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Zombie Carol of the Day: Zombie Yells

Bleeding from the nose,
There's one horse left to slay,
O'er the fields we go,
Feasting all the way.

Bells on bobtails ring,
Make undead spirits bright.
What fun it is to chew and sing
An eating song tonight!

Oh, zombie yells, zombie yells,
Howling all the way.
What fun it is to ride
In an undead open sleigh!

(Taken with permission from the pages of Michael P. Spradlin's It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Zombies! A Book of Zombie Christmas Carols.)

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High Moon: Werewolves. In the Old West. How Did I Not Like This??

I really, really wanted to enjoy Dave Gallaher and Steve Ellis' High Moon. I had been looking forward to it from back when I first reported on it. And yet, now that I've finished the bound first three chapters released in book form by DC's Zuda Comics, I am stunned to say that it held very little interest for me.

I fully realize I am in the small minority on this, and part of my excitement about it was due to the rave reviews. Gallaher and Ellis even won a Harvey Award for Best Web Comic with the series. And yet there I was, page after page, befuddled at my lack of engagement, until finally putting it down and trying to figure out what just happened.

Revolving around a former detective-turned-vigilante's investigations into a mysterious Texas town, High Moon gives us werewolves battling it out with cowboys and outlaws, plus some vampires thrown in for good measure. It has a certain Sergio Leone feel to it, which I'm guessing is what the creators were going for.

This sounds like a surefire recipe for success. And it isn't so much in the writing that the series falters. Gallaher has an interesting style, using a minimum of dialogue to convey a lot. He's also got a great concept on his hands, and takes some bold chances early on that impressed me. Rather, I think it's in Ellis' artwork that the book loses its way.

Some may blanch at this, but I've always felt that the artist has a lot more control over whether a comic works than the writer. The writer I equate with a screenwriter; but the artist, he's the director. He's the one that has to take a script and really sell it. And quite simply, Steve Ellis fails to do this.

Don't get me wrong, the man appears to be an excellent draftsman. His work is moody, visually stimulating, and he does a lot of interesting things with light and shading. His touch helps create an environment of Leone-esque Old West, with a kind of 1970s Heavy Metal sensibility weaved in.

Individually, his illustrations are great to look at, but here's where I turn into Curmudgeony Old-Scool Guy. There's a reason that Jack "King" Kirby is still considered by many to be the greatest comic book artist who ever lived. Certainly, there have been others since with a better grasp of realistic anatomy, a stronger sense of nuance and detail, a more evocative way with light and shade. But what sets Kirby ahead of the pack and always will are two things: His cleanness and purity of style, and most importantly, his impeccable sense of action and movement.

This is why I'll still take a Kirby, Steve Ditko, or Gil Kane over the Todd McFarlanes, Jim Lees and Rob Liefields of the world. A master like Kirby never forgot that comic books are illustrated narratives, and the most important thing is telling the story though the pictures, moving the story along in a dynamic way. He knew it wasn't about making a series of pretty individual pictures, especially if the story suffered because of it.

The problem with Ellis' work is that, taken as a whole, it does nothing but create total confusion. I'm a pretty bright guy, yet there were many points while reading High Moon where I couldn't have told you what the heck was even going on, where I had no grasp on the overarching story being told. And unfortunately, Gallaher's minimalist writing style gave all the leeway in the world to Ellis, putting the ball in his court to get the story across.

As part of DC's Zuda line of web comics, High Moon first came to life on the internet before being reprinted on paper. I can't be sure since I didn't see it in its original medium, but it's possible that something was somehow lost in translation. In short, this is a moody, evocative piece that looks great on the page and has some clever dialogue. Yet taken all together, read as a story, it fails.

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Zombie Carol of the Day: Nothing Like Brains for the Holidays

Oh there's nothing like brains
for the holidays!
No matter how far away you roam,
When you're hungry for the taste
Of someone else's face,
For the holidays, you can't beat
Brains, sweet brains!

I ate a man who lived in Tennessee,
And he was headed for
Pennsylvania to go eat his
mother's eye.
From Pennsylvania folks are traveling
Down to Dixie's sunny shore.
From Atlantic to Pacific,
Gee, the cerebrum tastes terrific!

Oh there's nothing like brains
for the holidays!
'Cause no matter how much your
own mouth foams,
If you want to be happy in a
million ways,
For the holidays,
You can't beat brains, sweet brains.

(Taken with permission from the pages of Michael P. Spradlin's It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Zombies! A Book of Zombie Christmas Carols.)

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TRAILER TRASH: Christmas Edition!

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Zombie Carol of the Day: I'll Be Undead for Christmas

I'll be undead for Christmas,
Eating more than I usually do,
And although I know
It's a long road home,
I'll be fueled by goo.

