Attack of the zombies we’re supposed to care about!

In an effort to bring something new to the zombie genre, for the past decade, filmmakers have bombarded us with movies in which the zombies are the main characters. Generally, I’d rather have another Night of the Living Dead rip off than to have to feel for the zombie, but occasionally, I can get into a lovable zombie flick. So I did a marathon of them just so I could get back to hating and being terrified of zombies.

BOY EATS GIRL (2005)

I expected to be disappointed by Boy Eats Girls. The title makes it sound like one of those yawnfest zombie love stories where the girl loves her zombie boyfriend so much that she struggles to live and survive with a cannibal as in Zombie Honeymoon. OR one of those cute zombie romance stories like Warm Bodies.

Instead, I got an awesome teen zombedy loaded with guts, humor, and the living dead! I’m surprised this Irish horror flick didn’t get more of a following. Cute cast, pop rock soundtrack, fast paced with a short running time, and a great balance of scares and laughs. Plus it has Samantha Mumba! Remember her? She had one hit here in the U.S.:

So boy is best friends with girl (Samantha) and is about to tell her he loves her. Instead, he has his heart broken when he sees her getting out of a car with another guy. Tragically, he dies…and comes back as a zombie thanks to a magic spell his mother casts to bring him back to life.

There’s a school dance and the classic line-up of characters, including the bitch, the bully, and the geeky comic duo. Boy has his first meal and suddenly the zombie outbreak has begun! It’s nonstop chase scenes (fast zombies!), gut munching, gore, and comic scenarios until the main characters are all holed up in a house surrounded by zombies. Can boy (or his mom) save the day and stop the zombie apocalypse?

There’s nothing PG-13 about this one. It even gets into Dead Alive territory when Samantha hops in a bulldozer!

AAAH! ZOMBIES!! (2007)

Aaah! Zombies! made it real easy for me to side with the zombies by casting Matthew Davis of Vampire Diaries and Urban Legend: Final Cut and Michael Grant Terry of Bones and Grimm.

Two cuties and two chicks are eating green ice cream at the bowling alley, not realizing the green is actually toxic waste that leaked into the ice cream mix. They also don’t know that eating it turned them into zombies. We see the movie from their perspective as we follow their story in glorious full color. However the film occasionally turns black and white to let us know we are seeing from the perspective of everyone else—at which point we see our four main characters as the zombies they really are!

It makes for a pretty unique and funny flick. There are plenty of funny zombie gags and gross out flesh gags and the cast is great. But then it all falls apart because they bring in the army angle. When will horror filmmakers learn that there’s no worse of a buzz kill than the fricking army???

DEADHEADS (2011)

DeadHeads opens with an awesome 1989 punk song called “They Won’t Stay Dead” by the 3-D Invisibles, so I knew this was going to be my kind of movie.

The first dude we meet is already a zombie and just doesn’t know it. After being shot a few times and trying to warn other zombies to run, he finds a zombie buddy who clues him in to what he’s become.

As their zombromance ignites in a bar, his zombie buddy convinces him to go find his girlfriend. Zombie road trip movie! Soon, they adopt a zombie pet and hitch a ride with an old dude. They’re also being pursued by two hot zombie hunters—a muscle hot black dude and a comedic bearded dude who looks like he should be dressed in leather and chains in a sex dungeon. The zombie buddy even makes some great jokes about the zombie hunters having sex together.

The shenanigans all lead to a high school reunion finale that features an awesome 80s inspired song titled “Getaway Driver” by a band called Ivy Walls. DeadHeads rules!

FIDO (2006)

Fido takes us back to the innocent days of the 1950s. In fact, there’s something oddly innocent about the movie. Sure, it’s a comedy satire, but there is gut munching and gore—even child victims. But the tone of the entire film is whimsical. It’s not going to appeal to all zombie lovers.

The film opens with a black and white public service movie about how we domesticated the zombies. Then we meet Timmy and his parents. Timmy’s mom is all about appearances and everyone has zombie domestics, so she wants one. But dad isn’t thrilled about the idea.

But they get Fido. And son Timmy befriends Fido. And Fido watches out for Timmy. Then the unthinkable happens; Fido eats humans. And Fido is taken away from Timmy. And so Timmy has to figure out a way to rescue Fido from the powers that took him.

Seriously, this is a sweet family movie wrapped in a hard zombie shell. You have to love the part when Fido returns to the mother like Lassie…and she says, “Fido! Where’s Timmy?” And fear not. There’s a zombie horde and plenty of brain blasting at the end.