overwhelming the first time around. Dana DeLorenzo and Ray Santiago were likewise awestruck when they sat after being introduced.
Ash vs Evil Dead returns to Starz in October. In the meantime, slake your bloodlust with the trailer.
Fear the walking Dead SDCC 2016 Coverage By R.C. Murphy
Taking the stage first in the two-hour Dead block in Hall H at San Diego Comic-Con, Fear the Walking Dead kicked off the festivities with the teaser for the latter half of season two.
For the most part, the trailer focus on Nick’s pilgrimage to Tijuana. He meets some kind people, some not so kind people, and even more people with a bizarre connection to the dead. It’s like he’s drawn to this stuff. Madison drags Alicia, Strand, and Ofelia around Mexico looking for Nick with no results. They wind up taking refuge in a hotel which randomly rains dead bodies. But it must be an okay place, Alicia stopped to shower. Travis and Chris’ bonding trip is off to a rocky start as son insists repeatedly that he can take care of himself against the undead or any obstacle in his way. There is a lot more close-quarters fighting with the infected on the way. Alicia does some slightly-very dangerous things to shake her undead assailants. We’ve also got more than just the gangs and weirdos in Tijuana to look out for, as well. Chris and Travis’ problems aren’t all internal for the remaining seven episodes.
Producer Gale Anne Hurd said, “We’re really going to see a lot of things you’ve never seen on television before.” Having seen the TWD trailer, that bar is pretty high. I don’t think FtWD can deliver on the spectacle coming from its sister show. However, if they can get even an ounce of the energy from that trailer to translate to each episode’s timing, I may consider watching it again.
The characters fans saw earlier in the season won’t be quite the same. Producer Dave Alpert said he’s enjoyed watching the characters turn into “battle-hardened warriors.” Kim Dickens echoed the sentiment, saying what Madison did in the mid-season finale revealed a new side to her. We’ll see a more extreme Madison from here on out, perhaps? Madison isn’t the only parent stepping to the plate. Cliff Curtis claimed Travis won’t be a sad-ass when the show returns, he’s prepared to become a, “bad ass dad.” Pretty much every actor spoke up to say their character would get a harder edge for the new episodes. Matter of fact, Mercedes Mason said she wants Ofelia to “pull a Carol” and become “a really violent butterfly.” Coleman Domingo had a different outlook for Strand. He considers Strand a symbol for Western civilization. As his character survives, he will continue to break down.
There was a new face on the panel. Danay Garcia will join the show for the remainder of season two as Luciano. She plays a part In Nick’s story line.
Will the new blood and a kick in the pants for the characters be enough to make it as interesting as the trailer promises? I sincerely hope so. There’s too much potential in that cast to continue to watch them flounder with a poorly-managed script. The danger becomes if splitting the group and the story leads to forgotten characters or story-telling shortcuts which defy what little logic these characters operate by currently. I know there’s not much sense in a guy who covers himself in zombie goo all the time, but you know what I mean. Fear the Walking Dead will continue its second season on August 21st at 9 PM on AMC.
The Walking Dead SDCC 2016 Coverage By R.C. Murphy
The annual walker invasion at San Diego Comic-Con took place from July 21st through the 24th. Okay, there were a few thousand other people there, as well. Comic-Con is kind of a big thing, if you’ve lived under a rock for the last few years.
One of the most anticipated panels this year was The Walking Dead. Lucy had some ‘splainin’ to do about that angst-generating cliffhanger ending. Which is why Robert Kirkman struck that iron while hot shortly after the producers took the stage. Aside from numerous statements defending the ending since the finale, he simply added that fans would love the payoff from waiting so long for the reveal. We’ll agree to disagree, as we have since he first stepped on a soapbox to defend knee-capping Negan’s big moment.
