[0:00] Welcome to the Heavy Spoilers Show. 
I'm your host, Paul. In this video,  
[0:03] we're breaking down Day of the Dead. [music]
[0:10] Released 7 years after Dawn, George A. 
Romero's Day of the Dead brings us back  
[0:15] to the zombie apocalypse. Whereas the previous 
two movies focused on the zombies taking over,  
[0:19] we're at the point now where they outnumber 
the humans. We don't really know what's left of  
[0:23] humanity, but what remains scrambles to survive in 
an underground bunker. Now, while this is widely  
[0:28] considered the worst of Romero's dead films, I 
actually still think h it's quite good. Just had  
[0:33] a tall order following two of the greatest horror 
movies of all time. And though it was slammed at  
[0:37] the time, I think people have grown to appreciate 
it. There's a lot to like here, and Day of the  
[0:42] Dead brings the social commentary of the first two 
films full circle and leaves us with some really  
[0:47] cool and thought-provoking ideas. Throughout this 
video, we're going to be breaking down all the  
[0:51] hidden details and symbolism layered throughout 
the film and try and bring some justice to this  
[0:55] misunderstood classic. If you enjoy it, please 
hit the thumbs up and also check out our Night  
[0:59] of the Living Dead inspired ship below. We also 
have our Misfit inspired Skeletor one along with  
[1:04] our obsession one as well. There's lots of shirts 
on there, too. And we also have some big sales  
[1:08] as well that will help videos like this get made, 
so thank you if you picked one up. Now, before we  
[1:13] get into the movie itself, we have to talk about 
some of the behind-the-scenes drama that led to  
[1:17] the final version of the film. This played into 
the overall ending and pretty much affected the  
[1:22] reaction to the film. So, pay attention. Get off 
your phone. What do you mean you're watching it  
[1:26] on your phone? Either way, when George A. Romero 
sold Dawn of the United Film Distribution Company,  
[1:31] he was unfortunately locked into a three-picture 
deal. Now, despite Dawn of the Dead's massive  
[1:35] success, Romero was in no rush to make a sequel. 
Even against the pressure, but with both Night and  
[1:41] Dawn being heavily layered with Romero's views on 
society during the time they were made, he liked  
[1:45] the idea of revisiting the zombie genre every 
decade to reflect on how we all live in a society.  
[1:51] Instead of doing another zombie film immediately, 
Romero then made Night Riders in 1981, and this  
[1:56] was followed by Creep Show alongside Stephen King 
in 1982. Now, this was mainly because this is just  
[2:02] what he wanted to do, despite everyone wanting a 
zombie movie. I actually think a lot of Romero's  
[2:07] films didn't get the love they deserved until much 
later on. And while some of them are admittedly a  
[2:12] miss, you've got to respect the dude's love for 
the game and willingness to take risks. However,  
[2:17] yeah, Nightriders was a flop despite its high 
budget and Creep Show was owned by Warner  
[2:21] Brothers. So, those guys took the majority of 
the profits. This left Romero and his company  
[2:26] with virtually nothing. And the sad thing is 
they didn't even Warner Brother. But yeah,  
[2:31] because of this, the studio were like, uh, no more 
passion projects. So, basically, he was forced to  
[2:36] go back to the dead series and at first struggle 
to really get an idea of what day would be. Due to  
[2:42] the rights, he also wasn't allowed to use any of 
the same characters from Dawn. So he couldn't just  
[2:47] pick up where they left off with Bran and Peter 
flying away in the helicopter. However, this was  
[2:51] the 80s, baby, meaning there was no shortage 
of political issues for Romero to pull from.  
