arrroaugh. rargh. uhh. muhhhrr. gahhk. 4 itchy tasty

[thehefner]

The general consensus on The Walking Dead--the Darabont-helmed AMC show based on the great comics by Robert Kirkman--seems to boil down to two reactions:

1.) People who've read the comic loved the pilot.

2.) People who haven't read the comic thought the pilot felt like pretty much every zombie movie ever.

I definitely fit into the first category. I wasn't thinking, "What's gonna happen next? Oh, so they're hitting the same zombie movie beats we've seen a million times before," because... well, that's what happened in the comic. I was expecting exactly that. What I wasn't expecting was for the show to do it better.

Because look, I love the comic, but like much of Kirkman's work, it takes six or so issues before it finally kicks in and takes off. Kirkman likes to set up ways that feel like going through the motions, so that he can then tear it all down with what the story's really about. Walking Dead, in particular, had a rather standard start that worked at the time because it felt refreshingly back-to-basics and old school in the sudden Fast Zombies boom with the Dawn of the Dead remake and 28 Days Later*. It was so refreshing to see someone doing classic Romero slow zombies again as an ongoing series that I cut Kirkman some slack.

But since then, zombies have over-saturated the market to the point that such an opening episode feels like "classic" and more "cliched." Should Darabont have rewritten Kirkman's opening to make it fresher and more distinct? Only if it could mean the people in Category #2 could be as excited as those of us in Category #1.

The reason I loved it so much was because, even though I knew what the story was going to be, and what was going to happen next, I was awestruck by the storytelling. Darabont understands the essential, oh-so-basic rule that no one seems to frickin' understand: nothing is scarier than silence. Almost any other show/movie (especially modern zombie ones) would fill those spaces with creeeeeeeepy music, and uh oh, it's getting creepier and more suspensful, so you know something's about to happen, whoooaaaa!

No. Fuck that. For true horror, silence is golden. Silence doesn't give you the safety net of clues to tell you what to feel. Silence lets your imagination run wild. When Rick was walking through that hospital, the casual background images of the bullet holes in the walls was all you needed to know. Even when we saw the zombies, there was no music. The horror speaks for itself in this dead world.

BUT... it's only when Rick went back to his house, desperately searched for his wife and son, found nobody, and broke down crying... that's when the dramatic soundtrack swept in. And I just wanted to kiss the air, like a compliment to a fine chef. Because the music was humanity. The music was only for the living, and the feeling. And it was only when the very living sorrow broke through that the silence was itself broken, if only for a moment. Fucking beautiful.

The rest of the show carried on magnificently, I thought. After soundtracks, the second greatest reason why most horror movies suck today is "BOO!" scares. Ughhhh, there's nothing so lazy in horror as the "BOO!" scare. True horror comes from letting your imagination fill in the gaps, as your dread mounts. That's what TWD show did so wonderfully. For now, there were no big action sequences, so Savini Showcase gore effects, just character-focused moments, interaction, and dread.

The pacing just made me extremely happy. Henchgirl (who fell into Category #2) said it felt like a 70's film. For me, I think that's a fantastic thing, and I hope it's maintained throughout the series. I also hope the show does start getting more original and distinct, as the comics themselves have, now that the familiar groundwork has been so expertly laid.

Until then, I hope it rises above the over-saturation of today's market (I think it's Pride and Prejudice and Zombies that really killed the trend) and catches on with more people, especially those from category #2. Because damn it, I want to geek out about this with more people. Especially once Michael Rooker (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer) joins the cast.

For now, I just have one thing to say to those of you in category #2: if the show is anything like the comic, then don't get too attached to any of the characters. Even the ones you assume are safe. Even the lead. There was a point when I seriously thought Kirkman was going to kill off the entire cast and continue the series focusing on the father-son team of Morgan and Duane. It wouldn't have been surprising.

Man. I hope they bring in the Governor. *shudder*




*In fact, with 28 Days Later evoked, let's look at TWD's opening. Both the comic and the show featured the main character waking up in the hospital, having been in a coma while the zombie outbreak started.

Most people accuse Kirkman (and now the show here) for ripping off 28DL, but what few realize (so few that it's not even mentioned on Wikipedia) is that 28DL itself ripped off a New Zealand film called The Quiet Earth. In it, a man wakes up (in the same full-frontal nude shot that was replicated in 28DL with Cillian Murphy) to discover that everybody else on Earth has vanished.

