Anthony Michael Hall demonstrates battle readiness

On a recent foray into Chicago to recruit new members Zombie Survival Crew commanders encountered zombies, bore witness to the dangers of mob mentality and field-tested our general battle readiness.

Purple Brigade First Lieutenant Anthony Michael Hall demonstrated courage under fire, calmly delivering the following PSA from within the madness.


Juliette Terzieff on The Throw Down

Our Fearless Leader, Juliette Terzieff, gets thrown down by JB Maddawg at Chicago Comic Con mid August (2011).

From the Throw Down: Anyway, once I found Rants, we ran into an interesting booth and decided to find out a bit more. Turns out it was for a pretty wicked premise for an entire brand called the Zombie Survival Crew. Rather than sit hear and read what the deal is all about, we figured you’d rather see the vid and let one of the ZSC folks tell you directly.

Link: The Throw Down


A Zombie Reviews… Boy Eats Girl

by A. Zombie

Uhnnng…

I seem to have stumbled into a cesspit of teen horror flicks. However, while wading through the muck one film caught my eye: Boy Eats Girl (2005). It held just enough “different” elements from the other movies on the list to catch my interest. And, lets be honest, it’s hard to keep a zombie’s attention what with ravenous hunger pains driving us to keep moving.

The first major difference to set Boy Eats Girl away from most teen horror movies is the fact that it was filmed in Ireland. It isn’t often I even hear of a film coming out of the country, let alone one capable of biting and holding on. The second difference to set the film apart? Voodoo. The use of Voodoo in zombie movies went out of vogue a long time ago. Most filmmakers resort to biological warfare or a “Romero” take to zombie creation, and while these are still entertaining, zombie flicks originated with voodoo. It’s nice to see filmmakers digging back to the origin of a genre.

We meet our band of slightly heroic teenagers doing ordinary teenage things, most notably preparing for the end of school disco and coping with the idea of forming new relationships under the watchful eye of some rather strict parents. Think of it like Romeo & Juliet. Actually, the build up to the zombie bits are straight up influenced by the Bard with an equally tragic end for one of the characters. Distraught over her son’s choice, his mother uses a Voodoo text to bring him back to life. Only the book had been damaged. Her spell, partially completed, didn’t resurrect him, but brought him back as a zombie. Whoops!

Parents, magic is never the answer when learning how to cope with the loss of your child. Please observe safe magical practices. (The more you know…)

After this point the Voodoo portion of things is murky and the spell is passed on via the main character biting a classmate, who just happens to be a right jerk and deserved what he got. There are a few characters in this film that will make you to cheer when their fate is decided. This is in part to the script. Though I did find a few flaws with the way things were written. At one point it felt like they forgot the magic element and decided to go the gory, Saw route.

Despite that, don’t think the gore wasn’t entertaining. If anything, stick through to the end to see the most horrific use of a tractor this zombie has ever witnessed.

I’m going to give Boy Eats Girl 3 ½ bites out of five. If some of the characters had been utilized better (what was up with the priest guy?), it’d be a solid 4, maybe even a 4 ½. Watch this flick for a fun, teen zombie movie and to get a dose of blood and guts. Don’t watch expecting any in-depth look into how humanity works during the Zombiepocalypse. Some movies are just for the fun of it.


What is Essential for the Green Brigade Go Bag?

Green Brigade

Green Brigade Commander IronE Singleton explains the reasons for his choices of essential Go Bag items… But in order to see what the reasons are, you’ll need to login and if you are not a registered member, please take a few moments and register for the site. The links for both the login and the Member Registration can be found in the sidebar to the right.


Zombie Survival Crew Commanders Do Battle…With Each Other

Priority Status: HIGH

Dispatcher: Juliette Terzieff

The Chicago Comicon was a bit more than your commander-in-chief expected. Sure we in Zombie Survival Crew command pre-planned for massive crowds, sore feet, lost voices, and puffy bags under our eyes. We even had a strategic operation parameters in place for the zombies we knew would attend.

What I wasn’t prepared for was a battle to the near death with two of my co-Commanders, Blue Brigade leader Norman Reedus and Light Blue Brigade head Anthony Guajardo.

It all started early Saturday morning when I and Yellow Brigade commander Jinxie G noticed a significantly more obvious presence of walkers at the event than we had seen on Friday. We were bombarded at the temporary ZSC command post by groups of people eager to discover any survival tips they could use immediately. Quite a few people said they were ready to fight; a few even had weapons with them.

I calmly explained there was unlikely to be any actual battle inside the convention hall and most people seemed to accept that a bunch of walkers at a Con wasn’t too much of an immediate risk.

That all worked fine until the Zombie Crawl began. Pandemonium erupted as dozens of zombies converged near ZSC command. Their moans were so severe they almost drowned out the screams of everyone else. I tried in vain to explain to panicky humans that the zombies were under careful watch of the convention organizers. I rushed into the crowd of zombies to try and calm everyone down – and that’s when it happened.

I was bit.

Within seconds I found myself under assault from fellow Zombie Survival Crew commanders. Blue Brigade commander Norman Reedus grabbed me in a chokehold – taking care to cover his mouth and not breathe in any germs I might be spreading or inadvertently get hit on the mouth by flying blood specks.

I croaked that the bite had been from a panicked human and NOT a zombie. Norman let me go but stayed right behind me. For a moment I found the thought of his continuing concern to be really sweet, until I spotted Light Blue Brigade commander Anthony Guajardo coming at me with a katana!

I turned to yell at Norman but he was gone. I learned later he had sprinted off to make sure other ZSC commanders were out of harm’s way.

Anthony was already swinging by the time I turned back around. As the blade approached my neck I shouted “I’m not infected!!!” It was just enough to get Anthony to pull the blade to a stop, though he did not actually let his guard down until about three hours later. Instead he followed me around with the darned katana. And believe me, the guys over at Dragonsong Forge who made that beautiful piece of weaponry are going to hear it from me personally very soon.

After I calmed down enough not to want to seriously hurt my fellow commanders, I decided this little experience holds some valuable lessons:

  1. Panic is the enemy and ZSC members should avoid entering a mob even if those they care about are inside it. You’re better served prowling the edges and picking off walkers, or hightailing it out of the area.
  2. Stick to the plan. ZSC members have their own individual survival plans, and the official ZSC escape planning we’re revealing shortly on the site to help guide them. Yes the unexpected will crop up and you’ll have to deal with it best you can, but having a plan in place can save your life.
  3. Sometimes a pause can save a life. If Norman and Anthony had not given me those few seconds to explain, well, I wouldn’t be writing right now. I’m not 100% sure I’d recommend it in the heat of battle, but I sure am grateful.
  4. Help when you can but be cognizant of the risks. The ZSC firmly believes we fight together or die alone. Working together also means defending one another, and that could someday cost you your life.

A Reminder from Jon Bernthal

While the bulk of command has gathered in Chicago to strategize on next steps for the Zombie Survival Crew in the face of the increasing incident reports, I thought it would be a good time to remind everyone of our focus. Especially since we not only have the enemy without, we also have the enemy within as evidenced by last week’s appropriated video. You don’t want to be caught in an Zombiepocalypse without your brigade!!

Actor Jon Bernthal expresses why we have gathered forces..