What’s new for season seven? The producers confirmed a visit to The Kingdom, plus many more survivors and locations. Gale Anne Hurd meowed at one point, which baffled show fans who haven’t delved into the comic world. Kirkman admitted that once the show took off, he included things in the comics they’d never put on television. The show’s other producers picked up the gauntlet and plan to include some of the outlandish comic ideas into season seven. Sometimes these things bites one in the backside. In this case, one idea can bite off an entire backside and then some.
Right before they premiered the trailer, Nicotero shared new walker concept art. Looks like we’ve got more burned walkers on the way, plus the older walkers continue to become more mummy-like, and I don’t even know what happened to the bulgy walker. Death by bee hive attack?
Okay, on to the trailer.
I was really looking forward to seeing Jeffrey Dean Morgan swaggering on the screen. Instead, we got a rehash of the finale’s final scene, along with a cliché memorial video of sorts superimposed over Lucille. I would’ve gladly taken just the cropped shot of him slamming Lucille down on an unseen victim after a pan of the group by the RV. Instead they padded the footage with what is essentially an overly emotional teen girl’s video scrapbook. All that’s missing is the sappy song. The second half of the trailer delivers new characters, but too fast to identify any faces. We meet Ezekiel, leader at The Kingdom. Something we’ve rarely seen on this show is animals. Well, that’s about to change. There’s beasties coming. Most notably, Shiva, Ezekiel’s pet tiger. Funny how a few years ago, the show’s budget was nitpicked right and left. Suddenly they’re okay with tossing huge chunks of cash in to make CG animals.
The actors hit the stage when the trailer wrapped. Andrew Lincoln told fans, “Hang in there, guys.” He went on to say Jeffrey Dean Morgan has way too much fun as Negan. Which, as we already know, is probably creepy as hell on set, despite JDM’s infectious smile. There’s just something about a grinning guy wielding a barbed wire-wrapped baseball bat to make one’s sphincter clench. Lauren Cohan said, “We go to very physical and emotional places.”
Pretty standard quo for this show, but things are just beginning to take a turn for the worst. Nicotero confirmed it when he said this [their current situation with Negan] isn’t rock bottom.
The panel devolved into talk about on-set pranks and several cast members doing impressions of other actors. They did air the footage from when Reedus dumped a ton of confetti in Lincoln’s car air ducts. The first time I watched it, I couldn’t breathe because I laughed so hard.
I wasn’t happy with TWD at the end of season six, and they still haven’t done much to convince me they grossly mishandled Negan’s entrance. Yes, we get a flippin’ tiger next season, as well as a smarmy yet charming Big Bad, but fans are kind of a puppy kicked too many times. They’ve promised so many grand things, what happens if these season seven grand plans fizzle like the drawn-out Beth storyline?
Once you jump the tiger, there’s no going back. Hope they have a solid game plan going into this highly unpredictable season.
Oh, the Monroe Family. You gave us hope for sane, rational characters and left way too soon. I honestly feel these actors were given the short straw with characters who were never going to make it out of that particular location. Too many great actors are brought in for one place and left to the wayside when Rick’s movable feast shuffles on to bloodier pastures.
The first to go was Daniel Bonjour’s character Aiden. Boy, he didn’t get a nice, clean death. Skewered and disemboweled. Ouch. Daniel fared far better than his TWD counterpart once he wrapped his two episodes. He’s gone on to film several TV appearances, including an episode of MTV’s Teen Wolf. Taking on the world of video games, he voices several characters in Hitman. Daniel starred alongside Will Arnett in the Netflix original Flaked. Coming up in October, Daniel will star in Frequency on The CW. The show is inspired by the film with the same name. Daniel can be found occasionally at various conventions with the Walking Dead family, meeting and enjoying the company of genre fans/creators.
Reg, like many on TWD, died doing the right thing. Steve Coulter left Alexandria behind and filmed the third installment in the Insidious film series. He also reunited with James Wan and his team to film The Conjuring 2. Not one to sit idle, Steve reprised a recurring role on Banshee recently, as well as appearing in Sick People, Ashby with Mickey Rourke, Extraction alongside action star Bruce Willis, and he has numerous other projects in the works. When he’s not on set, Steve travels the globe to attend conventions with fellow TWD cast members.
