After a military convoy transporting a dangerous payload is involved in an accident, the zombie inside escapes beginning a series of infections that consumes all of Las Vegas. Years after quarantining the city, the government decides to nuke Las Vegas destroying what remains of the zombies. Scott Ward, a former soldier who specialised in dealing with zombies, is approached by a sinister businessman about travelling to Las Vegas and recovering the $200,000,000 in a casino vault before the nuke destroys the city. Ward puts together a team including his former comrades and other experts needed to get in, get the money and get out.

Behind The Scenes

Army of the Dead is directed by Zack Snyder, one of the most successful directors working today, being the driving force behind the biggest DC films, as well as 300, Watchmen and the remake of Dawn of the Dead – a film I love and so was excited to learn of a new Snyder zombie film.

In Front Of The Camera

The film has a large ensemble cast but Dave Bautista in the lead as Scott Ward. Bautista has had an exceptionally interesting acting career as part of a long list of professional wrestlers who moved into acting but unlike most, Dave Bautista is very good.

Does It Work?

The film is certainly a lot of fun as a mashup genre of zombie and heist film set in Las Vegas should be. The action scenes are very well done with an impressive level of carnage and destruction visited on Las Vegas. Dave Bautista is very good as the leader of the team and settles into a role he has played a few times now – the powerful tough guy but who is actually quite nice. Aside from the money, Ward is motivated by reconnecting with his daughter, Kate, who is a volunteer in the quarantine camps outside Las Vegas. These camps being a convenient place to put any difficult people who under the guise of containing the zombie infection. The rest of the cast does a good job: there is Garrett Dillahunt as the immediately suspect Martin, the very cool Nora Arnezeder as Lilly aka The Coyote and the mismatched pair of Omari Hardwick as Vanderohe, a tough army veteran and Matthias Schweighofer as Dieter, eccentric and comparatively harmless Dieter, the safe cracker.

Army of the Dead also plays with the usual zombie rules. I know there a lot of zombie traditionalists who will only tolerate the slow zombies of the Romero films but personally, I see no harm in changing things. After all, there are a thousand variations in vampire mythology, from Dracula to Let The Right One In to Buffy the Vampire Slayer – and that diversity is a good thing. If zombie films were limited to a very specific set of rules you’re quickly going to run out of ideas. In Army of the Dead, there are Alphas – these are faster, stronger and more intelligent zombies, the zombie who escaped the convoy was an Alpha and everyone he infected became an Alpha (those they infected became the slower, shambling zombies).

The assembled team as well as Ward and his former soldier colleagues has a safe cracker, helicopter pilot, a zombie assassin, a representative of the sinister businessman and a “coyote”, Lilly, who helps people sneak into Las Vegas to steal the valuables left inside. Almost immediately fractures in the group appear, leading the helicopter pilot Peters (Tig Notaro) having a conversation about “triage” – i.e. ranking the importance of each member and keeping them alive, with her as the pilot who will get them out of Las Vegas as one of the more important.

The film does make some mistakes. First, it’s two and a half hours long, in fact, two minutes longer than mob epic Goodfellas. This does seem to be a problem with modern films as some directors seeming to think it’s not worth making a film less than two hours. Second, the film tries to bring in more serious topics, such as the relationship between Ward and his daughter and some clumsily handled political issues around the quarantine camps. That’s not to say that a zombie film cannot deal with these subjects, but the film is split between huge zombie-slaying spectacle and these heavier issues, with the more serious stuff not getting enough attention to be properly addressed and developed in the film. I would rather have had a simpler storyline that leaned more into the zombie-heist idea.

Army of the Dead is an enjoyable film, especially for those who like the zombie genre. It’s not a great film and takes itself too seriously at times but a good cast, some new zombie ideas and an interesting combination of heist and zombie genre help make it a lot more than just another zombie movie.

Rating: (3.5 / 5)

Also Read: #Alive (Review)

Your contribution to Big Picture Film Club will allow us to continue to produce content. No matter the amount your contributions are greatly appreciated.

The post Review: Army of the Dead appeared first on Big Picture Film Club.

What’s The Current Plan?

DC Films have a strange relationship with shared universe continuity. Recently, the trailer for James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad went online. Acting as a sort of sequel, but sort of not to the original film. Returning characters such as Harley Quinn, Rick Flagg and Amanda Waller feature alongside new ones, with the potential for them to be killed of. Shazam! featured easter eggs and references to the events of other films in the universe. WW84, being set in the ’80s and as a prequel to her other appearances, only refers back to her original film.

Originally, The Batman was to star (as well as be directed by) Ben Affleck and focus on his version of the character. However the film will now focus on a new version, played by Robert Pattinson, and Jared Leto was replaced by Joaquin Phoenix for the standalone Joker (he won an Oscar for his portrayal). There hasn’t been any indication that these two films will connect, with the different settings meaning Pattinson could face a completely different Joker.

Shared Universe Vs Multiverse

Originally, it seemed like DC was going to follow in Marvel’s footsteps with a shared universe. Justice League was to lead into several solo movies, as well as part two and three. But with most of those films stuck in development hell and no word on a Justice League sequel, those plans are up in the air. Some character’s fates are uncertain, with no word on whether we will get another Superman with Henry Cavill, or the previously announced Cyborg solo outing.

