Day of the Dead – Episode 10 – Choke on ‘Em!
So here we are: the final episode of Day of the Dead entitled “Choke on ‘Em“. Over the course of the season, we’ve been building towards what should be a huge climax, and I’ve been increasingly curious to see how the writers would bring all of these characters, mysteries and storylines together. More importantly, given that this would ultimately become the first and only season of the series, I wanted to see whether they could provide a satisfying conclusion.
The short answer is… alright, I suppose. It’s not terrible, but it doesn’t have the impact I was hoping for. After some of the slower episodes earlier in the season, I was expecting the finale to really let loose and deliver something spectacular. Instead, it feels more like the show is trying to get the major plotlines wrapped up within the time it has left.
There are some genuinely good ideas, though. One of my favourites involves Rhodes being placed on a truck and used to draw the zombies away from the inhabited areas. It’s an entertaining concept and immediately brought Mad Max: Fury Road to mind. It gives the finale one of those ridiculous-but-fun images that this version of Day of the Dead has occasionally been good at delivering.
The action, gore and effects continue in much the same way as they have throughout the season. When the show gets the opportunity to let the characters loose with some suitably ridiculous weapons, it remains great fun. From time to time the main characters are given increasingly cool and brutal ways of dispatching the undead, and those sequences do provide the entertainment value without the sheen of a big budget production but it has carried the series through some of its weaker dramatic moments.
Unfortunately, the limitations of the production become even more apparent as the action ramps up. Some of the special effects are decidedly ropey, with the gunfire being a particular example. The muzzle flashes and other effects become increasingly budget-looking as the episode progresses, and when you’re watching a supposedly large-scale climax, those limitations are difficult to overlook. Even so, I have to give the production some credit. There is clearly a lot of effort and energy being thrown into this episode. The filmmakers are trying to make the finale feel bigger than the series has previously managed, and while they don’t always succeed, the enthusiasm is certainly there.
The actual conclusion is where things become considerably less impressive. Much of the climax takes place inside a cave, and not just any cave, but a very darkly lit cave where a large number of zombies are ultimately entombed. I suppose it’s good to have the show circle back for the finale, however, it’s a strange choice particularly when you consider the scale of the outbreak we’ve supposedly witnessed. This is a small town experiencing a zombie apocalypse, yet by the time we reach the climax, it feels as though only a handful of zombies are actually making their way into this cave.
Again, this is almost certainly a consequence of the budget. You can’t expect a television production of this scale to suddenly produce hundreds of convincing zombies. But it does create a disconnect between what the story tells us is happening and what we actually see on screen. The apocalypse feels considerably smaller than it should.
The emotional side of the finale doesn’t fare much better. Given that the series has struggled with its dramatic material throughout the season, it probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that the emotional reunions and farewells don’t quite land. Characters are brought together, characters say goodbye, and we’re clearly supposed to feel the weight of what has happened, but the show hasn’t always given these relationships enough time to develop properly.
The ending itself does leave the door open for another season, although there’s also enough resolution here for it to function as a once-and-done story as we currently have. There’s a slightly tacky cliffhanger attached to the final moments, and a few storylines were left open to perhaps give the writers somewhere to go if the series were renewed or picked up elsewhere.
I’ve said it before but I can’t help wondering whether the production team had already realised that renewal was unlikely and were simply trying to round everything off enough to leave a reasonably complete package behind. And perhaps that’s the biggest disappointment. I started this series with very low expectations and was genuinely surprised by how much I enjoyed the opening episodes. Episode 4 in particular gave me hope that Day of the Dead might turn into something considerably better than its reputation suggested. There were some great ideas, entertaining characters, decent gore and an obvious willingness to have fun with the material.
Unfortunately, the second half of the season gradually lost some of that energy. The character drama became increasingly prominent without being very strong, the mythology never quite developed into anything substantial, and the pacing became inconsistent. By the time we reached the finale, I was still interested in seeing how everything ended, but the excitement I had built up earlier in the season had largely disappeared.
So, where does that leave Day of the Dead (2021)?
Ultimately, it’s an average television adaptation that is nowhere near as terrible as its reputation suggests. I really can’t emphasise that enough. If you go into this expecting a television remake of Romero’s 1985 Day of the Dead, then you’re probably going to hate it. But that’s not really what this is. The series borrows elements from the wider Day of the Dead mythology, most notably the Bub-inspired character, but otherwise feels much closer to a modernised Dawn of the Dead-style zombie story, with the action taking place in a living community rather than Romero’s bunker. The angle I liked from Day of the Dead 2: Contagium (2004).
And I actually think that was the right approach. Keeping the story out in the wider world gives the series considerably more room to breathe than simply attempting to recreate the military bunker of the original, as we saw in Day of the Dead (2008) and Day of the Dead: Bloodlines (2019). It allows different characters to experience the outbreak in different ways and gives the show opportunities for humour, action and some occasionally inventive zombie situations.
It just doesn’t always execute those ideas particularly well. There are budget limitations, some questionable effects, uneven acting, clunky action choreography, inconsistent pacing and dramatic material that often feels underwritten. But there’s also enthusiasm, practical gore, some likeable characters and a genuine attempt to do something different with a familiar name.
Would I watch it again? Probably not. Do I regret watching it? Not at all. And that’s probably the fairest conclusion I can give. Day of the Dead (2021) isn’t a hidden classic, and it certainly doesn’t deserve to stand alongside Romero’s original trilogy. But neither is it the disaster that some of the online reaction would have you believe. It’s an okay zombie television series that occasionally rises above its limitations and occasionally falls well below them.
What we actually get is a fairly straightforward attempt to modernise the concept for television and introduce the zombie apocalypse to a contemporary audience. It doesn’t completely come together in the end, but it gets there well enough. And for a show that I initially expected to be a complete waste of time, that’s not the worst outcome in the world.
A Blu-ray of Day of the Dead: Season One was released by Dazzler, with the three-disc set arriving in January 2022 and containing all ten episodes of the first season of the US horror series inspired by George A. Romero’s film. It’s a fairly bare-bones release, with the only real extra being a trailer, although a small booklet is also included.
The series itself arrived rather unceremoniously on DVD and Blu-ray, accompanied by an advertising campaign proudly proclaiming it to be “inspired by Romero’s 1995 masterpiece” which is quite an achievement, considering that 1995 was actually the year The Dark Half was released, and ten years after Day of the Dead first arrived in cinemas. Quite how that particular piece of marketing made it through the approval process is anyone’s guess.