So, yeah, give ripping off credit where it's due.

Comments

[box-in-the-box.livejournal.com]

Most people accuse Kirkman (and now the show here) for ripping off 28DL, but what few realize (so few that it's not even mentioned on Wikipedia) is that 28DL itself ripped off a New Zealand film called The Quiet Earth. In it, a man wakes up (in the same full-frontal nude shot that was replicated in 28DL with Cillian Murphy) to discover that everybody else on Earth has vanished.

... That's actually kind of WORSE, because that means The Walking Dead was stealing rather blatantly from a scene that was itself stolen, so instead of going to the same source as 28 Days Later, it copied the copy of that movie. What happens to a picture's quality when you Xerox a Xerox of it?

That being said, The Walking Dead is very competently and professionally made — well-acted, well-directed, tightly written — but even speaking as someone who tried the comic off and on over the years, I've SEEN all this shit BEFORE, so watching the mainstream media go apeshit over it NOW feels like when everyone suddenly decided, in the wake of Dr. Evil in the first Austin Powers movie, that supervillain deconstruction was somehow a NEW thing. I mean, yes, a part of me will be glad if this means that more people are in on the joke, but compared to so many other works in the genre, it's not even that REMARKABLE, and Kirkman's inevitable Whedon-esque meat-grinder that he puts the characters through is a huge part of it. It's as predictable as fuck that any time any character gets an island of peace or clarity or contentment, they're going to get their balls kicked in for it, to the point that it's on a par with the old cliche about the life expectancy of the guy in the war movie who tells other people about his girlfriend who's waiting for him back home.

[box-in-the-box.livejournal.com]

Also? True story: During my wartime deployments, I specifically refused to tell my fellow sailors about any of my loved ones back home. I just wouldn't do it. Once the ship pulled back into Norfolk, THEN I'd tell stories, but while we were out to sea? NEVER. I refused to risk the possibility that genre conventions would crop up in my own real life.

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

Banking on the hope that you were a featured character and not a Red Shirt extra, I gather?

[box-in-the-box.livejournal.com]

HEY CHARLIE SHEEN I KNOW WE'RE BOTH TRYING NOT TO GET KILLED HERE IN VIETNAM BUT TAKE A LOOK AT THIS PICTURE OF MY GIRLFRIEND BACK HOME WHO WILL BE SO DISTRAUGHT IF I WIND UP CRIPPLED OR KILLED

Certain shit just qualifies as inviting fate to assrape you, no matter who you are.

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's not good either, is it? But I still like where he went with it from there.

It is annoying, yes, to see people wanking over something that folks like us have known about for years.

As someone very sick of the Whedon-esque meat-grinder, I'd agree with you about those being problems if the story was anything other than a zombie story. At that point, the stakes become "How the hell do we keep this from being entirely hopeless?" Because if Romero's stories tell you anything, it's that moments of clarity or contentment are fucking fleeting, and that stopping to enjoy such things for too long means letting your guard down.

But I think Kirkman handles the balance so close to shark-jumping that it's sometimes unbearable. Look at Cormac McCarthy's The Road, which is pretty much hopeless, yet still powerful for how the characters hold on to their humanity, no matter what. Contrast that with Ennis' Crossed, which is absolutely nothing but ugliness, where the characters early on sacrifice their humanity and become cold shells of survival.

Kirkman seems to walk a tightrope of The Road, wobbling and threatening to fall into Crossed territory. And every time the series seems to have gotten to the point where the characters have totally sold their own humanity just to survive, he throws another wrinkle into the plot, the characters' psyches, or both.

He's still managed to do it. I don't know how much longer he can, and once he falls, I probably won't be able to keep reading.

[box-in-the-box.livejournal.com]

Crossed is basically Ennis doing Mad Max with his preexisting Texas Chainsaw Massacre sensibilities amped up to Eleven, which is as unpleasant as you say, but The Road is literally the most pointless thing ever. It is to the post-apocalyptic genre what George Costanza's description of Seinfeld was to sitcoms - it's the "end of the world" that's about nothing. The Walking Dead is at least more interesting, but it simply highlights the fact that there's a REALLY good fucking reason why the day after is almost exactly the opposite of a suitable premise for an ONGOING series, as opposed to a mini or a contained series of films.

