Zombie movies have been around for so long, seeing so many iterations, that they’ve essentially become their own subgenre. The all-time greats list includes ‘Dawn of the Dead’ (1978), ‘Rec’ (2007), ’28 Days Later’ (2002), ‘Shaun of the Dead’ (2004), and ‘Zombieland’ (2009). What you’ll notice is that none of those named above have arrived in the last ten years.
This look at zombie movies will include the one film since 2011 that certainly joins the all-time greats, but other than that, many see most releases as being middling at best. Still, movie studios continue to try to entertain through the established zombie tropes. The latest of these is Zack Snyder’s ‘Army of the Dead’, which follows a heist amidst zombies in a quarantined Las Vegas.
Here, we’ve picked out four distinctly different approaches to zombies over the last decade, seeing how they differ and what makes some better than others. The zombie films of choice are ‘Army of the Dead’ (2021), ‘The Dead Don’t Die’ (2019), ‘Train to Busan’ (2016), and ‘Zombeavers’ (2014).
Fast Vs Slow Zombies
Traditionally, zombies are slow-moving, with their numbers, strong grip, willingness to bite, and ability to pass on some kind of disease, making them a threat. What with zombies being reanimated corpses, this approach is certainly the most logical. Fast zombies, however, add that fear factor of being chased, with protagonists needing to be even more on-edge.
In ‘Train to Busan’, a very immersive horror movie, the zombies are fast, jerky, and are vicious once they’ve undergone the change. Much like in fellow Korean zombie show ‘Kingdom’, the fear comes from provoking them, often only being able to run into confined spaces. In this way, especially as much of the film takes place on a train, everyone is always fearful.
In ‘The Dead Don’t Die’ and ‘Zombeavers’ – the first of which is more of a dry comedic look at a zombie breakout, the second of which is a creature feature that naturally weighs-in as a comedy – the zombies are slow. People have time to make their puns, observe the absurdity of zombies, and generally not be bothered by zombies in ‘The Dead Don’t Die’. In ‘Zombeavers’, unless in water, the zombie beavers merely amble around but are crafty.
‘Army of the Dead’ bucks the trend of picking one or the other. It has both shamblers and alphas, which are the mindless drone zombies that are mostly sluggish as well as a fast-moving, super-strong zombie king and queen. While they can all end up charging towards the heist crew, the slow zombies are only ever a threat when in numbers, but the alphas take on a leading role as the main dangers throughout.
Locations of Zombie Outbreaks
The main distinction between these four films is that the ones that aim to be taken more seriously, ‘Army of the Dead’ and ‘Train to Busan’, take place in very urban areas. Even though most of it takes place on moving trains, being based in the Korea Republic’s capital city (with the train coming from Seoul) means that there are far more people to get infected, become zombies, and pose a larger threat.
‘Train to Busan’ takes the theme of being cramped in urban areas to the extreme. ‘Army of the Dead’ goes for grandeur, with spanning overheads of a wrecked city. To let you know that it is, indeed, in Las Vegas, the movie sees zombies pile over the legendary slot games that remain real money casino favourites. Of course, many people experience these online these days, with titles like ‘Zombie Hoard’ and ‘Wild Walker’, so the scene does add a bit of levity to the attempted serious tone of danger.
‘Zombeavers’ and ‘The Dead Don’t Die’ take place in the middle of nowhere, essentially. The former is at a cabin near a lake, with just a couple of other people living kind of nearby, isolating the main characters to allow their dim-witted characters to act as such in the face of zombie beavers. In ‘The Dead Don’t Die’, the outbreak occurs in the slow, rural town of Centerville, with people being quite spread apart and displayed to rather slow themselves.
It’s All about Hitting the Notes of the Main Genre
These four films received very different aggregate review scores, which generally follow the moviegoer’s consensus. Train to Busan, deserving a place among the very best, holds by far the best score at 94 percent. Next comes ‘Zombeavers’ (71%), ‘Army of the Dead’ (68%), and then ‘The Dead Don’t Die’ (54%). Other factors, such as anticipation, use of CGI, and storytelling, will factor, but the main theme linking these reviews is how well each movie adhered to its primary genre.
‘Train to Busan’ is a superb horror film that’s suspenseful, upholds the theme of an ever-present threat, coaxes you into liking the characters before they make tremendous sacrifices, and keeps you on the edge of your seat throughout. ‘Zombeavers’ loyally adheres to the tropes of American teen comedies and creature features, with everyone’s dedication to the threat of these zombie beavers, and the silliness of the series of events, working very well together.
‘Army of the Dead’ has action – lots of slow-motion action, as you’d expect from Snyder – and follows some of the heist tropes. However, people are much more used to smart heist films now, whereas ‘Army of the Dead’ plays more like an attempted horror-comedy, with neither managing to land too well. While the superstar cast of ‘The Dead Don’t Die’ props up the film significantly, much of its comedy and side themes struggle to land. In both, zombies – even alpha zombies – are rather cheap and don’t inspire fear, sometimes due to the tone.
Essentially, a great zombie film can be made provided that it commits to its primary genre but also maintains zombies as some kind of proven threat.
