DAWN OF THE DEAD (2004)

0:35 None. Hey there everyone, and welcome to the pod and the pendulum. We are the horror movie podcast covering all of the horror franchises, one movie and one episode at a time. As always, I'm your host, Mike's Noonian, and today we are going to talk about 2000 Fours Dawn of the Dead, written by 1 James Gunn and directed by a young Zack Snyder. So you know, 2 upstarts folks might not be familiar with them but that's OK, I kid. All right, that joke landed like a ton of bricks and I am not alone. I'm not holed up here by myself. We have a pair of Co hosts with us today. First up, he is from the Spectre Cinema Club in Tainted Love, a podcast that deals with love, romance, sex and relationships and horror. Mr. Devon Taylor.

1:24 Devon, how are we? Oh. We should have done a soundboard. We didn't do a soundboard. I thought I thought maybe it might come in, but hey, I have to make my own soundboard sometimes. I would. Like to. The problem I think is I have not figured out Riverside's soundboard yet. So it's like 5050 whether or not it shows up in the episode. Like we last few episodes we've recorded the intro without editing in. Like we just play it and then start talking and now when I go to edit, I'm like, there's no introduction and the outro has never made it in.

2:04 I always have to go back in and put in like the outro music. And I think that's not Riverside, I think it's me. So we're figuring that out. Figuring it out. You just heard her voice. She is the author of Millennial Nasties, a book that is all about the gooey, goopy and sometimes hardcore horror of the first decade of the century. Miss Ariel. Hellraiser, Ari. How are we today? I'm so good. I'm so stoked to talk about this millennial nasty with you guys. And are you down with the sickness? Oh, I'm very down with the. Sickness. Very down with the sickness. We'll definitely. Day one with the sickness. Down since day one. I have a question because Disturbed did the remix of the Stone Cold Steve Austin theme around 2000 I correct?

2:52 I don't know that is sounds plausible because I remember I had the CD, it was called Aggression and it was remixes of WWF entrance music by rappers and new metal artists and so it might have been on there. But do you remember the remix of Austin's theme like back in the day, like when he stopped using the wah wah, you know, guitar and it was more the chugga chugga new metal theme or is that? I do remember that I. Don't. Know. Well, I mean, I like that I it's a sign of the times, you know, I like Stone Cold's original or I don't know if it's his original entrance music, but the previous one and the new one. I think they both, you know.

3:33 Yes, you are correct. It's the glass shatters the Stone Cold Steve Austin theme. Excellent lyrics. I don't know, I wasn't about it, but gotta be honest, by like 2001 they were doing a lot of things wrong, so. Well, that's our other podcast. That's a different podcast. I would love to do that. Well, before we talk about this movie, we'll do a brief bit of housekeeping. I'll get it right off the bat right away. You are listening to episode 299. If you've been with us for from day one, thank you so much. We have a huge, huge episode 300 planned that we'll talk about later on. If you've been with us for a long time or are a new listener and you have not given us a review yet, please take a minute and do so.

4:20 Go to Apple Podcast, rate US five stars, give us a few kind words to review and make sure that you hit the subscribe button so you get every single episode. You can do the same on Spotify, Rate US five stars and you can comment on individual episodes. Make sure that you follow us. That way, all of our new shows will show up right in your feed. If you really love what we do, go to patreon.com/pod and The Pendulum where you have access to all of our bonus content, including our latest episode on James Gunn Superman that Steven and I recorded together, as well as all of Ari's series on the I Spit on Your Grave franchise. Ryan's episodes on all of the Nasrato films. A lot of 1 Offs fan commentaries. Shoot the shits.

5:09 Like what are we watching over 70 hours of bonus content for as little as a couple bucks a month at patreon.com/pod in the Pendulum? So please, we're begging for your money. Become a patron today. And I don't know, maybe we'll send feet pics, who knows. I mean, who can? Say Nope. Ari is not included in that. I bet Devon and I would. I mean Devon and I probably. Only. Only the boys. Yeah. And that's, that's what the people want. Fair enough. Of course. Yeah. So you. Charging enough for your feet picks. Don't sell them cheap. I have really ugly feet. Somebody out there, Mike wants to see them.

5:49 Somebody is really some ugly feet. Literally, there's a foot for everyone. And as we were talking before we hit record about going off the rails, and now that I've officially done that, let's things bring things back and talk a little bit about this movie. Ari, what were your initial thoughts on this? Like when did you first see this one and how does it rate for you? Yeah, So I don't remember exactly when I saw this for the first time. I saw it around the time it came out. I can't remember if it was in theater or on home video. I liked it, but it didn't leave a huge impression on me. As I've admitted before, zombies, I don't feel super connected to zombie stories.

6:31 But I really liked this movie, probably because of all the things it does that are like other movies that I like, right? It's got good violence and bleak themes. It's got incredible action. And it looks like it takes place in Sauce City, as you noted yesterday, Mike, because of all the blue and the green and the yellow. And I like it. I've liked it more the more I watched it. You know, I had to watch it a handful of times when I was writing Millennial Nasties. And it made me really appreciate what this movie is and what it isn't. And also especially because I don't feel super strongly connected to the Romero films. I haven't even seen the original Dawn of the Dead. I'm not comparing it to anything. And so I'm able to just enjoy it for what it is without being disappointed in what it isn't. And I think it's like a really solid action movie. I think that's a interesting point you brought up there, like when you don't have the connection to the original works, which in this case would be Romero's Dawn of the Dead, that having that layer of removed lets you enjoy the movie on its own merits.

7:35 And I wonder, are there any remakes you've watched? And I'm sure that you've watched a lot of them because so many came out during the decade your book covers that you felt you couldn't connect with just because you had such an attachment to like, the original film. That's a good question it. Really is. Good job, Mike, with your question. It's surprising that I don't feel that way about The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I really enjoy pretty much every iteration of that. I would say that like the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, I don't super love, but I think that is, you know, I'm sure we've talked about this before, but it's hard. It's Robert England.

8:16 I just miss Robert England and that and I don't remember the Friday the 13th remake well enough, but I think I it left me cold and maybe I'd like it more now, but I was just kind of like, what are we doing here? So I guess the big slasher temp holes. The Friday the 13th remake is interesting because it's similar to this in that it has like a phenomenal cold open like the 1st 15 minutes of that. Like I know there was just that short film Sweet Revenge which was awful. Just like one of the worst things you could spend 15 minutes on. And if you use the opening of the Friday the 13th remake instead, that would have been a way better like short to reintroduce Jason. It's a great Derek Mears really should have had like a a run like a cane hotter type of run, like doing four or five Jason movies.

9:08 He was really good in the remake and there are issues with it. But Devon, how about yourself? Like your initial thoughts on Snyder's Dawn of the Dead? Yeah, no, I mean, it was an interesting time, you know, in the early 2000s 'cause, you know, people like to shit on some of the remakes from the Sierra, but it's like, I think like from the first like four years or so when they were getting cranked out, they were mostly pretty good and like, you know, like, And I think this is definitely one of them. I remember watching this on DVD in my living room whenever this came out. I was, I was like what 1011? And, and it's interesting since Shawn of the dead did come out the same year, but I didn't see Shawn of the dead until like a few years later whenever Hot Fuzz came out. And I mean, I definitely, I don't know if I, I, I know I definitely didn't have the attachment with some, some of the originals to these remakes because again, like a lot of these ones were like my first introduction, like I saw 2003 Texas chainsaw before I saw the original, like wait, before I saw the original.

10:13 And so like, I guess I just instantly didn't really have those attachments, but I mean, I liked it then. I liked it now. Like I didn't really remember much from it. I think the last time I would did watch it was probably back in like around whenever Sham the Dead came out or, or, or when I watched it rather a couple years after that. And so I mean, I probably haven't seen this in like 15 years or so. And then I was like, Oh yeah, no, this is this is pretty good as far as like directorial debuts for a genre film. I think this is like kind of isn't really talked about is like somebody kind of coming out of the gate like with a really solid film. And my, my 2 bombs I'll drop now that we'll come back to after notes one.

10:55 This is as good as 28 Days Later, though they are very different types of zombie movies, which we'll get into a little bit later. And I'd say this is better than most of Romero's films aside of Not the Living Dead. Like, again, I don't really have like, any preciousness with George, like Day of the Dead, A Day of the Dead and His Dawn of the Dead. I'm like, you know, yeah, whatever. I like this one better for different reasons because again, the Snyder is definitely going for something much different. But I mean honestly, like like this was actually better. Like whenever I like was going in to rewatch this, I thought I was gonna like maybe knock it down a few pegs and I was like, Oh, no, this is actually like much better than I remember it being.

11:35 And I had a a really good time with it because this is more of the this is more of the thrill ride zombie movie, less than the exploration of his social and morality themes. And and that's kind of more what I prefer most of the time in zombie movies. So I really enjoyed this one. I think it helps knock this up a couple pegs, especially after watching Diary and Survival back-to-back. Like you watch those two movies and this is a much, much better made movie than both of those movies. And so definitely talk more as we get in to the notes here because I think I'm closer to agreeing with you in one of those statements more than the other.

12:17 But I think there's merit to like both of them for sure. For me, like this was a theatrical watch. Like this was a time where we had a large group of us that were either watching like horror movies in my living room. Every Sunday night. We do a double feature, have friends over, like cook out on the grill and just have like 10 or 11 friends come over and just get together to watch a bunch of movies we loved. And then we would get together whenever there was like a new horror movie in theaters. There was the, I think the Regal Cinema near Fenway Park at the time, which I don't think is there any longer. And this might have even been like a, a preview screening of it, like coming out like a week before we were able to get our hands on some tickets for it. And there was like a huge group of us that essentially took up like a whole row in this massive cinema. And I remember us to a man getting up and clapping at like the zombie baby, like it was something when that came on screen and it was something we had never seen before. Like we just stood up and did a golf clap because this is the kind of theater you could do that and not get murdered basically.

13:26 Like you weren't told to shut the fuck up. And it was a horror movie crowd like hooting and hollering and having a really good time with it. It's a really fun movie. And, you know, it's not, you know, I don't think we knew who James Gunn was at the time. We didn't know who Zack Snyder was at the time. And obviously, like for this is, although Gunn's not first writing effort, it's might be the one that maybe launched him into directing later on. Snyder obviously would go on to have a pretty prolific career that he continues to have after this. And you know, he's a divisive filmmaker for some reasons, but I don't think you can argue that he's a talented filmmaker. Whether or not you like his work. Like you can't deny that he does have some chops. I don't think I'm as fond of this movie as I was when it first came out.

14:19 I think part of it is I'm not a huge zombie person. And part of it is there's just like not a lot of there. They're like, it's a fun action horror movie, but it doesn't necessarily have a lot going on for it under that service. But it does what a remake should do in that it takes the original movie, it makes it recognizable, but then recontextualize it and does do its own thing with it. What I do like is that aside from some brief cameos of like a Ken Foray and a Tom Savini, there's not a lot of like fanservice where you're just pointing at the camera and going like here is like another thing that I recognize the original. Therefore, that dopamine hit comes in. Yeah, there's really not a lot, and it allows people to come to this on their own and not feel left out, you know, like, I don't have to get the jokes into it. I think that's a great thing for a remake to do, yeah. And sometimes when that happens too, you're if it's not a good movie, you're just reminded you should just be watching the original again anyway.