A natural leader, Deanna Monroe was the figurehead every fan wants Rick to become. She was also the kind of giving, thoughtful leader Rick can never become. With Deanna’s death, there’s a serious lack of good leadership examples left on the show. Since leaving TWD, Tovah Feldshuh’s hard work on the show has been honored with a Saturn Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress on a TV Series. She is currently on The CW’s Crazy Ex-Girlfriend as Rachel Bloom’s overbearing mother Naomi. The show is a musical-comedy, putting Tovah far, far away from the land of blood ‘n guts for now. Though she does still occasionally visit the Dark Side while attending horror conventions.
A. Zombie Reviews . . . Pet Sematary II By A. Zombie
Rated: R (Violence, adult language, sexuality, rape)
Starring: Edward Furlong, Anthony Edwards, Clancy Brown, Jared Rushton, Darlanne Fluegel
Synopsis: After his wife’s violent on-set death, veterinarian Chase Matthews and his son Jeff move to Ludlow to rebuild their lives away from Los Angeles. Harassed endlessly by the neighborhood kids, Jeff finds a friend in Drew Gilbert, who fears his abusive stepfather, Gus. After Gus murders Drew’s other best friend, his dog, the boys take the body to the nearby Indian burial grounds—rumored to resurrect any dead buried in the soil. When evil returns, the boys realize sometimes dead dogs should be left to lie.[Official Synopsis]
Because I wanted to question every decision I’ve made this week, I opted to pick what film to watch by drawing a title from a hat. The pickings weren’t great to begin with, given my options, but I believe I scraped the bottom of the barrel labeled “Trying Too Hard.”
The script came from someone who missed the mark in the struggle to create a comprehensive love note not only to Stephen King’s original Pet Sematary script, but his works in general. Bumping up the age of the children involved brought the interpersonal drama in line with what King fans found in IT and Carrie. Where the writing failed was when the bullying never panned out to anything except trauma-porn to make the script darker. There’s no satisfying end to the bullying where lessons are learned. It just keeps going until the movie has to end.
In order to make sure viewers know they’re watching a horror flick, it takes place over Halloween week. They also included far too many unnecessary quick camera jumps to mangled animals to make up for the lacking story line. Not to mention logic jumps beyond comprehension. The bad guy died. Two thirteen year old boys hauled him up that terrifying path—for non-readers, the path to the burial ground could kill you two-thousand different ways and no one would find your body—and then dug through hard as hell dirt up there? Add in the dog seemingly capable of teleporting, plus giving Chase sex dreams with his dead wife, and it’s too much. King’s books are weird, but animals don’t usually inspire sexy things.
Casting is one of the few things going for the movie. Furlong is appreciatively creepy. Edwards makes a decent straight guy facing all the weird. Clancy Brown is a personal favorite, though his character had no depth beyond being a bully. The supporting cast isn’t too shabby, either. Too bad they didn’t get a better script to work with.
The effects are on par with the original film. There may be a few more gallons of blood in the sequel. The major time effects failed was, unfortunately, in the opening death scene. Through no fault of the effects team, though; the sequence was about two minutes too long. Better editing would’ve made it far more jarring. There’s many instances where effects are overdone in an effort to shock. Again, this completely misses the mark trying to honor King’s work.
Overall I’m giving Pet Sematary II two mangled paws out of five. One for casting, one for the effort put into the effects. This is a pass for your animal horror movie marathons. Watch Cujo or the original Pet Sematary.
The world premiere of MIRACLES FROM HEAVEN Featuring: Brighton Sharbino Where: Hollywood, California, United States When: 09 Mar 2016 Credit: FayesVision/WENN.com
We’ve tracked down the Samuels girls this week.