[2:57] The US was in the height of the Reagan era. The 
AIDS epidemic was sweeping the nation. The Cold  
[3:02] War was getting red-hot and the war on drugs was 
devastating communities. Romero saw how society's  
[3:07] ability to trust each other, specifically 
the government, had only gotten worse since  
[3:11] tackling the theme in Dawn. And thus he focused 
on a small group of people conflicting with the  
[3:15] government. The now playing podcast described it 
as gone with the wind with zombies with it being a  
[3:20] gigantic tale that would cost $7 million. It was 
going to have thousands and thousands of extras  
[3:26] take place across massive locations and yeah going 
to be the biggest zombie movie of all time. $7  
[3:32] million as well. You know that that was completely 
unheard of for a horror film. Uh but the studio  
[3:36] thus wanted to ensure that the movie would receive 
an R. However, Romero wanted it to be unrated.  
[3:42] The podcast then kind of talked about the dilemma 
he was in and how he could either get more money  
[3:46] to make their movie or less money and go and 
make his own, which ultimately he opted for,  
[3:51] but this forced Romero to rewrite the script and 
eliminate most of the big action sequences and set  
[3:56] locations, which is why most of the film is set in 
a cave. And yeah, I remember seeing the movie for  
[4:01] the first time and thinking, uh, this is rather 
small. The original script, though, was reportedly  
[4:06] around 200 pages long with a final version coming 
in at just 88. We'll talk more about how this  
[4:11] ultimately screwed Romero in the end, but the 
director maintained that while he had to scrap  
[4:15] a lot of the script, the revised version still 
captured the essence of what he was going for.  
[4:20] And he did actually say that day is his favorite 
of the Dead series. Not sure I agree, George, but  
[4:25] hey, let's give it another shot and break down the 
movie. Now, we open with a wide shot of a woman  
[4:30] sitting with her head down in a bare white room. 
This is similar to the walls of an insane asylum,  
[4:34] and it represents the fear and isolation that we 
see the survivors experience throughout the film.  
[4:38] Romero also used a similar shot to open up Dawn 
with France sleeping in a newsroom with the carpet  
[4:43] resembling blood. We get formally introduced in a 
moment, but this is our main character Sarah who's  
[4:47] played by Linda Cardile. Linda is actually the 
daughter of Bill Cardile aka Chili Billy. And in  
[4:52] case you don't remember, he was a news reporter 
and host of the Chiller Theater in Pittsburgh.  
[4:56] And he also played a news reporter in Night of 
the Living Dead. So yeah, bit of nepotism there,  
[5:01] but I know Linda's acting gets slammed quite a lot 
in the reviews. H. But I actually think Sarah's a  
[5:05] great example of how far Romero's come in writing 
female characters, especially when you compare  
[5:10] her to Barbara from Night. Sarah then looks a 
bit of calendar on the wall and it shows the  
[5:15] date as October 31st. What a way to celebrate 
Halloween. Now, the air isn't specified, but  
[5:20] the original script says day takes place 5 years 
after dawn, which was in 1978. We'll circle back  
[5:26] to this date more in just a bit because it does 
become important later on. air but the movie was  
[5:30] actually released on Tuesday October 1st and with 
most people probably watching it around Halloween  
[5:35] I can imagine at the time they were doing the Leo 
pointing meme at the screen. November 1st is also  
[5:41] celebrated as All Saints Day and November 2nd 
is considered All Souls Day. However, the period  
[5:46] between the 31st and November 2nd is also known 
as the Day of the Dead. So the day of the dead is  
[5:52] happening on the day of the dead. In real life, 
this is a celebration in which people honor the  
[5:56] dead and welcome their return, which is basically 
what happens with the zombies. As Sarah walks  
[6:01] towards the calendar, she then becomes fixated on 
the picture of people farming pumpkins above the  
[6:05] dates. This is her most likely remembering what 
life was like before the zombies took over, and  
[6:11] according to the law, she was actually a pumpkin 
farmer. She then touches the picture and were  
[6:15] hit with a jump scare of zombie hands bursting 
out the wall. This symbolizes how that sort of  
[6:20] life's no longer possible and that everyone will 
inevitably become part of the undead. It's a super  
[6:25] cool effect as well that basically starts off the 
movie and it's it's since been mimicked in lots  
[6:30] of different films. How shooting it was a complete 
disaster and all the zombie actors behind the fake  
[6:35] wall broke right through and fell on top of Linda. 