15:23 It's like, why am I watching this one? And I think you both have said like this is early enough in the remake phase of things that you're remaking something because you think you have something new to say with it. Or even if you're not always successful, it's not what you would see as the decade would wear on, where it's producers and studios buying the rights to titles and then just doing whatever they can to make a buck off it. Like that became what happened as the decade wore on and his remakes were successful. I mean, there's, there's the different types of remakes you can do, obviously, like, you know, if you're either doing something completely different.

16:04 I mean, this is like, you know, like, like you said, not a lot of fan service, but it's also not too dissimilar from the original Dawn of the Day. But this is a big change in tone. Like I think that's like really the emphasis here is like the tone is much different and emphasizing a little bit more on the action than previous ones have I think is kind of what sets this apart. Yeah. What I mean by like fan service is if, like, one of the stores was named like Flyboy Jeans, you know what I mean? Things like that, Like, just things you would point to, like you would only get this if you knew the original movie. Like that is the kind of fan service that can be very grating.

16:48 And what was cool about these cameos too, is like, they're cameos, but they actually fold in really well. And for this movie being a remake, because the two characters that they're cameoing as are people on TV, like influencing people. And that's what this movie is. It was influenced by Donald Dead. And like, so it's like, I like how even the cameos like kind of bake that in and to be in like, you know, these are the characters from that movie that influenced the movie you're watching now. So yeah, it does a it does a few really cool things. But again, like it hasn't gotten to the point of the late odds early 20s where we're starting to learn the wrong things from remaking films. At least studios rather. Yeah, just grabbing for cash later on. Absolutely agree with that wholeheartedly. Well, let's talk a little bit about how this one came together and maybe put it into context and like what was going on around 2004.

17:45 So it is a time where zombies are heating up once again, the horror world is booming, and the world kind of has gone to shit. Like, it's only a few years after 911 and we're ramping up in Afghanistan in a war. We're about to invade Iraq as a war. George W just got reelected. Great time. George W will be reelected late. Yep, he'll be reelected later that year despite not being a very popular, having pretty poor poll numbers, and not being very popular president. He's about to get us engulfed in another war. The economy is in the toilet, but horror is doing great. And Ariel? I can hear the horror is back headlines now.

18:27 Yes, yes, horror is back from wherever it went. And there are times it had dipped a little bit, I would say, like post the Scream, post Scream 3 in that little run, you know, you have that it heated up in the late 90s and then would dip a little bit. And then it feels like 3 is a bit of the turning point where there are some like fairly big titles like the Texas Chainsaw remake and some other ones that have a lot of success where there's like another run that is going to sustain for almost a decade. Are you're our resident, like, 2000s horror expert. So maybe you could speak on a little bit what was going on with like the genre at this time?

19:07 Yeah, 2003 was a really big turning point. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, like you said, which not only was hugely successful but also kicks off a remake boom. 2003 also gave us wrong turn, which kicked off a very successful franchise. Well, very successful. I don't know if that's fair to say, but it kicked off a long running franchise and also. Sold a lot of DVDs. Yes, definitely did. And House of 1000 Corpses also came out in 2003 after sitting in development hell for years and also kind of being its own Texas Chainsaw remake. And so we've got Rob Zombie, we've got the Wrong Turn franchise getting kicked off and we've got kick off of remakes in 2003. So in 2004 with Dawn of the Dead, we've got a remake of, you know, like another beloved classic, which is what we're going to do for a while.

20:02 Made much more violent and gritty and bleak to fit the tone of the time. You know, the movies of this time are very, there's a feeling of helplessness, which definitely comes through in the end of this film especially, and this feeling of we're trying. You know, there's something to be said about Zack Snyder's filmmaking being military propaganda. You know, that's a whole conversation, but you really feel it in this movie. Guns are necessary and good, and they're going to be the thing that saves us. And that's how the United States was feeling at the time. At least that's what the culture was telling us Everything was like. We need to protect ourselves and guard our own because no one's going to do it for us, you know, get your guns.

20:45 So that comes through in this film as well. So, and it is two years after 28 Days Later, which was a really successful zombie movie. And like you said, zombies are hot again. I don't remember when The Walking Dead TV show started. Was that around this time? 2010 I think it's still oh, that's way later. Then yeah. OK, but I believe the comic is out or just about to come out. Like it's right around this time that Kirkman's like black and white comics, like they start to get released and they're very popular, like right out of the gate. Yeah, and 28 days later it come out two years before this. So that was like, I'm the one that was like, oh hey, let's start doing zombie movies again.

21:26 And there was also like the trend to of with these remakes and such of pulling these directors that were like usually had like backgrounds and music videos because Mark is misspelled. He was also another director that they like plucked from doing many music videos. And that's where they kind of found Snyder. And so they were like kind of also like finding these these newer directors, you know, that have style and a vision that like, they felt comfortable with, like giving like, you know, a decent size, you know, chunk of money. I mean, you know, they gave, you know, Zack Snyder $26 million on his first film. Like nobody's getting that these days. That's crazy, you know, so like the fact that they, you know, were being like, well, these are experienced directors, just not film directors per SE.

22:16 And so it like kind of led to the IT was because that was an interesting pipeline in general in the 90s, late 90s, early 2000s. Like not even just in horror, just in, in general. There are a lot of taking these directors that you knew, knew how to handle themselves technically. And then you were just like, well, I guess we'll see if they are creative enough to like, you know, make something interesting. But like they were OK. Like kind of giving these new ish directors kind of a lot of room to roam. Yeah, they're all looking for the next David Fincher. You know who had cut his teeth in music videos and commercials? And his film debut was Alien 3, which almost swore him off a Hollywood. But then he would go on to make seven in the game and a number of other, you know, Fight Club in another other classic film. So everyone's looking for their next venture. And that would continue all the way through, like Samuel Bayer getting the Elm St. remake despite turning it down I think at least two times.

23:16 Like not wanting to make it until they made him, like an offer. Offer he really couldn't refuse. And this era is why McGee has had such a prolific directing career. For every for every David Fincher you get, you get a McGee. As far as music video directors, gone film. He was the man behind or am I thinking of Eric Kripke? I think of Mick GI think of like Supernatural, the long running TV show. I think figure he was a producer on it, but maybe I'm. Completely. Off base, if I know that was like an Eric Kripke like he created he was. Yeah.

23:56 But Big G might have been like in the he had his hands in that somehow. But you're right. Charlie's Angels, Mick G. Let's put some respect on that name. And Ari, you said something there, you know, about this style of horror being hopeless. And I think that that is a really astute point because there's a couple more movies in O 4. That's going to be the year we get the first release of one of your favorite franchises as well as another movie a year later in Hostile. And I think would you say that like that tone is what kind of defines this like decade long stretch of the genre? Yeah, it's it's definitely one of the defining characteristics of a millennial nasty is a feeling of helplessness or hopelessness.

24:40 And it can have an OK ending, but you really got to go through the ringer to get there. Or it can have a completely bleak ending, like Saw, like this movie, depending on which version of Hostile you watch. Like Hostile? What do you mean? Is there different endings? I only know the OK. Is there a happy ending in Hostile? No, Well, no, there's not a happy ending, but there's definitely like a darker 1. OK, I have not watched that and I'm sure that will come to the wheel at some point. The three film. I want to do the first two, I really don't want to do the third one. That's what stops me from putting it on the wheel. You don't have to be on the episode, you can take that episode off.

25:25 Mike, it will be the worst movie you've ever watched. I don't know. If I can do that to you again after wrong term 5 nearly made you quit podcasting. I haven't seen. I haven't seen any of the Hostel movies actually. The second one is the best one, the. First one. Yeah, the second one is legit rules. The first one's totally fine. The third one is offensive. Like I wouldn't piss on it if it was on fire. OK interesting, I am almost peaked. I might just like watch. It you're gonna, you're gonna hate it, you're going to be mad. OK, fair enough. Well, I'll tell you who wasn't mad. Producer Richard Rubenstein, who had been one of the producers of the original Dawn of the Dead. After he sold the rights of the film to Mark Abraham and Eric Newman, Rubenstein said he was reluctant to sell it first. He didn't want the remake to kind of have like the attitude of films of this area, that kind of grim, dark look and feel to it.

26:23 But he did trust Abraham based on his track record. And Abraham wasn't necessarily a horror guy, but he was making solid movies like throughout the he's into the early 2000s. This is just like a small sample of what he had done. Like there's like at least a dozen more that he had worked on as a producer or executive producer, But he had been like one of the producers of the commitments. He had been a producer on Air Force One, the one of Harrison Ford's best roles, like a really fun kind of find a kind of fun thriller that we don't really get anymore. We've been a producer on the biopic The Hurricane, and he had helped spirit along bring it on like the cheerleading movie, which is, you know, and I think that's if, you know, I just listened to a podcast on that movie recently on the big picture. And that's a movie that like the script and there was like so many pitches on bringing that to life and nobody wanted to make that movie.

27:23 And he was one of the ones that saw something in it and became like a huge hit and. It's a huge. Hit it became a huge franchise. Yeah, there's like people don't realize there's like 6 Bring it on movies. Like it actually is like a very fruit, and they're actually mostly pretty good. Yeah, that one won't be on the wheel though, because that is not a horror movie. There you go. Patreon wants to do it for the. Patreon up them Patreon box guys and you guys can get the bring it. Off on what can do the bring it on series if we did bring it on before we did Hellraiser like if we I did Dale like. Quit listening. Yeah. Dale would implode. We would lose. Dale, I also feel like how on brand that would be. Ari gets I spit on her Gray, Brian gets Nosferatu. Devon, you get to bring it on.

28:11 You get bring it on. That would be amazing. Like that would be. That would be outstanding. That's too funny. We can't do. We could do anything we want. Suppose. So now I'm almost going to force it through now to be like, fuck it out now. That's probably not going to happen. So although he wasn't a horror guy like after Dawn of the Dead, he does go on to executive produce James Gunn's directing debut in Slither, which is a movie I think we should cover for The Patriot. Because that movie is. Amazing. He would go on to be a producer of films like Children of Men and also The Last Exorcism, which is my favorite.

28:52 You know what you know me and Mike love that movie. I love that movie, so when that's. Dead on. Two film series, so technically accounts I think we need to slide it in at some. Point Whenever. Yeah, when we can put those two in between like 2 bigger franchises or something. I didn't know there was a second one. And there is, there is. There's a reason you don't know it's a second it's so. Strange it's not found footage but the first movie still happened in universe. It's very bizarre. Yeah, All right. I would say that the the folks over at Pod Mortem just did an excellent episode on the 1st movie. It was a really fun listen, really fun listen. So it was a great to give a shout out to another show that you should listen to this first and then go like, don't turn us off like we need, but go back and listen to it.

29:39 It's great. So the idea they want to re envision the story so it feels familiar, but it it can be viewed its own thing. And they cite remakes such as like 1978's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, as well as in the 80s. Like the thing in the fly is like touch points and inspirations for what they want to do. So no pressure, just like we kind of want to be like 3 of the greatest remakes in horror movie history. No pressure. No pressure whatsoever. Well, they're, they're trying to bring on like the second wave because again, like, yeah, that late 70's, the mid is, was when they were remaking all the 50s stuff. And they, I mean, they kind of did it in a way like get that second wave going of OK, now we're remaking the 70s stuff and doing that now in, in this way.

