DVD Review: Anna and the Apocalypse

Anna and the Apocalypse
(DVD Anna)

This movie started as a short film in 2011, Zombie Musical, written and directed by Ryan McHenry. It was then expanded to this full-length feature film, following McHenry’s death, by writers Alan McDonald and Tommy Reilly, with music by Roddy Hart and Reilly. And the music is integral to this film’s success — there are over 15 songs, sung by various cast members, who break into song-and-dance numbers that seamlessly merge into the chaos and zombie killing.

 

Teenager Anna is looking forward to traipsing around the globe following the end of her senior year — a prospect that neither her over-protective father and her best friend don’t relish. Anna isn’t part of the “popular crowd” but she and her fellow misfit outsiders still form a tight bond. They tend to ignore the news reports of a global pandemic that appears to be turning people into zombies — until it starts to affect the people in their sleepy Scottish town of Little Haven. As the entire world appears to be dissolving into total chaos, Anna and her friends (and enemies) must fight their way through their zombie-infested town to their high school, which may or may not be the last safe haven.

 

The entire cast of this is terrific, particularly Ella Hunt as Anna and Malcolm Cumming as her lifelong platonic best friend John. The songs are at first a bit jarring, but quickly become one of the best parts of the film — it reminded me of watching the Buffy the Vampire Slayer musical episode “Once More, With Feeling” — and all the actors have excellent singing voices. The make-up and special effects are grotesque but impressive. If the film verges occasionally into cartoonishness, it is allowable, as the entire concept seems outlandish. And yet, somehow it works!

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to see the If You Like…Die Hard list of harder-edged action/suspense films set at Christmas-time.)

 

( Internet Movie Database entry for this film )

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Book Review: The Complete Roadtrip Z (on Hoopla)

The Complete Roadtrip Z
by Lilith Saintcrow (Hoopla)

If you are looking for your next zombie book, look no further! A little dark, a lot gritty, with a hero you just can’t help but relate to, Lilith Saintcrow describes the collapse of the modern day world wonderfully. The two main characters, Ginny and Lee, are opposites. Lee, a former military vet and country handyman travels with Ginny, a New York upstate librarian (I know, that is part of why I was drawn to the book) who wants to check on her family. A little romance, a lot of action and several side stories help complete the picture, this series is delightful and makes me want to learn more handy skills as a just in case!

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Steelflower by Lilith Saintcrow, Guilty Pleasures by Laurell K. Hamilton, Written in Red by Anne Bishop or Feed by Mira Grant.]

[ official Roadtrip Z page on the official Lilith Saintcrow web site ]

For some similar items, check out the Zombies — The New Vampires Reader List here on BookGuide!

Recommended by Rio B.
Bennett Martin Public Library – Public Service

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

DVD Review: Zombieland: Double Tap

Zombieland: Double Tap
[DVD Zombieland]

Zombieland: Double Tap (2019) came out ten years after the original, Zombieland (2009). This sequel returns the entire original quartet of zombie apocalypse survivors — Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin). In the years since the end of the first film, they’ve continued to travel, ending up residing in the White House for quite a while. For better or worse, they’ve become a dysfunctional family. But when Columbus tries to get Wichita to marry him, commitment-phobic Wichita hits the road with Little Rock, who’s looking to find another male human survivor for companionship.

The film becomes a road trip, with stops in Nashville, where Tallahassee briefly hooks up with a tough woman (Nevada) over a mutual love of Elvis, and Columbus connects with vapid mallrat Madison. There’s also amusing cameos from some recognizable faces as a pair of dopplegangers to Tallahassee and Columbus. Things all come to a head with the quartet eventually reunited in a peacenik commune, where a horde of zombies descends on the weaponless human survivors. It’s blood and guts and cursing and absurd humor, and it’s all way over-the-top. But if you liked the first Zombieland, you’ll definitely like this second one. The in-jokes about Columbus’ lists of “rules” for surviving the zombie apocalypse are hilarious.