The current lineup for DC films, only features two following characters from Justice League (Not including Batman, who is recast) Aquaman 2 and The Flash. Of those, The Flash is more likely to refer to it, as this version has not appeared since (barring a cameo on the TV show). Interestingly, if WB decides they are going to continue with the “shared universe” model, The Flash could be the one to do it, especially if the rumours of it being based on “Flashpoint” are true.

However, in an interview with Variety, WarnerMedia CEO Ann Sarnoff seemed to indicate that they would be moving away from that model. The Snyder Cut appears to be the end of that particular story, but other versions and new heroes will feature. It still sounds like they will crossover with each other and other media too.

Final Thoughts

Moving away from the “shared universe” actually sounds like the best thing for DC. Aside from the diehard fans, the films have had largely mixed receptions from audiences and critics. Whereas the standalone entries have been much better received. It frees up filmmakers from having to follow along with a plan, and instead focus on their own project. As a side effect, it also reduces comparisons to the MCU, which has sometimes been criticised for how overwhelming it can be to keep up with.

Adopting an “Elseworlds” model allows each film to be wildly different from each other. Looking at the trailers. it doesn’t seem like The Batman and The Suicide Squad take place in the same universe. It’s hard to picture Pattinson’s Batman going up against Starro. Likewise, this doesn’t stop them from crossing over occasionally, with Michael Keaton’s Batman supposedly appearing in The Flash. It really seems like DC might be doing exactly what they should have done all along.

Also Read: Joke’s On You: The History of Batman’s Arch Nemesis

Your contribution to Big Picture Film Club will allow us to continue to produce content. No matter the amount your contributions are greatly appreciated.

The post With The Batman Now Set In Earth-2 and Calls To #RestoreTheSnyderVerse, What Will Happen With The DCEU? appeared first on Big Picture Film Club.

What Is The Snyder Cut?

When DC wanted to create its own superhero universe, the DCEU, one director was pushed to the front – Zack Snyder. Snyder directed the first film in the DCEU, Man of Steel, in 2013. He then went on to direct Batman Vs Superman: Dawn of Justice, which brought Batman and Superman into conflict and introduced the character Wonder Woman. Naturally enough, a Justice League film was planned, this being a team of superheroes that worked together from the DC comics. Again, Snyder was to direct. However, after a family tragedy Snyder stepped down from directing and the project was taken over by Joss Whedon. Many fans were disappointed with the finished product with some believing Whedon had taken the film in a different direction to which Snyder had wanted. And so an internet campaign was born for the so-called “Snyder Cut” to be released.

The Two Film Problem

This has created a rather thorny philosophical problem – which is the real Justice League film? To use the correct term – which is canon? In the past this wouldn’t have been too much of a problem, canon was not something that worried the people who made Batman Forever, whilst nominally a sequel to Batman Returns it was very much its own film. But in the DCEU this is important as it will have repercussions to the other films and tv shows. In the world of comics, canon is at once incredibly complicated and incredibly simple. There is no one story for a superhero, there are multiple stories, they can be set in different time periods, change important details of the story, retell old stories in a new way. This is a perfectly natural part of comic books that allows them to remain refresh when characters can be decades old. Such a reset is probably coming to MCU relatively soon.

The DCEU machine is already winding up for the release of The Batman with Robert Pattison taking on the role. Obviously this will be a younger Batman/Bruce Wayne than Ben Affleck’s Batman and raises the question of where does this sit in the DCEU storyline? I have tried to find this out but it seems very unclear. Similarly what about Suicide Squad, The Suicide Squad, and Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey? Affleck’s Batman briefly appeared in Suicide Squad and as Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn runs through them it could be assumed they are all in the same universe.

I doubt in terms of plot too much would be different between The Snyder Cut and the original film. I can’t imagine that Snyder’s will feature a massacre of the main characters or a completely different outcome but if nothing else fans obsess over small details.

The Darkest Timeline

My own rather impractical solution is to have two separate DCEUs running alongside, each branching off from their own version of Justice League. The idea of having two competing DCEU timelines with the same actors and same plots is certainly intriguing, given that it’s DC you’d have to assume that each would be competing to be the darkest timeline – in the vein of Abed’s infamous belief, in TV show Community, that of six possible different ways for the show to go, there was a “darkest timeline”. Like in Community (as inspired by Star Trek) all characters in DCEU would wear goatee beards, the acknowledged universal symbol of evilness.

Abandon The Universe

My unpopular opinion on the MCU is I don’t think it promotes good storytelling. The MCU currently consisted of twenty-three films (as well as tv shows that are meant to take place in that universe) and every new film has to fit in. There can be a lot said for telling a story over multiple films and adding scope to the narrative but I see it as so much baggage.

Joker is probably the most critically acclaimed comic book film ever as well as being hugely financially successful and popular with traditional fans and it is not considered part of the DCEU. I would like DC to embrace this idea. They didn’t have to worry about how this film would fit into the wider story and just make a great film. If they want to do another Green Lantern film there is no reason for it to fit in with an existing story, it can be it’s own self-contained entity, allowing them to be more experimental. This will allow DCEU to have over-the-top minor character mad-cap adventures like the recent Harley Quinn and their brooding dark Batman films.

If nothing else the release of The Snyder Cut could be an interesting watershed for films with huge fandoms, fans made this happen. Much has been written about what effect fan dissatisfaction had in relation to the recent Star Wars films and it’ll be interesting to see how fans will use this new power.

Also Read: The Snyder Cut Saga

The post What The Snyder Cut Could Mean For The DCEU appeared first on Big Picture Film Club.