30:25 So I mean, you know, so I mean, they kind of did it, but like they, you know, again, not that this was the first one, but I mean, as far as if they were trying to do it in that way. Because like, it is fascinating when you look back at the 90s, there's not like there's like no remakes except for like, except for the Invasion of the Body Snatchers. See, see, that was the benefits of everyone doing cocaine in the 90s. Lots of original ideas. Nobody, nobody had, nobody had time to remake stuff. But then they'd come around. So you know, everything always happens in cycles. Yes. When are we going to get to the 2000s remake cycle?

31:06 Like the millennial nasty remake cycle, that's going to be the same. Thing too far off honestly, I'd say by 202032 they're going to start throwing around, you know, doing something, I mean, wrong turn got a head start. True. Yep, Yep. It's not too long. Probably going to be rebooted now that it's all owned by Lump House and like Toby. There's always a way to loop it all in, guys. There's always a way. So I mean, would it shock you if the next Saw movie is not SAR 11 but like a reboot of the whole franchise? I know I feel nervous. You're that I just upset. You. Well, it's been at the back of my head and when I think about it, I feel a little sick. Feel a little nervous?

31:50 OK, yeah, Devil's Rejects get a House of 1000 Corpses getting a getting a remake. How could you remake that movie? That movie is perfect as it is. I wonder what would you do? Yes, that's a five star film. That that's who you could be a franchise. We throw in the wheel. There's the. Firefly family, which is too hard. To say there's three of them, the three of them. So that's a franchise we could throw in the wheel. I like the solid trillion. I, I don't know, moving on, moving on to writer James Gunn. He had cut his teeth at Troma Entertainment. He had penned the classic Tromeo and Juliet, which is a personal favorite of mine. Probably the version of Romeo and Juliet that I'm most likely to pick up and throw on if I wanted to watch Romeo and Juliet because it's the only one that is narrated by Lemmy from Motörhead.

32:43 So, you know, I typically will ask like is, you know, you want to watch the classic Olivia Hussey one from the 19, I think 70s. I'm like, is it narrated by Lemmy for Motörhead? And if they say no, then I'm probably not going to want to watch it. Now I'm Baz Luhrmann all day. Give me a give me. Lemmy for Motörhead narrate it. No, but does have John Luizamo as tibble. He'd achieved not Lemmy, but James Gunn had achieved mainstream success. It'd be amazing if Lemmy for Motörhead did write the family friendly scooby-doo live action films, which I quite like. The first one I saw I. Love theater, They're great. Those are well loved. I don't know if I've seen them, but people love those Scooby-doo movies really a lot, so it must be good they're. Fun.

33:31 So they're, they, they are really fun. We, we actually, me and some friends, we did a watch party one night of the first one. And the thing was everyone, we just like, bombarded James Gunn with tweets the whole time we're watching until he finally would respond to something. And but we finally got him because we were like, what's that one? Like we're like, what's up with those guys in the in the harbor that like pick up the distress call and then they like start maniacally laughing evilly, like, what's their deal? And then he like said like, oh, it's like, you know, if you look closely, there's a secret blah, blah, blah. I don't know, something like that. But like, it was just just annoying. Just leave us. Alone. Yes, seriously, he was just like Oh my God, why is my phone blowing up from these 22 kids watching Scooby-doo? That's amazing.

34:19 And that is how social media should be used as to like, gently harass your favorite creators while you're enjoying their work. Like in a kind and supportive way. Not the way that James Gunn was treated when word broke he was writing this movie because as you can imagine, a certain type of horror fan under the, I would call it the neckbeards, the terminally online. They were none too happy about the writer of Scrappy Doo, like a guy who brought Scrappy Doo to the big screen. They were none too happy of him being in charge of their like beloved zombie classic film. And they bombarded message boards and were online and they were very angry about it.

35:09 Head geek of aid it cool news like Harry Knowles and Head Creeper of the site. He had gotten his hands on a draft of the script and he set fans at ease saying, hey, it looks really good. It's a horror movie, you guys are going to really like it. And that seemed to get people to tone down a little bit. So maybe that's the one good thing Harry Knowles ever did. I don't know. Gunn wanted to bring a more action oriented approach to the movie. There were some uncredited rewrites on the script won by an Academy Award winner. Michael, don't call him JRR Tolkien. He had won an Academy Award for The Player, the Tim Robbins film which is fucking awesome, about a holiday Hollywood exec that murders someone accidentally and is trying to get away with it and it is like, it's fantastic. I strongly recommend The Player.

36:01 It's not a horror movie, it's more satire. Than anything it's. Great. Oh, it's so good. It's really fun. And also an Academy Award nominee for script writing in Scott Frank. So, you know, you bring me on some like real talent to like you said, Devon, like big budget, giving it some real writing talent. Like they're putting their weight behind this movie. They want to see it succeed. Yeah, I mean, you know, a lot of directors like kind of don't get this this kind of set up, you know, but like you said, like getting a a writer that's like kind of on a bit of a streak that the studios trust giving them a budget and and things like that. And, you know, I'm sure the the budget and the studio is how he was able to get like such a like top tier ensemble cast as well.

36:48 So I mean, like Snyder was, you know, kind of set up very nicely for for success and all this. The only thing I could think is like, imagine it for Robert Eggers. His first movie was Nosferatu, right? Like if he got that sort of budget and playground, like instead of having like the witch and the lighthouse and the Northman behind him, if they're like you're going to start with Nosferatu, like that sort they saw that had that much faith in him. Like that's actually pretty. Happened like well, let's talk about Zack Snyder. This is his feature direct, his feature film direct directing effort. He had cut his teeth, as we had said on music videos for bands like ZZ Top act like Morrissey.

37:30 He was directed commercials like he did like a pretty famous one for Budweiser, which features like the Budweiser horses like all kind of moving towards the Ground Zero site that was like a pretty famous commercial like. 911. What's that? Ground Zero. Yes, yeah. It's supposed to be one of those like never forget, you know? That we did. We did a lot of weird stuff for a while. We really did. Yeah, I guess we were grieving, but man, don't make the Budweiser Clydesdales a part of it. I guess we did. They could have been sad. I mean, you don't know. They could have known. You're right, I don't know.

38:13 I don't know how horses grieve. That's true. Who am I to say? So I don't know, you know, I know like when my wife and daughter for the UK, like my pets get very sad for a month. Like they're like, where are they? So, you know, they grieve in their own way. And then when they come back, they get all excited. So who knows what the Clydesdale horses were? Who knows? You're right. I don't know. I'm going to find that commercial that's. Got awkward there, so that's OK. No, I tend to make things awkward. I'm just. Floored by the idea even though I lived through that era. I'm like a beer commercial with 9/11 Ground Zero.

38:53 It just sounds wired now. I'm going to have to look it. Up. It makes sense when you think about like who the target audience is. Absolutely. Wiser. Do you know what I mean like that? Easy to forget how much weird stuff we were doing for a bit. Exactly. You know you 100% agree. Like, it was like, there's a sketch comedy troupe out of Boston that my friends belong to that was really funny. And they had a sketch that was like a never forget sketch. And like this guy going throughout his whole day and some weird postcard keeps following him. And at the end he picks it up and it says like 911 never forget. And he's like, I almost forgot.

39:35 It just tickled me. And it was just like, really bizarre. But that's neither here nor there. Right. Snyder had almost made his debut as a director of feature films on the movie SWAT, but he clashed with Sony Pictures over the rating. Like, he wanted our rating, and Sony wanted, like, a PG13 rating. So he decided to step aside from that. And I guess I'll leave it open to both of you. Devon is coming back in. So pause. And I'll say I guess I'll leave it open to both of you. Like, what do we feel about Zack Snyder as a director? I mean, I've I like Zack Snyder as a director.

40:18 I mean, I'll say like, I think one of the most just ridiculous things that film bro society has done is the kind of the treatment of Zack Snyder like, you know, like you said, regardless, like what you feel about him as a film. Like, I think it was kind of ridiculous the way he was, you know, bullied for making super a superhero movie The way that people don't want. And like all the things he had to go go through in that while like grieving like a dead child at the time to like, like the things that the Internet put Zack Snyder through, I think is still very unfair. But then of course, like then it also then gets overcorrected where you have the the Snyder fans and like, you know, they just never shut up about the Snyder Cut, which they did get to happen. If only we can get the air cut people to shut up like jeez Louise.

41:05 Smaller. Group so I don't know there was like this very I think a big mistreatment of him, but then also then this this overcorrection as well. Even if you don't enjoy his style of film and everything, it's very specific. Like Zack Snyder, he's kind of like the more chill version of Michael Bay, like just like a slightly cooler he. And he's also the unproblematic one. He's not the dictator on set that Michael Bay is apparently, you know, So like very kind of similar in that way. But even if you don't enjoy a style, I think when you watch either of their types of films, you kind of have to respect like how much brain power it manages to like direct these huge, like, you know, big scale types of movies that he does, merging these different, you know, practical and digital effects, like these big sets, all these extras, this scale that I think it's rather impressive regardless if you like his movies or not.

42:00 But like, hey, I'm a sucker punch defender. So like I I, you know, I'm a Snyder guy in some form. I guess you, you saw what the studio saw in his technical prowess. And then regardless of how you feel of of him as a storyteller going forward, that's another thing. But I mean, as far as like, just like as a technical filmmaking director, I think it's kind of undeniable that he has a lot of talent. Yeah I totally agree. I really need to watch Sucker Punch one day it looks like it's going to be exactly my thing and I just have never seen it. I really love 300 though. Like I unironically enjoy 300 so much. I completely agree with you Devon.

42:41 I think the action scenes in this film are so like this is top tier action and I feel like action movie heads should watch this movie and see what they think about it. I feel like because it's in the horror genre, I might get a little bit ignored, but the direction of the action scenes of this movie alone gives Snyder his flowers for that. And when I realized, like the slow motion bullets remind me of some of the things in 300, like when there's slow motion things happening in there and you can see a through line, at least in those two movies of his work. And so I like him as a director. So I'm kind of in the middle. I think that unlike a lot of directors in our era, that he does have his own visual style.

43:30 Like you can pick out a Zack Snyder film. I think especially, you know, a few years later, we're going to have like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, like start to rear its head. And if that did one thing in the from like 2008 to like where we're at now is they would hire these great directors that would have their own visual style and palette and like their own distinct look to them. And then they would try to strip all of those things away and make them fit within the their own sandbox. And you saw that happen not just with Marvel, but other only certain kinds of movie got made. And you saw like a lot of, I want to say like tourism, but you had like a lot of visual flair and style stripped away for over a decade.

44:17 And that has not been Zack Snyder. Like you can tell the way he shoots action, the use of slow motion, he does have have a tendency to sometimes use some of the lens flares that we see with JJ Abrams. He's really good at directing like hero shots I would say. Like you see that even early on here, there's a couple visuals that are really, really striking. I think as a director, he does a fairly fantastic job of making a good looking movie. Where I have criticism of him as a filmmaker is his like his storytelling. I don't think you know, when he are handed iconic characters like Batman and Superman, there's a a world that they exist in. And it wasn't he just wasn't interested at all in playing in that world.

45:06 He was almost the equivalent of a kid picking his action figures and smashing them together at times like Superman and, you know, watch. And I'd argue that's kind of a good thing. But that's for a whole nother pie. So I thought. I thought I. Would argue that it's not a good thing though, when like Superman is like watching millions of people get killed in Metropolis and being like meh or like Batman with a gun murdering rooms full of thugs. Like that's it just displays like a fundamental misunderstanding of those characters, which it looks good. They look very, very good. Like the trailer for Man of Steel is incredible. I just wish we got that movie having a paw Kent that is like maybe people should die and you should be a secret. It's like, oh, that doesn't sit right. I did like his extended Justice League. I was kind of surprised when I watched it how much I enjoyed it.