Even the Mad Max series offered hope in the form of society REBUILDING, even if it was in the form of Thunderdome.

[fragmentedsky.livejournal.com]

I'm with you - I also actually liked it better than the comic. I hope they let it go past just six episodes. The mood was perfect. Then again, I'm also a big fan of 28DL. This is my kind of zombie shit. Andrew Lincoln did a great job, too.

Actually, I consider P&P&Z to be pure comedy. When it's 85% original Austen text, it's all just shits and giggles to me, not horror.

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

OT, but awesome blood bending icon. I look forward to getting Henchgirl caught up with season 3.

[fragmentedsky.livejournal.com]

You do need to. I cannot begin to tell you how utterly in love I am with this whole show, and season 3 is by far the best. I actually thought of bloodbending early on, but thought there was NO WAY they would do it because....it was a kid's show. When they did, I was utterly thrilled. Hell, it's actually got me writing fanfic again.


....that probably should have just been a 'thank you,' right? Thank you.

[foxhack.livejournal.com]

Surprisingly enough, the series will be broadcast down here, on cable, and I don't have to wait four months for someone to subtitle it.

Then again, this means they took like a week to subtitle it, which will only make my head hurt.

(It's going to air in four hours!)

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

Thankfully, much of the episode is silent (as you probably already know by now), so that might possibly not be as much of an issue maybe?

[mellifluous-ink.livejournal.com]

Walking Dead was based on something?

Damn it, I was going along thinking it was original (so to speak). What the fuck. Now I am less excited.

It still gave me nightmares, and was great, but damn it, can't we get ONE SINGLE THING that isn't based on a comic or a book or a true story, please??

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

To possibly make matters worse, Walking Dead is essentially a long-form take on a George Romero zombie movie, with McCarthy's The Road thrown in for good measure. The source material isn't really original either. But at least neither of them is an out-and-out remake, right?

Besides, hey, anything that might get more people reading comics is cool by me.

Either way, I understand the show is gonna diverge from the comic in significant (and intentional) ways, so I daresay there shall be a great deal of originality from Darabont's vision vs. the source material. I already saw a fair amount of that in the pilot.

[mellifluous-ink.livejournal.com]

Oh well. Zombies are zombies are zombies, I guess. This isn't fantasy, after all. Horror's always been for What We Fear, so essentially it's the same stuff over and over with different icing.

I think my favourite zombie is still Ghoulia Yelps, though. And I'm still brewing this idea about zombies being completely normal people just dead and brain-ivorous (or something; still working out details).

[mellifluous-ink.livejournal.com]

Of course, I have whole ideas about how Ghoulia represents differently-abled people in the sense that she can only 'speak zombie', and that she can't move very quickly and has low dexterity, and how frustrated she gets because she's really intelligent but has difficulty communicating. I mean seriously.

But anyway, here I go talking about my crazy toy fandom when there's novels about prohibition gangsters that happen to be unicorns and dragons to write! *skips off*

[kingrockwell]

There was a point when I seriously thought Kirkman was going to kill off the entire cast and continue the series focusing on the father-son team of Morgan and Duane.

It's too late, I've already become attached. Because I might want this more than anything (well, the focus more so than the culling).

haven't read much of the comic, but i picked up the Image Firsts reprint of #1 on Sunday and didn't touch it until after the premiere
liked the televersion better

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

I've been trying to come up with a response, but nothing I could say wouldn't be spoil-y. I don't know if you plan to read the comics, or just stick with the show, and I dunno what Darabont might do with them that differs from the comics. But either way: brace yourself.

[kingrockwell]

I don't really plan on reading the comics. ...But they're doomed, aren't they. :(

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

... a bit, yeah. :(

[night-train-fm.livejournal.com]

'nothing is scarier than silence'

This is a bit of a reach, but have you seen any of Marble Hornets?

[thehefner.livejournal.com]

Never even heard of it! What is it?

[night-train-fm.livejournal.com]

Youtube series that I can best sum up as 'The Blair Witch Project' (shoestring budget, no music, most of the terror left to the imagination) meets 'The Woman in Black' (the 'villain' is never physically agressive - it's just there).