The dead will rise, crawl, and walk
AMC takes on the zombie apocalypse

 

By Cody Klyne, Arts Editor

t some point over the past few

years the dead, undead, living

dead—whatever you wanna call
em’ —have risen from the trenches of cult
obscurity and lurched their way into the
pop culture limelight. And, while it may
have been a long-time coming, zombie
flicks (for example) aren’t anything
new; never before have our single-
minded flesh-hungry kin garnered so
much attention on such a wide and all-
encompassing scale.

From annual zombie walks pulling
out walkers numbering in the hundreds,
to countless videogames, and the
invasion of classic works of literature
(see Pride and Prejudice and Zombies),
the undead hordes have successfully
completed stage one in their nefariously
planned apocalypse: media domination.
With severed limbs and blood splatter
every which way, how long until we the
entertainment-hungry masses grow tired
of our zombie brethren? New to AMC,
The Walking Dead looks to address the
question of zombie longevity head-on.

Based on a long running comic series
by the same name, The Walking Dead
takes a cinematic and intimate look into
day-by-day lives of a group of survivors
as they struggle to get by during a zombie
apocalypse. First rumoured to be a one-
off miniseries consisting of six episodes,
AMC has recently given the go-ahead for
a complete second season. While we may
only be a few episodes in, as of the time
of this writing, the announcement of at

8

least one more season of Walking Dead
is a good sign that we’ve yet to reach
zombie critical mass. So, what makes
this most recent foray into the land of the
dead worth your precious tube time?
Focus. While, as a member of
the audience, you’re never given the
opportunity to outright forget about the
larger issue of the zombie apocalypse,
you also aren’t beaten over the head
with the suffocating doom-and-gloom
of the situation. The almost chemical
in nature reactions that occur in the
form of interesting and conflicting
characters butting heads, along with the
ongoing analysis of individual character
motivations, is what rests as the nutrient-
rich heart of the series so far. Thanks
to the kind of reality that can only be
brought to life as a result of solid acting,
The Walking Dead’s emphasis on the
human element—how people cope in
extreme, unnatural situations—is what
will ultimately keep me coming back
week after week. There’s a dramatic
tone at play here that helps to ground the
absurdity of the undead invasion. From
the camera work, to the set design and
dialogue, there’s a cinematic quality that
permeates the whole of the The Walking
Dead as a production in a noticeable,
meaningful way.

Airing Sunday nights at 10:00pm on
AMC—downloadable online through
iTunes for about $3.50 a pop— The
Walking Dead has quickly cemented itself
as the new kid on the must-watch block.
AMC, my sofa salutes you.

 

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Oh she is everything
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