45:59 It felt like he maybe pulled back a little bit from the things that didn't work. I think you're right, Devon is he catches a lot of shit because of his very rabid fan base. Like he I did like one thing when there was the whole kerfuffle about like the Batman animated show where he and Catwoman are in a relationship and they would not let and it's an R rated adult show and they're like, you can't have Batman in an animated form going down on Catwoman. Like Batman wouldn't do that. And then Snyder posted a picture online of like Batman going down Like that to me is like, I'm here for it. Like, yeah, that's the kind of stuff that, you know, that to me is less egregious than Batman with like a semi automatic rifle mowing down a room full of thugs. But he's cheeky like that in your right. He's not a problematic filmmaker. People seem to really like to work with him. It's that his like, there's a sense of entitlement with his fan base that makes it really hard. And I don't think he encourages it. I don't think he goes out of his way to necessarily sick the attack dogs on people.

47:10 I just think that this is how they are. And for a while, like, a lot of that bad behavior seem to be getting rewarded. When they announced the Snyder Cut, they're like, see, we told you there was one. It was finished. He still needed like 70 million to finish the movie. Like that's not a finished movie. Well, I enjoyed it. Well, and then the, but then and what we kind of see now too is like, you know, the studios and like a specifically Netflix, you know, they see the, the business that brings in with the conversation of people talking about a Snyder film or whatever. So they're like, yeah, fuck it, we'll give Snyder all the money he wants and let him make his 2 1/2, you know, 3 1/2 hour long epic movies and bullshit. And they're willing to indulge him, which then feeds into the the fans passions.

47:57 And again, somehow gets reflected back on Snyder when it's like, at the end of the day, hey, Snyder's just a guy that like, yeah, he's kind of like, you know, he grinded in the music video and he's just like, hey, I get to, like you said, I get to play with my toys, you know, and like, you know, like, and there's nothing, you know, kind of wrong in that. As far as, again, some of the the vitriol that Snyder gets in, it's like, again, you think he was like some sort of bad guy or something. We, we, we spent a lot of time talking about that with, with the conversation around Zack Krieger lately with Weapons. We talked a lot about that Inspector Cinema Club, the way that people kind of grow these resentments towards directors when it's really not their faults in a way, whether it be due to what the studios are kind of putting out, what the fans are kind of responding.

48:43 But as far as like your storytelling was talking about, I think it really works in this. This gave me vibes of agree. This gave me vibes of a Robert Rodriguez directing Tarantino's script from from Del Sol Dawn. You know, like early on, it takes somebody that has a really good hand. And, you know, I think maybe Zack Snyder's films are different. You know, if he, you know, spent more time directing other people's scripts rather than kind of leaning into his own, you know, he could could have a different type of trajectory. But hey, I'd say he's happy where he's at right now. You're saying like Robert Rodriguez? I'm thinking like Tony Scott directing True Romance, which is 1 of Tarantino's early scripts.

49:26 So that is one of I love. Tony Scott. I don't like that movie though. OK, fairpoint, I love never. Seen that, but I don't like that. Movie. I love that movie. It's a lot of fun. One of Christian Slater's like better performances. It's not for everybody, so. I know who to agree with, so they do. Film in a mall and they actually use a real shopping mall. There was a massive search for like a defunct or soon to be demolished mall. So the Thornhill Square Mall in Toronto stands in from Milwaukee, WI. The production team did build a number of structures including new storefronts and they all have fake names because there's only like 2 actual real branded companies.

50:07 That said, yeah you're OK to use our our name and our logo in your picture? It's over like a 45,000 square foot structure. They add a ton to it. They also add like a site just off just off site. They add a facility where they can the effects team and the make up artists can like make up like hundreds of extras at a time. We'll talk about the cast. Maybe we get more into the movie, but I would say like it's a top notch cast here of people that we either are familiar or are going to be very familiar to us like very soon. Special effects, Well, we don't have like Tom Savini or K&B for this go around. They are in the very capable hands of David Leroy Anderson. He was a protege of Rick Baker and he had won two Academy Awards alongside his mentor for Men in Black and the Nutty Professor.

51:01 He had also worked on the Elm Street series where he would meet his future wife, Heather Lingham Camp and they're still together and she's listed in the credits as like one of the on the production team as well. Yeah. And she's this was in her like like ever since like kind of like the mid 90s, she had been working a lot in effects. And yeah, they can, I think they are still run their effects house to this day together so. I love that. That's so sweet. It really is. It really is. I noted 1 innovation that he did here in that he pulled off head shots a bit differently than most practical effects persons did the time.

51:42 Like folks were relying on squibs under prosthetics and that could be, not sure if it's like a full safety risk, but it could be painful for the performer because you have this thing that's basically exploding on your head. And if it didn't go off properly, if like the prosthetic covered too much of it, it could cause some damage. So he developed an air ratchet system that was controlled by remote and the wires would then pull the prosthetic off with this capsule filled with fake blood. And they found, like, that was a way safer way to go, like less painful for folks. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. Do they? I wonder if that still gets used. Well, now that everything's CGI. But like if he invented that, I wonder if that carried on into other films.

52:26 I don't know. That's. Super cool, but you figure if it's in it's probably a little bit more expensive way to go than a squib. So it probably boils down to like budget. Yeah. You know who would appreciate this degree of engineering? John Kramer. John Kramer. You told him about this invention. He'd be like, oh, that's really, that's really creative. I can use that. He would. Except people didn't get hurt and in Kramer's traps. Oh, that's true. It's more. Sometimes he wants to fake someone getting hurt and that's true. Do you think John Kramer and Cosmo Kramer of Seinfeld are related? No.

53:06 No, no. If they were, he would, he would have killed that. If that was his cousin, he would have killed them by now. There's no way. Yeah. By the end, like Kramer is really diabolical. Like Kramer is well. Isn't Toby Bell in Seinfeld? In one episode, he. Is he is definitely in an episode? So I think, I think that's the linchpin. I think that's how we know. You can't have a doppelganger. Can't do it. No. OK, well the film Dawn of the Dead is released March 19th, 2004 and it's a huge hit. On a budget of 2526 million, it pulls in over 100 million worldwide.

53:46 It's released the same day as the Jim Carrey sci-fi romance Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. One of my favorite movies. What a weekend for Cinema I. Need to rewatch that. I had such a good movie. We were just we used to be a country that made really great movies. I mean, we still make some great movies, but. I I really enjoyed that the 2000s was like, they do this on purpose, like the, the counter programming a lot more often. Like we don't really see that. And like I, I love how like everyone was surprised when like Barbenheimer was a thing. And it's like, well, yeah, we used to do counter programming like releases all the time. You release something crazy and gory and then release it, you know, alongside something completely different.

54:28 So I bet it worked out for both films. I feel like you could have had a freaky weapons where you had like freaky fracky and weapons on the same day. I think you could have like tied those two in maybe a little bit Better Together. Yeah, there's like when you I think Barb and Heimer like when you see now examples of that like it's 2 studios pairing together and marketing it not just like a Sly. Hey, that just happened. Yeah. The Internet will that one into existence, which is pretty dope. Yeah, so it does beat its initial projections by about 5,000,000 by making 27,000,000 like the opening weekend alone. And it overtook another zombie movie as the box office champ. It beats out The Passion of the Christ, which is a different sort of zombie movie in way.

55:19 Gorier. And bloodier, I mean. That's an interesting take, Mike. I mean, they're making a sequel and I think the sequel is supposed that's going to be the true zombie movie. Is it? I just get the feeling it's going to be like Jesus with a gun, you know, like. Probably. Let's arm Jesus. That would be something else So and Jim is it Jim Cassavelli he he has gone off the deep end. That man is there is something wrong with him. Anyway, I am aside from casting aspersions on folks moving on, Universal was going to release the spoof movie Shaun of the Dead not too long after Dawn of the Dead. And they actually only agreed to distribute the film if Dawn of the Dead came up first.

56:05 Which to me makes sense because if you release Shawn of the Dead 1st and it's this wonderful, funny, charming spoof of zombie movies, and then you have Dawn of the Dead, which is a lot of things, but like, funny is not one of them. It's a very serious film. I think that it would have died at the box office. I mean, I think it's the spoofs, I mean, I think, I mean not even just for the tone aspect, I think it just makes sense that it's like if you're going to watch a spoof, it's because like spoofs hit harder when you can appreciate, you know, what it's coming from. So like, I think it just makes more sense in that angle. And so that way people like kind of have even if they like aren't re watching the Romero 1 before Shaun of the Dead, they'll see this and it'll still kind of be like a little like, oh, OK.

56:51 A reminder of the tropes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I agree. So made a like 106 million worldwide. You got to figure it made at least that on DVD as well. Like at 1520 bucks a pop and then you do the Blu-ray of it like. Those few. Years like it was something that it hit me like it was again listening to a different show the other day they were talking about Anchorman like making 100 million at the same year as this 2004 if I remember because it's a year before a 40 year old virgin so. I mean, they were also plant. They they were even planting the seeds themselves. How one of the guys in this movie is like, I sell TV's at Best Buy.

57:32 Yes. You know, so where you're going to go get your DVDs? Like they were already subliminally putting it into the movie. So yeah, it had to have done well. It I remember it had its own wall in Blockbuster. It would have been amazing if that if you had a horror fan of this wearing like a Dawn of the Dead T-shirt. Like, yeah, the moon. And you could kind of do that because you could be like, hey, we should hole up in a mall. Like that would be a good place to go hole up. Like it actually would be one of the rare cases where referencing it would make sense. Yeah. I mean, Anchorman made 100 million in at the box office and then another 100 million in DVDs. It's so weird to me that studios gave that up for streaming.

58:15 Like, let's sell the rights to like Netflix or Prime for pennies on the dollar. And we're not going to get any of this like extra revenue from physical media. And then they've come out with their own streaming services, which lose a ton of money. Like, there's not many streaming services that are actually profitable. And unless they have like venture capitalists propping them up, like they tend to do pretty poorly. Like, it's so weird. We would have given all of that up. It's just. Because we live in a day now where a media C also rules out for a lot of people like, because like back back in these days, it's like, you know, it would run for, you know, like get a nice, you know, month long, month and a half long run in the theaters. And then you had to wait like 6 to 8 months before it was on physical media.

59:05 Like, don't get me wrong, I think it's cool now that we kind of get like stuff on like Blu-ray like a month after it comes out in theaters. I mean, from a collector, that's nice. But at the same time, it's like, you know, they used to build that anticipation for and that's why sold so hot, you know? So it's like people just don't have the patience. You know, they're just like, OK, what's going to make us the money now, not what's going to make us the money in a year. I think that also cuts down on studios taking a risk like this, like you said, like giving a first time director 26,000,000 to make a movie like this. Because in the back of their head, like if they're doing math on a napkin, they're like, well if we make X amount in a theater, we can probably make that same amount selling copies of the movie as well. And then we'll be totally fine.

59:54 Like we'll recoup the cost for now. There's kind of less of a chance to do that. So you're less prone to take the risk. Yeah, and a lot of people are like, why would I buy a DVD when they're streaming? And yeah. And then when it goes away and it's not streaming anymore, Yeah. And I love when people say a movie's not streaming, but it is. You just have to pay $3 to rent it. Right. And it's there. Are movies I want to watch that I legit cannot pay to find and that is distressing to me. That's when it's when it completely goes away, yeah. Like, and that's how I end up blind buying used DVDs from Joe's Movie, closet.com or whatever because I'm like, I need to watch this movie and it's nowhere. I will literally drive like on a day off. Like there's like a used Blu-ray boutique shop and some used bookstores.