If you can’t handle “R”-rated language and violence, this one definitely isn’t for you. And if you enjoyed Bill Murray’s part in the first film, and are disappointed that he’s not in this one (since our heroes accidentally killed him), never fear — check out the “extra features” on this DVD!

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try the original 2009 Zombieland.]

[ Internet Movie Database entry for this film ] | [ official Zombieland: Double Tap web site ]

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

iZombie, Vol 1: Dead to the World by Chris Roberson and Michael Allred

iZombie, Vol 1: Dead to the World
by Chris Roberson and Michael Allred [Hoopla Digital Service] 

Before I read this I had started watching season one of iZombie, realized it was based on comics and was curious how different they were. Turns out they are really rather different, but I liked both. For starters the main character’s name is different. In the TV show it’s Liv, and in the book it’s Gwen. The book starts after she’d died, whereas in the TV show we see her a bit before she dies and how she becomes a zombie, so we know less in this about who she was before. It is clear thought that she is no longer in contact with the people she knew before death and zombiehood. She lives incognito working as a grave digger and gets brains to eat that way. Like in the TV show, she needs to eat brains but when she does gets flash backs of the deceased person’s life and memories. Unlike the show she does not take on their personality and skills too. She has some friends including a ghost and a wereterrier; although we also meet vampires and a mummy. I used to watch the Munsters on TV and this kind of reminded me of it in that there are a group of ‘monsters’ who aren’t villains or really too scary, just trying to live a normal life in a world where they aren’t normal. The TV version of iZombie does portray this, but it definitely has much more action, thrills, and fear that someone may find out the truth about the main character and the repercussions that could come from it. I would recommend this to people who enjoy the TV series or fantasy fiction set in the modern day.

This is available as an instant (no waiting on hold) download from a resource called Hoopla. You can download it on your phone or tablet via the Hoopla app, or read it in your browser on a computer. I always read it on a computer which lets you zoom in on each panel to read the text better or be zoomed out so you can see the whole page at once. There is a Hoopla link on our website and you can now search Hoopla titles directly from the normal catalog and it gives you a link to download them from there, which is pretty cool.

[If you like this item, you might like these too – You might also like the Witchblade, Hellboy, or Ghost graphic novel series (also available on Hoopla).]

[ official Chris Roberson web site ]

Recommended by Kristen A.
Gere Branch Library

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New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewers recommendations!

iZombie: Season 1 (on DVD)

iZombie: Season 1 [DVD iZombie]

Someone I know talked me into trying this series; it was clearly about zombies which I was not really into but they told me that the main character solves mysteries about people’s deaths, so it’s kind of like a CSI show, and also there is brain eating with hot sauce. It was the mystery aspect that appealed to me initially, so I agreed to try it. I was a bit surprised at how much I liked it. I had not watched anything with zombies before was not too interested in them but in this series they are actual people we can relate to, some characters act like zombiehood is just a health condition or alternate lifestyle. It’s really full of surprises that I don’t want to spoil, so I’ll be brief with the plot summary. Liv Moore is a med student doing her residency at a hospital; she goes to a party, crazy stuff happens, a lot of people die and she wakes up finding herself in a body bag. She died, but didn’t because she was turned into a zombie who has to eat brains regularly. Because of her new needs, she gets a job in the medical examiner’s office to have easy access to brains. The brains she eats from the bodies of the corpses that come through give her visions and the personality/skills of the deceased and she uses this to help solve their murder case with the Seattle Police Department. There is a lot of character development in this series and a very twisting plot. This series is based on the comic of the same name, which I also reviewed this month. The TV show has a much faster pace with more action, excitement, drama, brain eating, and very graphic violence including blood, guts, guns, and meat saws. If you don’t like watching movies or shows with this level of violence I’d recommend you read the comic (available on Hoopla) because it has a comparable story without the blood and guts.

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try iZombie: Season 2, or the iZombie comics on Hoopla.]