Mika Samuels didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell once her sister Lizzie snapped her last sane cog. Kyla Kenedy wasn’t on the show nearly long enough to truly appreciate her skills on camera. Luckily for us, fictional death has not put a damper on her get-up-and-go. Kyla regularly attends conventions to meet fans. Fan Fest sponsors a vlog hosted by Kenedy. Down ‘N Dirty pits the actress against other convention guests. In one memorable clip, she pranks Michael Rooker. On the big screen, Kyla appeared in A Gift Horse, and Love is All You Need? Recently she’s snagged roles on the medical drama The Night Shift and the pilot Kyla filmed for Speechless with Minnie Driver was picked up for a series.
No matter how many times we yelled at Lizzie that zombies aren’t pets, she never quite grasped it. This resulted in her killing her sister, nearly murdering a newborn, and being put down beside a patch of wildflowers like Old Yeller. I’ve got to give Brighton Sharbino a hand, she played crazypants really well. She also handled the backlash associated with playing a morally questionable character on a popular show admirably. Brighton spends occasional weekends at conventions to meet fans. She’s got plans in the work for some projects. Her recent films include Growing Up Smith with Jason Lee and Anjul Nigam, and Miracles from Heaven with Jennifer Garner.
Rated: R (Strong language, graphic violence, and gore) Starring: Vegar Hoel, Ørjan Gamst, Martin Starr, Jocelyn De Boer Synopsis: If the worst day of your life consisted of accidentally killing your girlfriend with an axe, chain-sawing your own arm off, and watching in horror as your closest friends were devoured by a zombified Nazi battalion, you’d have to assume that things couldn’t get much worse. In Martin’s case, that was only the beginning. [Official Synopsis]
Most of the film is Martin sprinting here and there to save everyone’s bacon with his accidental zombie mojo. He’s joined by the Zombie Squad and a random guy he reanimated who dies in several horrific ways, only to revive again. They eventually figure out that in order to defeat the Nazis, they must fight fire with fire and revive some Russian soldiers. Sure. That makes sense. Whatever, Martin needs an army and there happens to be a frozen one not far away.
There’s a load of fighting in the film. Fear not, those who want blood and gore. All the fake blood in Europe went into the numerous full-scale fight scenes and many more skirmishes. What I love about the filmmakers? They didn’t avoid daylight. The fighting pretty much all takes place out in a brightly lit field.
All that light means the makeup must be on point. They did not disappoint. A few designs didn’t stand up to the harsh glare—looking at you, Russian dudes. But the tried-and-true Nazi zombies were brilliantly detailed, along with the mundane zombies turned along the way. The death gags were insane. So many were wrong to the point I couldn’t stop laughing. This is how you add laugh beats to violence. Just silly, unexpected intestine humor to bring up the mood before more blood flies.
The local cop side story bogged things down a little. For the most part, they’re slap-stick comedic relief. It’s like the streams crossed somewhere and a story line from Hot Fuzz came over to screw with the timing. They did have a few good laugh lines.
Overall, I’m giving Dead Snow: Red vs Dead four bars of Nazi gold out of five. This series continues to amuse me while never failing to stun visually. It’s something to show your friends which won’t make them groan and walk from the room.
Week three’s departed cast members were two of the hardest to deal with. The Greene family started out on rocky feet with the whole barn thing, but by the time Hershel and Beth met their demise, they’d become integral to the team’s survival.
I’ll be honest, Hershel’s death hit me the hardest of any since the show began. Combined with the genuine good guy Scott has proven to be over and over again during his convention appearances—where he’s often one of the last to leave because he strives to thank every volunteer—and it really felt like losing Hershel meant losing a weekly dose of Scott in our lives. Luckily, he’s not one to rest on his laurels. While still traveling for conventions, Scott has also filmed episodes for Bosch, and had a recurring role on A&E’s Damien. Currently, Scott is working on a Netflix original, The OA, slated to release later in the year.