Her husband was apparently there as well to make  
[6:40] sure that nobody ced a feel. And uh yeah, when 
you've got arms grabbing through walls, you cheeky  
[6:44] bastards in Hollywood, I know what you're like. 
you. All these are getting cancelled. Now, we then  
[6:49] cut to Sarah in a helicopter and see it was all a 
dream. In the helicopter, we see Sarah is joined  
[6:54] by a fellow soldier, Miguel, who's clearly already 
losing it. He's tightly gripping a religious  
[6:59] necklace around his neck, which is the first time 
we really see some of the religious undertones  
[7:03] that are scattered throughout the film. Joining 
them are also John and McDermott. And I'll say it  
[7:08] now, best characters in the movie. Them sitting 
around drinking and chilling is exactly what I'd  
[7:13] be doing. In the intro, they basically say they're 
just there to do their jobs as pilots and we'll  
[7:18] leave both of them behind without a second thought 
if there's any sign of trouble. They even argue  
[7:22] that touching down isn't in their contract. But 
yeah, you kind of wonder what contracts are even  
[7:28] worth in this world. Also really like how Romero 
introduces us to our main group of survivors in  
[7:33] a helicopter, which calls back to how Dawn ended 
with Bran and Peter flying away in one. And while  
[7:37] we don't see um where either of those characters 
ended up, it does feel like a nice way to pick  
[7:42] up on where we left off and show how things have 
progressed from dawn in today. Also, I love the  
[7:47] score here and I think it's some of the best music 
in all the films. I actually sampled this on the  
[7:51] Gorilla's first album and I know that because 
that was the first CD I ever bought. It really  
[7:56] adds to the atmosphere though and I love as they 
hit the streets and we hear that. Hello. [music]
[8:07] just echoes through the empty sidewalks and 
skyscrapers. And you might notice the locations  
[8:12] notably different to Pittsburgh. That's what we've 
come to associate with Romero's zombie films,  
[8:17] but this was actually shot in Florida, which 
is where everyone goes to retire to, which  
[8:21] is pretty much how they end the movie. That also 
explains why there's alligators. And beyond that,  
[8:26] we have skeletons rotting in the street and 
a newspaper that reads, "The dead walk while  
[8:30] money lines the stairs to the bank." This is such 
a subtle way to show that society has collapsed  
[8:35] and that money and everything we once thought had 
value now mean absolutely nothing. It's a parallel  
[8:40] to how money and consumerism meant everything to 
the survivors in Dawn. And this is what ultimately  
[8:45] led to the zombies reclaiming them all. Now, if 
you zoom in on the newspaper as well, you can also  
[8:49] see various headlines alluding to this complete 
collapse. There's one that reads, "Whereabouts of  
[8:54] President Unknown, food supply dwindles, and man 
bites man." We are then introduced to our first  
[8:59] zombie, the incredibly handsome Dr. the tongue. 
He's one of the coolest zombies in the entire  
[9:04] film and just the perfect first one to show us 
how far the effects have come. These aren't just  
[9:10] people wandering around covered in blue paint. 
They're now grotesque and hideous. Now, Dr.  
[9:14] Tongue is actually a head mold of effects artist 
Tom Ceini, which he accidentally ripped the jaw  
[9:19] off of when trying to drill a hole into the face. 
This resulted in them going with the tongue gag  
[9:23] and then mechanizing the eyes to move around and 
blink. Dr. Tongue was also a hand puppet, which  
[9:28] I don't know why, but that makes it even more 
unsettling. Now, let's also take a moment to talk  
[9:32] about horror master Tom Cevini as he really pulled 
out all the stops here. After Dawn of the Dead,  
[9:37] Cevi really blew up and he honed his expertise 
doing Friday the 13 part one and 1984's the  
[9:43] final chapter. Looking to top his previous work 
and really shock people, Cevini and his crew of  
[9:48] fellow artists and friends took up a shop in his 
garage and just started pumping out prosthetics,  
[9:53] head molds, and zombie appliances for months 
on end. Many consider this as Savini's best  
[9:57] work to this day as well. And yeah, when 
we get to the more brutal scenes later on,  
[10:01] he does some incredible work. We then see the 
other zombies coming out of the woodwork, and this  
[10:05] includes two dudes who sort of push the alligator 
down the stairs. Now, this was, of course, a real  
[10:10] life alligator, and the two zombies following it 
were animal wranglers who brought it to the set.  