[ Internet Movie Database entry for this film ] | [ official iZombie series web site ]

Recommended by Kristen A.
Gere Branch Library

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The Walking Dead: Season Three (on DVD)

The Walking Dead: Season Three [DVD Walking]

I’ve been a fan of The Walking Dead since it first premiered in 2010, and I continue to watch it today, as each season airs on AMC. The series has had its share of ups and downs, with regards to its storytelling and settings. I think the third season, available in this boxed set, was one of the series’ strongest. After the second season ended in chaos, the primary group of human survivors finds themselves split up and going in separate directions. Group leader Rick Grimes leads his rag-tag bunch of desperate humans into an abandoned prison, clearing the facility of undead zombies wing by wing. Setting up the prison as their new home — it is defensible and offers a hope of stability — the survivors explore the surrounding area for supplies. Meanwhile, original group member Andrea ends up encountering fan favorite character Michonne in the woods, and they both end up at Woodbury, a walled community ruled over by the despotic man known as The Governor.

The zombie action of this series about a zombie apocalypse world remains gory and violent, but it is the human stories, particularly those involved the new characters of Michonne and The Governor, and are what this series is really all about. This 16-episode season has a distinct start and conclusion, and viewers unfamiliar with the show will get caught up quickly. Don’t get too attached to ANY of the supporting characters, because no-one should be considered safe to survive until the fourth season!

[There are distinct differences between The Walking Dead as a TV series and as a series of graphic novels, however, much of the plot covered by this season has also been touched on in the graphic novel series.] [ Internet Movie Database entry for this series ] | [ official The Walking Dead web site from AMC ]

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library

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The Snacking Dead by D.B. Walker

The Snacking Dead: A Parody in a Cookbook
by D.B. Walker [641.55 Wal]

If you like The Walking Dead and have a sense of humor this is the book for you. With just four chapters "Appetizers for an Apocalypse, Eating on the run, Messy bites for the Newly Dead and Last Call." The book offer recipes for parties or everyday meals, there's something for everyone. Some of my favorites are: Gutted Mushrooms with Bacon and Spinach -- I love all of the ingredients. Last Stand Skillet Cornbread, a little sweet, but still a tasty treat. Cat head biscuits with Sawmill Gravy -- if you don't have sausage, you can use bacon instead, Yum!! -- recommended by Marcy G. - South Branch Library

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Fifty Shades of Chicken by F. L. Fowler.]

[ official The Snacking Dead web site ]

 Have you read this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewers recommendations!

The Snacking Dead: A Parody in a Cookbook

The Snacking Dead: A Parody in a Cookbook
by D.B. Walker [641.55 Wal]

Okay, this has got to be one of the oddest tie-in books I've ever seen, and I actually collect TV and movie tie-in books! The Snacking Dead is a combination of a decent cookbook with schmaltzy fan fiction based on The Walking Dead zombie television series. There is a narrative line, in which a suburban mother of two attempts to survive the beginning of the zombie apocalypse (as seen in the Walking Dead tv series), by using food and cooking to connect with the people around her. While she whips up delicious foods, using ingredients still available after society's collapse, she remembers her run-in as a teenager with Daryl (one of the fan-favorite characters from the tv series). Narrative chapters alternate between the unnamed narrator and Daryl, himself, who is out on his own away from any of the series' other characters -- these narrative chapters also alternate with actual recipes, and photos of the dishes, posed in apocalyptic settings. The recipes themselves all sound quite good, and I'd like to try a few of them. But the tale of the narrator, who eventually joins the ranks of the undead, along with Daryl's own narration, is a bizarre counterpoint. I recommend this one for its sheer oddity, however I'm not sure that either Walking Dead fans or cookbook fans will come away fully satisfied! -- recommended by Scott C. - Bennett Martin Public Library [If you like this style of parody cookbook -- with legitimate recipes -- the same folks are responsible for Fifty Shades of Chicken.]

[ official The Snacking Dead web site ]

Have you read this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewers recommendations!