When Daryl carried Beth Greene from the hospital, many, many hearts shattered. Beth was one of the last gentle souls, the one who stayed behind to care for the baby, the one to sing a song when the silence grew too heavy. Emily Kinney took on some vastly different roles after her time on TWD ended. On Arrow and The Flash, Emily was Brie Larvan, a pun-heavy villain with a fondness for bees. For her role on Showtime’s Masters of Sex, Emily stepped far away from the small-town country girl vibe she used as Beth. She also appeared in several episodes of Cinemax’s historical drama The Knick. Conviction is a new legal drama releasing Fall 2016 from ABC starring Hayley Atwell, Shawn Ashmore, and Emily Kinney. When Emily isn’t filming, she’s recording music—her album This is War dropped in late 2015—and performing, often at horror convictions where she also meets fans.
The Asylum stepped into some large footprints when they opted to take a zombie film and set it in a Jurassic Park situation. They went for broke, too, holding nothing back when it came to zombie gags, perfectly placed irony, and an attempt to tell a coherent story through most of the film. It really held in there until they’d killed off so many characters, the hero, Ellen, basically had to say, “Forget everyone, I’ll do it myself.” Which still fits the theme laid out in just about every dino-flick when women finally have enough dying and get things done. There’s the usual parallels—mocking the infamous t-rex chase with infected lions, one character ditching the others and running, children coping way better than adults about man-eating animals, etc.—which make the film tolerable. The plot is simple, characters are just deep enough to provide tension, and the sense of funny-wrong doesn’t miss the mark. While there are times where plot points are dragged out for too long, it’s not so bad it bogs down the 90-minute format.
The easiest way to get to know characters where all your effort on a film is spent figuring the logistics of zombie apes is to trap them in vehicles throughout the three acts to do info dumps. It isn’t ideal, but for films like this, it isn’t about the characters so much as putting characters in outlandish situations to see if stereotype personalities will make it out alive. This movie has an okay mix of decent characters and some which needed serious reconfiguring just so fans don’t spitefully throw a beer at the screen when they finally shut up and die. Even Ellen, who we are supposed to like in the end, has character traits which can just stop happening in everything always forevermore, especially her need to repeat how much she feels she’s failing a dead guy. Family obligation isn’t the only reason a wealthy woman would show remorse for So Many Dead People.
The other main characters are the zombie animals. As with all Asylum features, don’t place your bets on being blown away by the computer graphics. There’s a few great shots featuring the lead gorilla character, reaction shots for smaller zombie monkeys, but for the most part the undead characters are blurry and laughable. When the zombie giraffes stepped on screen, I gave up and laughed through the entire thing. It’d take Marvel-sized budgeting to fully render the amount of shots needed to make the zombies work. When it came to fight scenes, they made it even simpler. The actors clutched wadded faux fur for the small animal attacks, and batted away a hand puppet for the terrifying zombie giraffe scenes. The humans who are attacked get slightly better zombie treatment. My favorite gag involves the nesting instincts of a bald eagle. You’ll know when you see it.
Zoombies gets three gnawed cow hooves out of five. It’s a decent Saturday night drink-and-watch with friends.
During week two of our series, we take a moment to peek in on Emma Bell and Laurie Holden, the women who brought us the sibling bond most hope they’ll have during the apocalypse. But with, you know, way more time together and less things trying to kill you.
Amy Harrison didn’t last long on TWD. Her death sets off a world of hurt for her sister, Andrea. They were pretty balanced together. Without Amy’s light, Andrea walked murky paths which inevitably lead to her demise as well.
