HNUM²

John Russo, Tom Savini, Zombie and Pennsylvania are all words that can be found on the box for this movie. All things that tie in to Romero’s Dead movies. Must be good, huh? Well, keeping in mind this was made before Land and Diary, you’d think it might be worthwhile.

But then, you realize that “Bred from the creators of the classic horror ‘Night of the Living Dead’” doesn’t mean Romero and “comes the long awaited sequel” didn’t mean Dawn of the Dead…It’s not looking so good, is it?

And when the director has this to say about it, you should know to stay away…”You see, I did in fact direct CHILDREN OF THE LIVING DEAD, and you know what? It really does suck!!!!”

I, for what ever heinous sins I committed in a previous life, didn’t stay away.

I’ll not bore you too much with the apparent reason for it’s terribleness. A terrible script written by the executive producers daughter. An executive producers daughter who would not allow a single word to be changed. The daughter of an executive producer who insisted on certain cast members. The female offspring of… Enough of that. Especially as we only have the directors word that it was her fault. I do have to wonder just how many tools he blames for this.

It’s the tale of a super intelligent, super tough, super resilient zombie with the ability to move at speeds faster than a rapidly driving van. The superman of zombies, if you will. Abbot Hayes, the local boogyman turned zombie, manages to hide out for 14 years. Completely unnoticed. Until some teenagers desecrate his mom’s grave. He then extracts revenge on them, turning the whole town into flesh eating undead. The survivors hole up in a diner, under siege from many gray faced flesh eaters. Until the shocking conclusion.

The movie starts of good. A nice shot of burning corpses. Unfortunately they can’t keep it up for long. We cut to some guys with cap-guns shooting crappy zombies with crappy make-up and crappy blood splatters (Savini was not the effects guy on this. Just an actor/stunt coordinator.)

And it only gets worse from here on in. We have vanishing zombies, terribly dubbed voices, Savini doing a muttering, mumbling, sub par attempt at an almost Ash-like character, atrocious acting, ridiculous plot conveniences, ‘cool’ moments that just weren’t, more atrocious acting, crappy effects… and did I mention the super zombie ability to hide out for 14 years? of the super-zombie offspring’s ability to hide out for a year? Never eating.