Christmas Eve will find me
Wherever brains will be.
I'll be undead for Christmas,
When I hear your screams.

I'll be undead this Christmas--
Yes the virus, it got me.
Tramp through the snow,
To eat some toes
And brains under the tree.

Christmas Eve will find me
Wherever brains will be.
I'll be undead for Christmas,
When I hear your screams.

(Taken with permission from the pages of Michael P. Spradlin's It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Zombies! A Book of Zombie Christmas Carols.)

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VAULT VLOG: Whose Death Affected YOU the Most?

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Zombie Carol of the Day: Eat a Toe

Oh, the virus outside is spreadin',
And there's more and more
undeadin',
But when fresh brains are
running low,
Eat a Toe! Eat a toe! Eat a toe!

The zombie 'pocalypse ain't stopping--
Listen, hear the eyeballs a-popping,
But fresh brains are running low,
Eat a toe! Eat a toe! Eat a toe!

The humans put up a good fight,
But lost to the zombie swarm!
So if you'll really let me turn,
I'll eat my own sister's arm!

Civilization is slowly dying,
And, humans, we're still good-bying,
But zombies already ate your nose,
Eat a toe! Eat a toe! Eat a toe!

(Taken with permission from the pages of Michael P. Spradlin's It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Zombies! A Book of Zombie Christmas Carols.)

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Dan O'Bannon 1946-2009

"A writer can't scare a reader unless that writer scares himself or herself first. So, you can't excite anyone in the audience unless you're excited writing the script! You're taking yourself for a ride before you take the audience for a ride!"

If you're not instantly familiar with the name Dan O'Bannon, you should be. This is the man who wrote Alien--not just a great sci-fi/horror film, but the sci-fi/horror film. This is the man who wrote and directed The Return of the Living Dead, not just a great horror comedy, but the horror comedy. The same man is responsible for both of these absolutely pivotal movies/franchises. Oh yeah, and he also wrote the scripts for Lifeforce and Total Recall, just in case his resume needed a little extra boosting.

And now, the man who did all those things is no longer with us, having passed away last night after a short illness at the sadly young age of 63.

From a personal perspective, I can tell you that were it not for ROTLD, I very well might not be the horror fanatic I am today. As a kid, I already had a solid grounding in Universal and Hammer, but it was O'Bannon's brilliant zombie comedy that put me over the top as an obsessed lifelong fan of the macabre. Without Dan O'Bannon, there might very well have been no Vault of Horror. Less than a fraction of a drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things, to be sure--but I thank him for that.

O'Bannon had a somewhat sparse career, but what he chose to be associated with over the years is so impressive. Definitely a case of quality over quantity. He went to USC with none other than John Carpenter, collaborating with him on both of their debuts, the sci-fi comedy Dark Star (1974). He was on board for the earliest days of George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic--you know those computer-generated Death Star blueprints, and the stop-motion game pieces Chewie & R2 use in Star Wars? Yeah, he worked on that.

He was also a writer of science fiction and horror in print as well as film, contributing occasionally to the landmark illustrated magazine Heavy Metal. In fact, two of his stories were adapted in the 1981 Heavy Metal movie, including the one about zombie pilots in World War II (figures!). In the '70s, he was attached as a writer to one of the most legendary cinematic missed opportunities, Alejandro Jodorowsky's adaptation of Dune. Although the project never happened, it did acquaint O'Bannon with H.R. Giger, the man who would design the title character of his most famous script.

What came out of the failed Dune for O'Bannon was the chance to script what would become Ridley Scott's masterpiece, Alien. So I guess we can't be too disappointed. You don't need me to tell you what a brilliant screenplay O'Bannon crafted for that picture, one whose influence continues to be felt to this day. He took the established haunted house/slasher motifs, and bonded them to a sci-fi template in a way no one had before. The closest prior comparison might be Forbidden Planet, but that was obviously pre-slasher. In the wake of Star Wars, he showed us the darker, grimmer side of sci-fi.

Nor do you need me to tell you what a minor miracle he pulled off with ROTLD. A movie called The Return of the Living Dead, based on a half-cocked attempt by John Russo to capitalize on the cult popularity of his previous work with George Romero, had no right whatsoever to be any good at all. Yet once O'Bannon took over, in his one great directorial turn, he transformed it into what I can say in all confidence is a terrific piece of film-making, justly revered among genre fans, but worth a look for any lover of film. It's a solid piece of work that gets better every time I watch it. Hell, it was so good it totally overshadowed Romero's own Day of the Dead, which came out at the same time!

So I'll be remembering Dan O'Bannon today, one of the key people who made me the fan I am. I hope you will, too.