After leaving Amy behind, Emma Bell appeared in Final Destination 5, and guest starred on several shows, including The CW’S Arrow. She went on to star in a few short films, the TV film Midnight Sun, and a couple indie movies. When TNT brought the revival of Dallas back for a second season, Emma came on board to play Emma Brown. A role she held through the show’s third and final season. Emma stars opposite Cynthia Nixon as the young version of Emily Dickinson in A Quiet Passion. Dating in the social media age isn’t a snap, as the characters on the go90 original show Relationship Status discover. Emma played Claire on the show, which also stars Shawn Ashmore and Molly Burnett. Earlier in June, Emma announced via Twitter that she guest starred on an episode of Rizzoli and Isles during the drama’s final season. Taking to Instagram, she’s given a couple behind-the-scene peeks as she directs the short Scratch.
As Andrea Harrison, Laurie Holden lasted a little while longer in the apocalypse than her on-screen sibling. Unfortunately, Andrea left the TWD world during the season three finale. In a striking change of pace, Laurie’s next role came in Dumb and Dumber To opposite Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels. She went on to guest star on prime time dramas Major Crimes and Chicago Fire. Stepping behind the camera, Laurie produced The Time of Their Lives and Honeytrap. The Abolitionists documents OURrescue.org and their teams as they liberate enslaved children around the world. Laurie is a vocal human rights activist and steps in to help rescue trafficking victims in the film.
The first to go was Daniel Bonjour’s character Aiden. Boy, he didn’t get a nice, clean death. Skewered and disemboweled. Ouch. Daniel fared far better than his TWD counterpart once he wrapped his two episodes. He’s gone on to film several TV appearances, including an episode of MTV’s Teen Wolf. Taking on the world of video games, he voices several characters in Hitman. Daniel starred alongside Will Arnett in the Netflix original Flaked. Coming up in October, Daniel will star in Frequency on The CW. The show is inspired by the film with the same name. Daniel can be found occasionally at various conventions with the Walking Dead family, meeting and enjoying the company of genre fans/creators.
Reg, like many on TWD, died doing the right thing. Steve Coulter left Alexandria behind and filmed the third installment in the Insidious film series. He also reunited with James Wan and his team to film The Conjuring 2. Not one to sit idle, Steve reprised a recurring role on Banshee recently, as well as appearing in Sick People, Ashby with Mickey Rourke, Extraction alongside action star Bruce Willis, and he has numerous other projects in the works. When he’s not on set, Steve travels the globe to attend conventions with fellow TWD cast members.
The script came from someone who missed the mark in the struggle to create a comprehensive love note not only to Stephen King’s original Pet Sematary script, but his works in general. Bumping up the age of the children involved brought the interpersonal drama in line with what King fans found in IT and Carrie. Where the writing failed was when the bullying never panned out to anything except trauma-porn to make the script darker. There’s no satisfying end to the bullying where lessons are learned. It just keeps going until the movie has to end.
Casting is one of the few things going for the movie. Furlong is appreciatively creepy. Edwards makes a decent straight guy facing all the weird. Clancy Brown is a personal favorite, though his character had no depth beyond being a bully. The supporting cast isn’t too shabby, either. Too bad they didn’t get a better script to work with.
I’ll be honest, Hershel’s death hit me the hardest of any since the show began. Combined with the genuine good guy Scott has proven to be over and over again during his convention appearances—where he’s often one of the last to leave because he strives to thank every volunteer—and it really felt like losing Hershel meant losing a weekly dose of Scott in our lives. Luckily, he’s not one to rest on his laurels. While still traveling for conventions, Scott has also filmed episodes for Bosch, and had a recurring role on A&E’s Damien. Currently, Scott is working on a Netflix original, The OA, slated to release later in the year.
When Daryl carried Beth Greene from the hospital, many, many hearts shattered. Beth was one of the last gentle souls, the one who stayed behind to care for the baby, the one to sing a song when the silence grew too heavy. Emily Kinney took on some vastly different roles after her time on TWD ended. On Arrow and The Flash, Emily was Brie Larvan, a pun-heavy villain with a fondness for bees. For her role on Showtime’s Masters of Sex, Emily stepped far away from the small-town country girl vibe she used as Beth. She also appeared in several episodes of Cinemax’s historical drama The Knick. Conviction is a new legal drama releasing Fall 2016 from ABC starring Hayley Atwell, Shawn Ashmore, and Emily Kinney. When Emily isn’t filming, she’s recording music—her album This is War dropped in late 2015—and performing, often at horror convictions where she also meets fans.