1:00:49 And stuff like. I will drive 90 minutes to like, you know, and make a day of it, like do some like your store. And to me, that's like a really fun way to spend the afternoon. That is fun. I will literally do stuff like that. I did that recently where I drove to like a store, what I thought was a store that had used Blu rays and it ended up being closing down like a month before and becoming a pottery store. And they had an updated their website. And that 90 minutes I spent in the drive was like still better than watching Survival of the Dead for this show, I have to be very honest with you. Like it was still better time spent. The last thing I have here for like the background. Just what did George Romero himself think of the remake? Because obviously he's going to have some thoughts on it and he was mixed on it.

1:01:39 But to be fair, he was probably kinder than some other film makers had been as like they had seen their works remade. He did praise the opening sequence, feeling that it was like, very, very exciting, really well done. But he believed that like the movie lacked a purpose and to him it felt more like a video game. So I pulled up a pair of quotes. One was from Time Out and I believe the second was from Total Film, where when asked about the remake in like 2013, he says it was better than I expected. I thought it was a good action film. The 1st 1520 minutes are terrific, but it's sort of lost its reason for being.

1:02:20 It was more of a video game. And then he was asked again later on he repeated that sentiment but went a little bit deeper into his reasoning. I sort of thought it lost its reason for being basically because I was using the idea for satire. My film needed to be done right when it was done because that sort of shopping mall was completely new. It was the first one in Pennsylvania that we had ever seen. The heart of the story is based in that, and I didn't think the remake had it, which it's a fair criticism from Romero. But I think it also there's the idea that you don't necessarily have to make the movie for the same reasons, and storytellers should be able to do what they want and not what we expect of them. Yeah, I mean, I'd rather him just not do it then rather than him do something and it not work out because like he does maybe again, like wasn't going for any sort of idea satire. So it's like, I'd rather just be like, well, I'm just not do it. So I mean, I think that makes sense. So like, I don't know, I don't find that's like silly, a bit silly, because that's like, well, it sounds like you just want to hear your movie again, like, and it's like, that's kind of not the point of a remake, you know? Like the point is to do something different, George. So I don't know, I mean, I I get where he's going, but funny enough, if he thinks that about this movie, then I would definitely love to hear what you thought about Army of the Day, because that movie is a video

1:03:52 game. And it's also Snyder attempting to like be deep and have like, yeah, some emotional stuff. So it's like, you know, as far as that goes, I think he would then retroactively maybe appreciate this a little bit more. I need to see Army of the Dead. I haven't seen it. I'll save my thoughts for the end. I did watch it after afterwards and and because I think it is a kind of an interesting full circle going from his first movie and then his circling back around. I remember almost nothing about that movie. I watch it when it came out. We watch it once on like a family movie night and then haven't really given it any thought since then.

1:04:34 So I don't know, let's talk about this movie now. Let's talk about our thoughts on Dawn of the Dead and Weird. I think maybe we should start with the opening sequence that first like 15 minutes, because as far as I'm concerned it's pretty close to. Perfect. It is really great. First get I love in any type of outbreak movie, when you see little bit slowly starting, I'm like, that's so scary to me. It's like when a roller coaster is going up the hill before it drops. And so starting in the hospital with, you know, there's there's these weird sicknesses that we're not sure what to do with and then she goes home and home is comfortable and calm and nice and she has a cute little neighbor friend and she's roller skating and then the cute little neighbor friend comes and rips her husband's neck out. It's just like a perfect 180 to something scary. I mean, I like how in this like cuz yes, as far as like hitting certain zombie tropes, like I think this is one of the better outbreak scenes in in a zombie film. Like I think it is a very well choreographed, like you said, that the pace at which it occurs is very interesting. And but I think the best part here is like we don't get like the inciting, like we're watching the the humans dump toxins into the river or like, oh, hey, look, it's somebody got bit by that thing or like whatever. Like we it's just like who knows, Like it just some, some it got out there somehow.

1:06:04 Like, we don't really know exactly where or how, and the movie isn't really caught up in kind of going deep into that. There's like, hey, doesn't matter. Like how it got here, Like it's happening now and we need to deal with it. Yeah, Devon, I know you mentioned 28 Days Later earlier in this movie being on par with it, and I think both of them have very fascinating opening set pieces, but for different reasons. Where Danny Boyle's film, it luxuriates in this quiet in like gyms and solitude, and there's this sense of unease that permeates it. I mean, we do see the inciting incident with the rage zombies, but then you go to like a completely empty London and you're feeling unease because you know this can't last forever, but you don't know when the shit's going to hit the fan. And what I love here, it's spider thing. It does a couple very cool things visually. He has that overhead shot of the neighborhood of like the suburban cul de sacs.

1:07:12 And it's this visual cue that, you know, in our own way, like we are zombies going through life, we are our own hordes. Like those homes are all sort of packed in. There is a sameness to all of the homes as well. Like we're packed into these suburban neighborhoods and we've given up individual identity. And that carries over now into death where we have these zombies that all pretty much have the same purpose. Like they want to do one thing is they want to feed and they amass together and they're danger. Not only are they fast, but the danger in them is the number of them. Like there are hundreds if not thousands of them in one clustered area and you can't get away.

1:07:55 And it's such a neat little visual cue right at the start, before anything bad has even happened. I think the choice of this being set in Milwaukee is very interesting and specific because it's like, I feel like that's like kind of like the perfect like sample of America because like Milwaukee, it's like it's smaller than most big cities, but it's still bigger than most small cities, you know? And like, so it's like in as far as like, you know, you know, income median and everything is like, I'm very, you know, in the middle. So it's like I I feel like that's a very specific type of place to like kind of yeah, show this being a, you know, all zombie movies are a slice of life movie, literally and figuratively when you think about it. And so like getting this one and also being different than 28 days later, obviously 28 days have passed in that movie versus a day one ground 0 outbreak is always slightly different. And like that's where you get like how the kinetic immediacy and like I really like showing like how fast it can start from just like 1 little incident to then spreading throughout the city.

1:09:05 And you like get like that, like camera pan out and just like kind of see it like fanning out, like the chaos of it all. It's a very Again, well done visually. Has an opening similar to Shaun of the dead as well. Like are you mentioned like at the hospital, how Anna is like hearing all these little snippets like, well, why is this person getting a neurological exam for like a bite in their arm? Like that's already signed number one and like. Having infections without fevers. Like she was like, wait, it's like what this? Everybody being like worked to the point of exhaustion. She turns on like the car radio on the way home and there's like the start of a news bulletin.

1:09:47 And now she switches over thinking it's no big deal. And you see that and Shaun of the Dead as well, where Shaun sees like that first day of the outbreak is happening, like he sees someone when he's travelling on the bus that looks like he's biting the head off a bird. There's the zombie that's howling outside the pub. There's the way that when he's hungover, he walks to the store. And it mirrors the scene from the day before, except that now, like, the world's gone to shit. And you have both of them, you know, similar, similar messaging done here, but the tone is so much different where this one feels ominous right from jump street, like, you know, something bad is about to happen. And I just I just love how that play. And it wastes no time in getting there when Anna starts to like her neighbor getting plowed by that truck after he refuses to help her.

1:10:40 Like how quick, you know, they obviously know one another. They're not neighbors that have never met before. And he can see that she's not bothered, but he's not going to help her. Like if anything he's going to murder her and cold blood. The crazy hell yeah, quick. People like turn on each other and like, yeah, she's in her driveway and he's approaching her going get back, Anna. I'm like, wait, get back. She's in a right. Yard her house. And just having that moment or those few moments the night before where, like, her and her husband are, like, watching TV and bed together and showering together. And like, it's very peaceful for her to wake up the next morning. And he has not only been killed, but he's been turned into a zombie that's about to, like, try to eat her. Like, you can get a sense for what she's lost. And I do love the moment when he's, like, chasing the car, see someone come out of their house and just, like, turns and goes after her.

1:11:36 Like, that's. Yeah. That's something we haven't really seen in any of these movies, like the ability to kind of change direction on a dime because like a new target has appeared on the horizon. It's quicker and easier to get to. Like that's something new. Zombies are hunters in this movie. Yeah, and I know how I feel about it, but Johnny Cash's use of the man comes around like, what do we think? It's correct. It's it's the correct time for that song. It's a great opener to this film. A great opener for this. It works out really well, but then once again, done with with, you know, taste and taste here versus Army of the Dead. There is literally like 18 needle drops explaining exactly what is going on in every scene.

1:12:25 And I was like, Oh my goodness, Zach. I was like, but again, does it so well in this where it's just perfectly placed. You get the 1. You get maybe like one other one like kind of later. But that is something that Snyder is goes on to be very egregious in as his needle drops. And that's just in his movies in general. Yeah, I would say that the the soundtrack is pretty on point here. Like there are maybe I think we'll talk about one decision that was made later on that I think was very polarizing at the time and probably still is today. But maybe because he's I mean, it's obviously he's someone that understands pop music and pop culture, like having that background in working with bands and making music videos. So you know, he has that sensibility as to what's going to work.

1:13:14 This is the perfect marriage of an artist song and what is unfolding on screen. I don't think that they could not have had a better and cash himself like was having such a moment like his the third act of his career from his cover of Nine Inch Nails hurt some of the latter day albums that he released. Like, it really was great, really was fantastic. Also has a the the first time that the score kicks into is really great and it's done by Tyler Bates, who is a very underrated composer and he would go on to work with Snyder on multiple films as well as James Gunn. He's done all the John Wick movie scores a lot of scores for Rob Zombie as well.

1:14:01 So another music video director turned film director as well. So like, there's something all kind of going in there. But Tyler Bates has had a a really great career working in a lot of genre films. And this is his first film score, his first official film score as far as I know as well. Like this was his debut. His debut solo one, cuz he did work on the Tammy and the T Rex score. OK, back in back in the day, he he's had a he's had a few other ones, but this was like his kind of his, his big like mainstream score because he'd he'd done like quite a lot of other like a smaller films. We kind of almost talked about this earlier, but when people say this film doesn't have any social commentary, I think that that's just not accurate.

1:14:46 It's different social commentary. You know that George Romero pointed that out. He was like, they're not doing what I did. This is so much more of a post 911 movie and a commentary on violence and like a desensitization to violence. So I'm always really floored by the scene where they're just like pointing out people who look like celebrities and Andy shooting them from across the street and like, yeah, obviously zombies, you need to kill them or they're going to kill you. But there's they're just doing this as a game and they're hunting humanoids for sport. And it's not the same thing as killing non zombie humans, but it is something where I think, gosh, I hope I'd never would cross that line.

1:15:32 I hope I would never look at killing something that was once human as a sport and would only do it for necessity. But who knows what you would do in that situation. And so I think there's a ton of social commentary there. It's social commentary on the more interpersonal level rather than I think Romero's films are kind of making these more grand like statements on like society at large versus I think in this film, like you had mentioned, it is that that kind of 9/11 response to where you know a lot of people since that it happened. It's like almost the idea of being ready and like being responsive to something is like allowed now because it's like, Oh, well, you're dealing with this thing. And like you said, like with like the game, it's it's kind of bringing out like, you know, something that's already been there.