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21st Century Terrors, Part 3: 2002

If the early part of the current decade suffered a bit from the aftereffect of the '90s malaise, then 2002 was the year that things really began to shape up. Most would agree that this decade has been a good time to be a horror movie lover, and 2002 is where it all kicked into gear. This was when the decade started coming into its own.

This was the year so many things began clicking all at once, giving fans lots of options, and rebuilding the face of the genre in the process.

For example, 2002 gave us what very well may be the decade most well-crafted and impressively made horror film, Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later. Not only was it a tense, fascinating and brilliant re-evaluation of the zombie genre, it's the kind of horror film that literally defines an era. In other words, looking back on the 2000s, we could very well call it the decade of 28 Days Later.

And speaking of zombies, it can safely be said that the 2000s was the decade those undead buggers really came into the mainstream after many years of existing underground and being somewhat out of fashion. And 2002 was the year it started. 28 Days Later was one major part of that, although "purists" will argue it's not really a zombie film since the attackers depicted are technically infected living people.

But this is an exercise in futile semantics. Technical details aside, the plot devices are those of the zombie movie, the setting, the structure, the methods of evoking fear--purism aside, 28 Days Later helped usher in a golden age of zombie films, with its depiction of manic, rabid, and--controversy of controversies--fast-moving "zombies".

But if a more old-school approach was more your cup of tea, then the other half of 2002's one-two punch of zombie goodness delivered what you were looking for--to a degree. Based on a successful video game, Paul W.S. Anderson's Resident Evil is the other film that usually gets pointed to as kicking off the zombie renaissance.

While not as good a horror film as 28 Days Later, it was just as popular, if not more so, owing largely to the vast popularity of the game. And while it gave us traditional, slow-moving zombies, it mixed things up a bit with an assortment of other bizarre mutated monsters from the game.

And most importantly, it reached a mainstream audience to a degree almost unheard of for a zombie movie, due largely to its lack of gore. While this didn't sit well with hardcore horror fans, it did expose middle-of-the-road America to the zombie phenomenon, and so may deserve even more credit than 28 Days for spawning the wave of ghoul cinema that continues to this day.

The trend of Asian horror cinema and its effect on the American genre gained greater steam than ever, with the most high profile U.S. remake of them all, The Ring. Taken from 1998's Ringu, this amped-up ghost story was a major hit, with some even preferring it to the Japanese original. Unlike what mostly had been happening, with paltry, inferior remakes of Asian horror, The Ring captured the attention of a lot of horror fans. And although most still prefer the original, it is a quality film.

For many casual horror fans, The Ring would become the benchmark of scary for the decade's fright films. The American version was able to assert a completely separate identity, which was a large part of why it became one of the decade's most memorable horror films. But meanwhile, overseas in Asia, more excellent horror was being created. Both Ju-On from Japan and Jian Gui from China would have a strong impact, and later be remade in America as The Grudge and The Eye, respectively.

Genre directors would make their mark in a big way in 2002. M. Night Shyamalan, who had debuted with the Oscar-nominated The Sixth Sense three years earlier, gave us Signs, a moody sci-fi/horror flick about hostile alien invaders. Although it ends with one of the director's increasingly tiresome twisty climaxes, along the way it delivered some solid scares.

And another young director, Eli Roth, crashed on to the scene with Cabin Fever, a wicked little horror comedy that instantly got him the attention of fright fans. There's no question that film divides horror fandom, but I fall amongst those who found it to be a delightfully sick little laugh riot. A ballsy film that put Roth on the map, leading to the continued impact he would have on the genre as the decade moved along.

Horror movies in general got more interesting in 2002 than they had been in a long time. Within the same 12-month span, we got the ingenious and truly original werewolf picture Dog Soldiers, as well as the boldly imaginative comedy Bubba Ho-Tep, which added one more shining gem to the crown of horror's reigning king, Bruce Campbell. Just one of those films in any given year in recent memory would be impressive--to have both come out within months of each other is testament to the blockbuster horror years that was 2002.

But OK, if you'd like me to balance things out a bit, I can point out that 2002 also gave us the abysmal Anne Rice adaptation Queen of the Damned, which made the previous decade's Interview with the Vampire look like Nosferatu; the famously atrocious FeardotCom; and perhaps the saddest entry in the adventures of Michael Myers, Halloween: Resurrection, in which Mikey tangles with Busta and Tyra...

Nevertheless, 2002 was indeed the year the decade came into its own. And there would only be more good stuff to come--including lots and LOTS of zombies.

Also from 2002:

• Blade 2
• Eight-Legged Freaks
• Ghost Ship
• The Mothman Prophecies

Part 1: 2000
Part 2: 2001

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