The Asylum stepped into some large footprints when they opted to take a zombie film and set it in a Jurassic Park situation. They went for broke, too, holding nothing back when it came to zombie gags, perfectly placed irony, and an attempt to tell a coherent story through most of the film. It really held in there until they’d killed off so many characters, the hero, Ellen, basically had to say, “Forget everyone, I’ll do it myself.” Which still fits the theme laid out in just about every dino-flick when women finally have enough dying and get things done. There’s the usual parallels—mocking the infamous t-rex chase with infected lions, one character ditching the others and running, children coping way better than adults about man-eating animals, etc.—which make the film tolerable. The plot is simple, characters are just deep enough to provide tension, and the sense of funny-wrong doesn’t miss the mark. While there are times where plot points are dragged out for too long, it’s not so bad it bogs down the 90-minute format.
The easiest way to get to know characters where all your effort on a film is spent figuring the logistics of zombie apes is to trap them in vehicles throughout the three acts to do info dumps. It isn’t ideal, but for films like this, it isn’t about the characters so much as putting characters in outlandish situations to see if stereotype personalities will make it out alive. This movie has an okay mix of decent characters and some which needed serious reconfiguring just so fans don’t spitefully throw a beer at the screen when they finally shut up and die. Even Ellen, who we are supposed to like in the end, has character traits which can just stop happening in everything always forevermore, especially her need to repeat how much she feels she’s failing a dead guy. Family obligation isn’t the only reason a wealthy woman would show remorse for So Many Dead People.
The other main characters are the zombie animals. As with all Asylum features, don’t place your bets on being blown away by the computer graphics. There’s a few great shots featuring the lead gorilla character, reaction shots for smaller zombie monkeys, but for the most part the undead characters are blurry and laughable. When the zombie giraffes stepped on screen, I gave up and laughed through the entire thing. It’d take Marvel-sized budgeting to fully render the amount of shots needed to make the zombies work. When it came to fight scenes, they made it even simpler. The actors clutched wadded faux fur for the small animal attacks, and batted away a hand puppet for the terrifying zombie giraffe scenes. The humans who are attacked get slightly better zombie treatment. My favorite gag involves the nesting instincts of a bald eagle. You’ll know when you see it.
After leaving Amy behind, Emma Bell appeared in Final Destination 5, and guest starred on several shows, including The CW’S Arrow. She went on to star in a few short films, the TV film Midnight Sun, and a couple indie movies. When TNT brought the revival of Dallas back for a second season, Emma came on board to play Emma Brown. A role she held through the show’s third and final season. Emma stars opposite Cynthia Nixon as the young version of Emily Dickinson in A Quiet Passion. Dating in the social media age isn’t a snap, as the characters on the go90 original show Relationship Status discover. Emma played Claire on the show, which also stars Shawn Ashmore and Molly Burnett. Earlier in June, Emma announced via Twitter that she guest starred on an episode of Rizzoli and Isles during the drama’s final season. Taking to Instagram, she’s given a couple behind-the-scene peeks as she directs the short Scratch.
As Andrea Harrison, Laurie Holden lasted a little while longer in the apocalypse than her on-screen sibling. Unfortunately, Andrea left the TWD world during the season three finale. In a striking change of pace, Laurie’s next role came in Dumb and Dumber To opposite Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels. She went on to guest star on prime time dramas Major Crimes and Chicago Fire. Stepping behind the camera, Laurie produced The Time of Their Lives and Honeytrap. The Abolitionists documents OURrescue.org and their teams as they liberate enslaved children around the world. Laurie is a vocal human rights activist and steps in to help rescue trafficking victims in the film.