1:16:19 But like, OK, well, hey, it's OK. We're in a zombie apocalypse. So like if I've always wanted to kill Jay Leno, OK, I found a zombie that looks like Jay Leno now and I can kill him. So it's like it's kind of in that to where people are because it is like, hey, the threat is in your yard now. So like, Yep, what are you gonna do about it? Stand your ground. That's kind of the energy that this movie brings. And like, when you kind of see the interpersonal reactions with people because like, again, like, so much of this is people turning on each other and being just ridiculously paranoid and aggressive towards, like, other humans more than they are concerned with survival. Yeah. It's very fascinating. CJ on his power trip near the beginning of the mall, it's just like, man, you are a mall security guard and it doesn't make you the king of the apocalypse. So I definitely think there's something there about power. But that aggression towards each other, that kind of inability to come together as people is something that does carry over from all of the Romero films, especially that first trilogy of movies where what you end up having like the zombies themselves almost pose like a minimal threat. I mean, we just covered the Night of the Living Dead remake where the character of Barbara points out, like, they're so slow.

1:17:43 And that Devon, like, if you had watched that, you would have been like, by gum, she's right. Like, she's making my point that you made many times. Like, she's like, we can just kind of walk right by all of them, but because they fight all the time, that zombies end up being like 10 times more of a threat than they should be. What this movie lacks is some of the original Dawn of the Dead Dead did. It misses that set piece in the apartment building where you have these this community that is already a bit downtrodden, this community that like, they're poorer, they're people of color, and they're already on the margins of society.

1:18:24 And the SWAT team is going in and indiscriminately killing people at this point, like they don't care if it's they're dead or alive. Like they're kicking down doors and they're firing 1st and asking questions later. And then you get to the basement where the dead are being basically stored by their loved ones. They're saying we know they're dead, we know they can't be free, but there's still people we love and care about. Like we're not going. We don't want to see them slaughtered. And you see, like Ken Foray's character, I believe Peter, he has to kill everyone in that cramped area and you see how that affects him.

1:19:04 You don't get anything like that here, Ari. Like he rightly pointed out here, they're killing zombies up on the roof for sport and entertainment because now there's no longer there's no ESPN you can turn on to watch like football on Sundays. Yeah, no, there's nothing like that where anybody's really sitting with the consequences of their actions. There are moving moments in this film for sure. Yeah. And I mean, that's why really I'd say the the only angle we do give that is zom baby. Zom baby. And the whole thing of like, oh, him trying to protect his family, even though she's like turned, even though, and now she's having still has this, you know, undead baby and everything. So like there's there's something in that. But then there's so much more in this of like again, like we even hear it from CJ.

1:19:55 He he even has to read a book on his personal character arc on trust. Yes, you know, I love how that goes from him reading a relationships advice book to translating to this. But that is where all the turmoil happens is like. People not trusting each other to like help them like, like these are strangers that you are now like, kind of with and like, OK, what is your background and like, how what do you have to offer that is going to give me, you know, a sense of mind that, you know, I'm going to be safe in this. And I think that's very interesting, especially with with Michael's character.

1:20:35 You know, he is kind of the he's the everyman. And I like at one point when Andre Mackay Pfeiffer's characters, he's like, he's like, what makes you qualified to be the leader? What do you do? And he's like, I sell TV's and he like laughs at them. But at the end of the day, Michael is the most logical one to be the leader because he is like the most neutral. He isn't going on a power trip like the guards are doing. He's not he doesn't have, you know, a wife and baby that is gonna, you know, cloud his judgement emotionally. Like you, Andre, like he truly is, makes the most sense because he is the most rational, but because of what his day-to-day life is. And he even has a spiel later talk about like all the odd jobs he held and it's like we'll see.

1:21:21 That's the reason this guy, you know, makes the most sense, even though on the surface it doesn't. You know what? He's not the traditional movie hero essentially. And that's what I like about this film. It's it's a lot. Even though it is Zack Snyder and he does still have his style moments, it's a lot less cinematic than some previous zombie movies, especially 28 Days Later. 28 Days Later is very like kind of melodramatic almost in a way versus this does kind of have the more lived in type of sense to it in my opinion. It does. Yeah. The characters, some of them are a little bit over the top, but for the most part they feel relatable or like you could really find yourself in an apocalypse with this type of asshole or this type of person and being really glad you have one nurse on hand.

1:22:07 So it does feel a little real. I. Mean for the most part, they're unremarkable characters. That's the thing about them is there's nothing about them that necessarily stands out in their day-to-day life or they don't necessarily bring like a special set of skills with them that is going to set them apart. Like these are a group of people that have been thrown together and just trying to survive. Like not even build a community like you see in the original Dawn of the Dead, Like they're trying to like really hunker down and build some sort of a community to the point where Flyboy is like, what if you and I get married?

1:22:48 Fran and Fran being like, those days are kind of gone. Like that's just not a priority right now. Here you see them kind of lounging in the mall and, and doing, you know, passing the time. But you still get a sense that like everyone's maybe a little bit disconnected from one another. Totally, I appreciate the the diversity and personalities amongst everybody. Everybody's, you know, mainly has one thing and that's their, you know, kind of stuff. And that's fine. But I like how we have Sarah Polley. She could have been a genre queen if she would have kept acting, but you know, she kind of gave that up to be more behind the scenes. But like, I love her love gang of Ving Rhames, who if you don't count the credits, is a black guy that survives.

1:23:35 And I'm just going to say that is the case. Yes. Once again, Zack Snyder does this twice. He does an Army of the Dead 2. He has a black guy survive and then kills him. I was like, wait, no, you were. You were right there at the finish line. Yeah, but I love having him there. And Mackay Pfeiffer is such an underrated actor. I've always appreciated the strong presence he brings. But yeah, I don't know, I think for how many characters in this ensemble is it, it all works out really well. Yeah. And the other fascinating thing is like any racial tension that exists in this in this setting, it's like Ving Rhames is Kenneth towards Pfeiffer's Andre. Like you see how he interacts with Andre and he makes a lot of assumptions about him.

1:24:21 But when on you made the point like when Andre asks Michael, like why should I follow a guy who sells TV's? You know, Kenneth's like, well, why should I follow a guy who steals them? Like we don't know a lot about Andre and making that assumption. And there's a lot of that back and forth. I think whenever those two kind of engage with one another, that's the kind of dynamic they have. Like there's that tension that exists. They don't get along. They don't partner up with one another. Yeah, interestingly enough, Ty Burrell and Jake Weber, they actually auditioned for each other's roles, which I find very interesting because like, I wouldn't really see Burrell and like the Everyman role and I couldn't see Weber being like this annoying of an asshole that that Steve is. So I guess that worked out really well where they're just like, so you see the casting director have the two headshots and just swaps them and goes, yeah, that's right. We're almost there and then they move them and they're like nail perfect.

1:25:23 Wait, are you saying you couldn't see Ty Burrell in the everyman nice guy role? Not in for this movie, no 'cause I know modern. One would be like the, like, sitcom dad of like the yeah. I think Modern Family is trash though. It's not trash, Yeah. I think it's trash it it does not hold up like even to where it was whenever it came out, but that's just. My last few few few seasons aren't great, but I would say that Modern Family is a fun kind of innocuous, but he is like a fun sitcom dad who's a bit bumbling. Like to me like this is him so much playing against type where he's such a douche in this movie that it's kind of it's even more comical. Watching it now after watching Modern Family and being like I did not know that Ty Burrell had this level of assholery in him. Yeah, it's a little bit hard to watch Phil Dunphy be mean. Ari, where do you stand on Modern Family? You're very quiet there.

1:26:30 You're the tiebreaker. I've watched a lot of it and I think it's a totally fine sitcom. Sitcoms aren't usually my thing, but I think Modern Family made me laugh a fair bit. Fence. Straddled. Good job, Ari I. Just don't have a strong opinion on it, you know? Look, I'm not going to ride or die and say like Modern Family is like a masterpiece, but I think his performance is like really good in that show and definitely like, not what he would get here. And to be fair, like Steve is a different kind of asshole and we typically see in these movies like he's not actively sabotaging events here. It's not like. He's just like a shitty personality, yeah. He doesn't.

1:27:14 Want to be in charge. He's not fighting for the top spot. He's like leave me alone. I want to drink. He's a realist in the situation, yeah, but like, also it's just like, yeah, no, he's not like an asshole because he's like actively making things worse. It's just like you're just not making it better either. Right. You watch the original Night of the Living Dead and Harry tries to shoot Ben and then in the remake he succeeds. You watch Day of the Dead and you have like Captain, you know, you have, I want to say Captain Knowles, and I know that's not it. Why can I not Rhodes, Captain Rhodes, who is like an evil motherfucker. And then Dr. Frankenstein who's like feeding soldiers to the zombies.

1:28:00 Like that's a different level of like fucked up. And Steve is just, like you said, Ari, like, I just want to have a drink. I just want to have, like, sex with this woman. I just want to be left alone and you all can do the work. Like, I'm not lifting a finger. And I imagine that kind of assholery would get very grating in close quarters over a couple months. Yeah, it's like if you don't have anything helpful to say, just keep it to yourself. We have a we have a character in our DND group that we always joke is like secretly A villain because he doesn't like really actively contribute to anything. It's like he doesn't it's funny. It's actually my roommate.

1:28:43 And like our characters like have like a funny rivalry, but like, like it's just like a running thing of just being like, hey, like if like he just like do like 1 like solid for us like every once in a while. And he does, you know, Steve, Steve does have his moments a couple times. But but yeah, I I really enjoy again, because this is kind of more of an action film than a horror film, though there are still some pretty solid horror sequences. The the zombie be birthing sequence felt like an exorcism scene actually. Yeah. It it felt like that but then it also is giving. I don't know, I doubt either of you guys are twi hards, but Twilight Breaking Dawn Part 1. The Bella's birthing scene is a straight up horror horror scene and it very much feels like almost maybe an homage to the scene in a funny way.

1:29:37 Interesting from the book, doesn't the baby like eat its way out of the womb? Basically like it chews its way out when it needs to be born. No, look, kinda. It's just it's like develop, it's like overly developed. So it's like like basically like like she's gotta. Be 5 year old kid. Like not a five year old, but like still like a bigger, more developed baby than a human can handle birthing. So it's like while she's giving birth, Edward has to like bite her and like infect with his venom to change her so that way she can like heal properly to have this baby essentially. But like it is a full on horror sequence like and like they like emaciated look and everything.

1:30:17 But then like when he's got her like tied up again, like kind of like exorcism style. He even had like a mouth gag ready for this like whole sequence. That's a great like it is so wild, like and nobody knew if we were going to go there. Like pregnant lady in a horror movie is such a like lazy trope. You know, it's obviously meant to just have instant extra tension for that character. No, you could like, you know, I don't know, maybe give Eluda some actual character development to make you care about her. She doesn't have to be pregnant, but all good. What? She's an accent. Yes, she's so. Sort of so interesting. Yeah, so interesting. But if you're gonna have a baby, you know, in a horror movie, you got to pay it off properly. And like, it's like, I love that the movie. It's like the whole time you're like, are we going to have a zomb baby?

1:31:08 And then Zack Snyder goes, you know it. And they they kill the baby off screen. I was kind of wondering as though I was watching it. I'm like, are they going to do it? Are they going to do it? Because killing a baby on screen is like the ultimate taboo. But they don't even a zomb baby. We can't handle killing on screen and. That's the only one too, where they're like, hey, should we like say some words or something like does anybody have a prayer like that's the only one where they like actually are like ceremonial about the death. Oh, and it raises so many questions, like the idea of a zomb baby. Number one, it doesn't have teeth, you know, just gums. Could a zombie baby infect a person if it doesn't have teeth and it's just kind of like gumming at your fingers?

1:31:54 What's the worst thing it can do? But also, you think of like one of the, one of the tropes of a vampirism is that you're always the age that you were when you are turned into a vampire. And that's one of the things of, like, interviewing a vampire, like the little girl being turned and then centuries pass and she's still in the same body. And how horrific an idea that is. Like, could a zomb baby develop? Like would it actually I'd say it develop, would it get bigger? I don't think it would well. It's interesting because it's like explore. Well, because it's it's like a hybrid, you know, like it is still like it was because it's a hybrid and basically because that's how blade becomes the day Walker is. I love mother was pregnant and she got bit by a vampire and that's what made him the day Walker. So if we're going by that logic, I think Zom baby would still develop because they're not completely dead. But as far as like like you said, like are they able to infect other people?

1:32:56 Not sure you know. Not exactly sure, but I feel like it would still be able to develop. So a zombie. Capacity. That like 5 years from now was like a four or five year old child and is developmentaling as one might expect but also has this like insatiable. But because. Some human flesh could be, really. Fascinating because zombies are more they're they're different than vampire immortals and vampire morals is a is more supernatural type of immortality versus zombies are functionally immortal the same way that crocodiles and alligators are like crocodiles and alligators are like immune to most diseases. They recover like super fast.

1:33:40 And so functionally, unless they get killed like literally beheaded or something like that, they could live for a very long time. So that's kind of the same way with zombies. They're functionally immortal. The babies starve to death. Quite possibly. But these zombies? Give it some blood bottles I guess. I guess. When you watch this movie, there are thousands of zombies that are outside of the mall and. That's true. They're not starving. Eight days later, you see, like how if they're not fed, they wither away. And yeah, if they don't completely die, they're at least incapacitated to the nuff where like, they're no longer pose a threat. Like you can literally just skirt around them because they can't move here.

1:34:22 You know, it's it's more like it's they just keep going. Like they want to eat. And maybe they're driven by hunger, but because they don't have any like functional internal organs, they don't need feed. Yeah, I mean, it would have to be raised by a human because babies need attention and zombies don't give attention. Yeah. It's true if. Anything if zomb baby it would die from a lack of attention before lack of brains. Science. Yeah, I think it holds up. You guys both mentioned CJ briefly paid played by Michael Kelly, who I was going on to have a pretty prolific career, especially in television, and he just has the face of like redeemable asshole.

1:35:12 Do you know what I mean? Like he has that face where you first see him. Like I don't like him, but maybe I'll give this guy a chance. My things. When he took his hat off and you saw he was balding, it's like, OK, you know, I all right, he is. He's going through it just like everyone else, like that's. Maybe that's why he's turning moment. He's like, I'm 30 and I'm going bald now. I'm going to be like aggro. But to me, CJ is the one character that has like a real arc in this movie. Like everybody else in this movie kind of stays who they were from the moment they walk in to the mall. Like they don't change all that much.

1:35:53 And here, like CJ, when you first meet him, he's racist. He locks everybody up, he's needlessly aggressive towards folks, and he's a misogynist. And as the movie goes on and he doesn't want to help anyone out, he's all in it for himself. As the movie goes on, like when Ken unveils his ridiculous plan, which I want to talk about shortly, Ken gets everybody killed, which Ving rings be better. So he does this. I will not budget on like Ken's plan is not good. He's like he he basically describes Ken's plan back to him. Like you want to like armor up these cars and drive out and pick this guy. He's like and he's like, all right, well, I guess I'm in and he's the one lending a hand.

1:36:41 And then at the end of the movie, he said, well, he sacrifices himself to buy the others time to escape, at least temporarily. Yeah, I mean, I like that. I like that it's an arc that it's like he doesn't, I wouldn't even say it's not like he like become like a great guy or anything. He just like you said, he like comes to a senses of being like, OK, I need to put my, you know, differences aside and like, you know, like to benefit everybody else because you do see that he is actually capable. I like that's what I like it too is like you think he's just going to be like the domineering asshole person and then like, but but like at the same time can't really do anything. It's like, no, he actually is a capable person too.

1:37:21 So like, you know, the fact that he just has to come around to be like, hey, like, you know, let me put my, you know, skills and expertise to like help the greater group, not just myself, but like he doesn't become like, oh, hey, hey, Kenneth, let's do a secret handshake now. Like, you know, we get it's nothing like that or anything. It's a it's. A I'm not saying he's going to win a humanitarian award. No, that's what I'm saying. Just appreciate it. It's a more restrained arc. Yeah, compared to like it doesn't really change from the start of the movie to the end. Like from the start of the movie, she's someone that is like, if I can help someone out, I'm going to help someone out and I'm very clear headed and I can be assertive.

1:38:02 What I need to be. Ken is kind of like the person who wants to be leader but also wants to be left alone as well. Perhaps like the only way you could say he has an arc is like initially he wants to leave in order to find his brother at the Army base and ends up staying behind to him being the person that's like, we're all going to go and we're going to go get pick up Andy as well. Which What are our thoughts on Andy, the lone survivor at the gun shop who we don't really hear much from? We see a lot of him on the rooftop. It would have been cool to like like as a like extra on the DVD or like promo, like have a short film where it's just Andy like hanging with this day for like 5 minutes. Oh it's there.

1:38:52 Oh, it is. Andy's lost tapes, it's on YouTube as well. Yeah. It's like a 15 minute. There are two featurettes that are pretty cool. One of them is like a news broadcast. It's like about 20 minutes long. And it's like snippets of the outbreak. And they have breaking news and one newscaster, like unveiling, like what's the White House's response? What? Let's go to this. We're showing the Dead Rising. Here's how you so. And it's like it's showing where it's spreading and how quick over the course of about one day. And then there's Andy's lost tapes. That's awesome. I didn't realize that was a thing. I mean, I like his character, the way he serves as, you know, him and Kenneth have this long distance bromance in a way. And I think it just emphasizes, you know, the idea of like, you know, like we as society, like, yes, even if you are an introverted person, we do crave interaction and connection. And so I like how his character just like shows how important that is to still maintain some type of connection. The way that him and Kenneth learn to play games and communicate via dry race board, I think is like one of the more like kind of, you know, more sentimental messages of the movie of just being like, hey, like, you know, like you might be on a rooftop over there by yourself and like, you know, he's getting hungry and all things. But like, hey, he gets to look forward to playing chess with Kenneth the next day.

1:40:16 And like, you know, that like kind of keeps him going. So I think it's a really actually like really great addition for the movie. I agree. Giving us something outside of the mall helps it feel more like a world. And Andy's death is just devastating. Because I can totally see why they wouldn't have told him about the bites. It didn't come up as kind of a silly way to put it, but they figure it out about the bites and they don't share that with Andy because you're not really thinking to, you know, share information in that way. And then Andy gets bit and he doesn't know what's coming. But we do and they do. And it yeah, that's heart wrenching. Watching their reaction as he's we're laying it over the walkie-talkie, It's one of the, I think, real emotionally resonant moments of the film. And then when he's on the roof and he like has that muscle memory where he picks up the blackboard and he just basically smears his blood against it and holds it up. Like it's a great visual.

1:41:16 Like it's a great visual touch from Snyder. I think one of the really strong ones. It's a pretty powerful moment. If we if we were going to go into a negative, I wanted to go to one more positive. A powerful like a surprisingly like, powerfully like, emotionally powerful moment is the scene with Nicole's dad. Yes. I made a special note for him, Matt Frewer. This scene goes so hard of whenever this is them figuring out the whole bite infection, a scenario and everything. And so basically he's been bit and this is where they start debating like, OK, well, do we kill the person now while they're still human? Do we wait for them to turn into a zombie?

1:41:58 But then that risks us getting attacked or whatever. So it's like you get some moral quandaries there. But but the scene, the way the scene is shot and like, you know, the dad has this moment with the czar and Zack Snyder's doing this like, you know, 360 like pan with the camera. And every time it goes back around, they added more makeup to fruit to like show the slow infection. And I was like, shit, I was like, this is like actually really fucking good. And then Frewer like really sold it with the performance of the scene as well. I was like, God damn, I totally forgot about the scene. And like it actually like gave me goosebumps. I was like, this is like not something that you know, you think of when you think of certain, you know, as far as like again, this being a action horror film, but again, like like 2 moments of like some like genuinely really good emotion.

1:42:46 Yes, he actually resembles like Steven from the original dawn of the dead a lot in that like in that that really gaunt look, that drawn out look as the infection slowly takes hold, like it is a moment that kind of recalls Stevens own deterioration and then death and then Ken for a having to put him down like it's a pretty resonant moment as well. So you're right. I'm glad you pointed that out. So I don't necessarily want to say that I'm being negative here, but I just want to say that like Ken's, like one in the original Dawn of the Dead, they leave the mall because like, it's now been overrun. Like you've had Tom Savini's like motorcycle gang break in. And because they've broken in, now you have those like hundreds or thousands of zombies that are outside. They've now breached the gates and it's only a matter of time before it's no longer safe to be there Here. There's no reason for them to leave except Ken is like, I just want to go.

1:43:48 I don't want to stay anymore. We're leaving. But basically what it boils down to, there's no inciting incident. They're like, let's just go out there and find something, maybe an island that we can go to. But there's no reason for them to leave. They have shelter. They have plenty of food, they're protected. Like the zombies aren't breaking in there. It's more like we just need a third act. So yeah, let's just pick our stuff up and go. It's a bad plan, I don't think. I don't think the plan is bad. I think in in your logic as far as like, yeah, from a screen writing the point, they do not give them a reason to have to enact the plan.

1:44:33 Like I totally get what you mean. Like they're, but at the same time, I mean, one, what other plan are you going to do? And two, I think it is also like, you know, you could also just go with the fact of like, OK, but then while they yeah, can like sit there and wait, you got to think of the rate that the zombies are multiplying. Eventually they're going to get in. So do you wait until the numbers are going to be even more overwhelming and you are forced to leave, or do you leave while you still kind of have somewhat of a choice? But then that's also spurred by Nicole who loses her shit over chips. Which valid, right? I would lose my shit over chips as well. She has a. She has a. She has a crash out whenever Chips doesn't make it back from his little mission. And that I think that kicks into gear because they weren't supposed to leave until like, a few days later. They had like, had like a countdown. But then because everything went to shit, Kenneth is like, fuck it, let's hit the road now.

1:45:27 Let's go get Andy. And it kind of goes off in that way. So, like, I think the plan itself isn't terrible, but getting to have, like you said, having a reason to actually enact it. Yeah, the movie doesn't really do that. But you know, it's what. I think if this is a tough one for me because even if it's not a good choice, I feel like I would want to be on the move. I feel like I'd be getting very antsy sitting and waiting for help, even if that is the right thing to do. When I'm stressed out, I'm like, we need to act. We need to do something. And sometimes that's not good. Like sometimes that leads you to doing things that are either not helpful or actively harmful. And so I, you know, yeah, for sure they needed a third act.

1:46:10 But also I'm kind of like, what I, I probably would have been antsy to go see what else was going on because there's no communication. And yeah, I don't know, I probably would have died. As. You mentioned in May 1 of the things that like was a flaw and their plan is they didn't pack it with perishable goods right away with the idea like if, if we need to move very quickly, we have food because you see in the post credit sequence like we're all on the boat. Like they run out of food, they run out of water. It's very miserable that you need to like it's nice to have chainsaws. Like chainsaws are a good thing to have. It's nice to have propane tanks. That you can shoot and.

1:46:52 Explode and get really a very cool look, like a very cinematic moment. It's also nice to have drinking water and some protein bars. I'm just saying that it's like nice to have like some boxes and bottles of that as well when you're prepping your doomsday anti zombie tank. And like Ken doesn't factor that in. He's just like, if we put this case of like quest bars on here, where are we going to put the 4th? Chainsaw, I mean, I think if we've learned anything from this series that we've been covering is 85% of bad things that happen zombie movies are due to human error, and maybe only 15% of it is due to the actual zombies themselves.

1:47:38 So, you know, I'd say that's online or in line with the tradition of zombie trope movies. Cuz yeah, I mean, you saw how excited Michael was to show off his little chainsaw slit. Door he had, we thought the things on him laid. He had a way It did it did it worked did it did they they they had a moment. They like kiss and they like show them like start making out and then they cut back to it and it's like a little time skip. We just don't see them fuck as we do Steve. And what's her face? Yeah yeah, but I do appreciate again the since we do have to go on the move, though, I like the variety of action set pieces in this.

1:48:20 They kind of escalate and scale, you know, cuz like we have a few like little smaller action scenes like in or outside the mall, but then but then it escalates to when they have to go to the generator and we get like the first like big fire and explosion, which again looks fantastic. You guys can never see GI fire. You gotta just up sometimes and then by the time you get to this third act now we're like kind of even in the kind of more bigger scale, almost feels like a Resident Evil esque in the third. Part I love the visual of all the zombies like surrounding the two vehicles like they're almost overrunning them. Especially once you have the explosion. It's like a really cool, I don't know, you mentioned Resident Evil. Have you ever played the game Dead Rising on the Xbox? I haven't played it, but I know the game. It's one where like you are in a mall and you make all different weapons and there are hundreds of hundreds of zombies or thousands of zombies and you have to ward them. It's a really fun game.

1:49:19 Like you literally make sometimes weapons out of things like toy hammers and frisbee guns, like stuff like that. It's really silly, but it's a lot of fun and you have visuals like that of like thousands of zombies, like trying to overrun you. I think everything is very well choreographed because like, even though it's like kind of crazy mayhem, it's you can follow everything. You can follow this third actually. Yeah. You can follow it and you have that lovely blue-green tint. We are definitely in that era where like the blue-green tint with a little bit of yellow. But to be fair, it does make sense here. That yellowish green. It is like a sickly dying world that I can forgive it here. Like I'm not not the.

1:50:00 Yellows and greens aren't as egregious, but once we turn blue in this movie, it's it is like I watched like I had watched Dead Silence for the first time not too long ago. And I was like, I was like, ah, yes, make movies inexplicably blue again. Like I was like. Yeah, so I want to end with the ending because that movie ends with like them getting in the boat and you have like the note of hope and you have. I think it's Jim. It's not Jim Carroll. All the people who died playing over. I think it's Jim Carroll. It is Jim Carroll. Never mind. It is, and you have this post credit sequence where everything goes horribly wrong. Like they run out of food, they run out of water, they're getting sick, they're arguing with one another, and then they find the mythical island.

1:50:47 Like they've come across the island and that too is overrun by zombies. Q2 disturbs down with the sickness in everyone. We followed for two hours like they're just murdered off screen and James Gunn confirmed this in an interview. He did some live tweet a thon or interview where he was asked what happened to the survivors of Dawn of the Dead and his answer was what survivors? What survivors? Which is that's harsh, man, that is like Ouch do we? I hate this ending. I like this movie. I hate this ending but what are your thoughts on? It mind, it feels true, feels plausible. I mean, I think it makes the most sense because like, yeah, like what I choose to think of this is these credits are snippets from the next movie.

1:51:41 So. So I like to think, yes, they technically we have survivors in this movie, but they're not going to survive the next one because like you said that we see how ill prepared they were. Like, you know, like this is what, yeah, if they went out on a boat and then they found a random island, yeah, this is logically probably what's going to happen to them. So like, you know, even though, yes, it was nice being like, oh, we got like a a squad of three survivors, like, or four of them actually. I was like, oh, wow, like, look how many of them made it out. But then plus possibly what's going to happen next, yeah, they're probably dead. So whether it happens now in the credits of this movie or in the sequel of the movie, that didn't happen for this it. That's most likely their future, just. Feel like it feels like such a cheat to follow these characters for like close to two hours and then like as you're getting up out of your seat to walk out of the theater, it's like just kidding, they're all eaten.

1:52:39 Here's some new metal, and maybe that's. These aren't our buddies. We didn't get to know them that well. Like they're just, they're people that are going to go on to go die. It's. Very 2000s, yeah. Very good. I guess my last question unrelated to this, what do we think of the lounge cover of Down with the Sickness, which is I'm not a new metal guy. I actually the original song kind of a banger, like I'm not mad at it. I like it's probably one of the better songs of that genre. But what do we think of Like the piano? I think I missed that part because like when I was listening to credits it was just the original. 10 No. Like during the montage scene when they're making the mall out nice and Phil Dunphy is getting his. I didn't.

1:53:21 Realize that's what it was. That's what that was, yeah. I, I, I, I just, yeah. I just was like, oh, yeah. Like Switch I, I in my mind, I go. I was like, is it Christmas time? I was like, why did they switch to Christmas music randomly? I was even paying attention that it was the lounge cover. That's funny. Damn. So yeah, I wasn't even paying attention. There's an album that came out somewhere in the late 90s, early 2000s called yeah, it was definitely in the 2000s. It was called Lounge Against the Machine and it was lounge covers of rock songs, but rock and new metal, and I didn't like it then and I don't like it now. It feels weird. I usually like covers. I can appreciate them.

1:54:03 But that YouTube channel the the Postmodern Jukebox where they do covers in blank style, like it's very much. So Ari, just for the record, you are anti kind of happy, fun time recontextualized music pro everybody getting eaten in pros, babies dying on screen. You know what? I guess that's what we learned here today. The one thing I'll. Say there was a there was a punk band in the 90s called White Flag and they were a lounge band. Like they did covers of punk songs as in a lounge band. They were actually pretty good, but. Sorry, I will say the the thing that makes me go I'll allow it is that malls always have weird tinny covers of songs, you know? And so this being it's the mall montage and they're doing a weird muzak mall thing.

1:54:55 And so I'm like, OK, I'll allow it, but would I listen to the song for fun? No. Probably not for like, I wouldn't throw this on for fun. I do also like the moment when they're in the elevator and they're going down and there's the Muzak version of air Supplies of All Out of Love. Yes. CJS like I like this song. Like he seemed smile first because yeah, I also like that song. Yeah, it's a good sound. Like a little air supply. All right, folks, I think that wraps it up for Dawn of the Dead. It will be interesting. Next week we do 3300 title of a Zack Snyder movie. Ironically enough, when we do episode 300, will 2004's Dawn of the Dead make our 25 best horror movies of this century?

1:55:41 The. Notes are being tabulated so we'll find out. Yvonne, what do you have coming up with Spectre Cinema Club? What's the theme coming up for September? For September, for the movie him, we are doing bad teachers and mentors. We have a interesting line up for that one. I will be kicking off the month with Silence of the Lambs. Of course. I know we'll be, I know we've chatted doing the Hannibal movies on here at some point. But yeah, so we'll be doing that. We'll be doing Tainted Love. We just dropped an episode on Necromantic 2. Yes, our first sequel on there. Masterpiece. Feminist Masterpiece is already known. Absolutely.

1:56:24 What a film, what a film. And so that is every other Wednesday, Spectre Cinema Club, every Tuesday over on Spectre Cinema Club over on our Patreon show, you'll be able to hear my extended thoughts on Army of the Dead, which I decided to watch after this for some reason. And it's very interesting because it's like Netflix was like, hey, can you make us a heist movie? And then Zacks and I was like, well, I kind of also want to make my do my spiritual sequel zombie movie. And they're like, Hey, why don't you just do both? Sure. Just two birds with one stone. And it is a 2 1/2 hour long kind of epic of nothing kind of movie. It's there's a good movie in there, but it's very much the best of Dawn of the dead. But then some of his worst prolifications that he's gained over the years.

1:57:10 So it was an interesting little full circle. So I'll have more thoughts of that over on the Spectra semi Patreon and you can find me at all places at Under Score Daddydisco. Excellent, Ari, how about yourself? You can find me on all the socials at RE Hellraiser right now. I've got my reviews coming out for London's Fright Fest that's going on at time of recording and so the reviews are dropping as the movies premiere. So I will be posting those on Instagram, Blue Sky and Letterbox. Great. What? Where are you covering those? For film hounds. Excellent. Yes. And where can folks get your wonderful book? Oh yeah, Well, I ever remember. It's become a bit it's.

1:57:52 Not though. It's like a mental block. Yeah. If you want to hear my thoughts on more movies like Dawn of the Dead from 2004, you can find my book Millennial Nasties, wherever books are sold. You can find it at itslikeapocalypse.com and hardcover, paperback, ebook and audiobook, and you can request it at your Public Library if you don't want to blind by a book you haven't read. Wonderful folks. You can find us at Pod and Pendulum over on Blue Sky and over on Instagram. You can find me at Mike Snooney and over on Blue Sky and Mike Jump change over on a letterbox. Here's what we have coming up. Like we mentioned, episode 300 is next week. It's going to be an all hands on deck episode where we countdown the 25 best horror movies of this century. Special thanks so far to Steven, who has put together a spreadsheet for the ages.

1:58:47 And special thank you to all of the folks we reached out to to help contribute to that list in the voting. Really excited to do this episode. I mean to get to episode 300 and a cool that won't lie like that is kind of cool. I did not think what we did. If we got past 10 episodes I'd be thrilled and thank you to all my Co hosts and folks that have contributed to make this happen. Once we get through episode 300 we'll do our Living Dead series ratings episode. I think we're limiting it to just the Romero movies, but if others speak up strongly and want to include the other two films, I'm kind of a pushover.

1:59:30 But that will be our rankings episode. And then Ari, what is the next franchise we're covering? The next franchise's Predator. If it leads, we can kill it. That's going to take us pretty much through the end of the year. Dang near. Because when you factor in 2 movies this year plus the AVP movies, which we didn't cover when we did Alien and now we got to get to that, that is going to take us almost through the end of the year. Although we do have a couple other big franchises on the docket. We do. And I'm sure come October we will also be covering doing some like fun shorter bonus episodes for the month of October. You're the busiest month of the year for horror fans. But I also think we need to find a way to get the new Hell House movie in somehow in VHS, Halloween and as well. So we'll be doing those as well.

2:00:29 So between amendums and the franchise, I'd say, yeah, I'd say that's pretty much us through. There I'm kind of tossing around the idea of like, can we do J Hora January where we maybe don't do a franchise but cover some Jay horror movies and then throw a franchise in at the end of that. So I've been watching all of the Ringu and Juan movies and they are a ride. So there we go. Listeners, thank you so much. We hope you've enjoyed really the end of the summer of George. I mean, we're going to have one little look back, but what a journey it has been. We have really enjoyed covering all of these and looking forward to bringing you next week's show. Take care, everybody.