[10:15] As the zombies make their way to the sound, we 
can see just how many of them there are. Miguel,  
[10:20] in comparison, is just one guy, and it cements 
how much they outnumber the living. Now,  
[10:24] while this wasn't shot in Pittsburgh, Romero still 
used the same casting agency he used for Dawn of  
[10:28] the Dead and specifically requested that all the 
extras be called. There were also just a shitload  
[10:33] of people who happily showed up to be a zombie in 
the new Romero film, and they had no shortage of  
[10:38] volunteers. Like Dawn, they all did it for the 
love of the game. As they were all paid with a  
[10:42] hat that said, "I played a zombie in Day of the 
Dead, a copy of the newspaper signed by Romero,  
[10:47] and a crisp $1 bill." The dead silence of the 
radio is then drowned out by the cries of the  
[10:52] undead, and thus they realize there's no one left 
to rescue. The group then go back to their base,  
[10:57] which we learn is an underground bunker operated 
by the military. Sarah then warns them that if  
[11:01] they refuel a chopper, it'll make a hell of a 
lot of noise, and this will attract more zombies,  
[11:05] which foreshadows some stuff for the ending. We 
then see that everyone is just sort of lounging  
[11:10] around with one dude keeping morale high by 
tending to his weed farm. When all else is gone,  
[11:15] 420 survives. blaze that as they say if my mom's 
watching now. No one really knows what to do. And  
[11:22] though they found a way to stay alive alongside 
the zombies, there's no real plan of where to go  
[11:27] from here. We'll see how this inevitably leads to 
them turning on each other throughout the film.  
[11:31] And with zombies becoming more human, you do get 
the feeling that the humans are going extinct,  
[11:36] kind of like the Neanderthal. That means you're 
a caveman, [ __ ] You're a [ __ ] throwback. As  
[11:42] Sarah tries to get Miguel out of the chopper, we 
can see he's still having some kind of existential  
[11:47] crisis and he snaps at Sarah for trying to help 
him. Now, Miguel is a very interesting character  
[11:52] because while he's shown as completely off his 
rocker from the jump, he's actually kind of  
[11:57] the most sane person in there. In this scene, he 
says it's insane that everyone's acting normal  
[12:02] and that it's kind of crazy how calm everyone 
is. And yeah, I mean, he's totally right. What  
[12:08] they are doing is insane and will ultimately be 
pointless. But everyone else still scrambles to  
[12:13] maintain some sort of resemblance to what life was 
like before and the hopes they can have it again.  
[12:18] Even the fact as well that Sarah is dreaming about 
calendars with farmers on, it just shows she hopes  
[12:23] that things can get back to normal. Miguel is the 
only one who seems to fully grasp the situation,  
[12:28] accepting that the world will no longer exist and 
that there's no way back, which is terrifying.  
[12:33] We'll see how this theme applies to each 
character throughout the film. But one last detail  
[12:37] here is that Miguel is played by Tim Deleo. He 
was actually Romero's best friend in Pittsburgh.  
[12:41] And yeah, being friends with George Romero must 
have been very [ __ ] sweet back in the day cuz  
[12:47] you were guaranteed a gig. I will be in the next 
zombie movie. Before going down in the bunker,  
[12:52] Sarah then notices a fresh pile of graves on the 
base. And we learn from one of the soldiers that  
[12:56] the leader of the operation died while they were 
at that was Major Cooper. And now the change of  
[13:01] power is basically what causes further division. 
Major Cooper, he died this morning. [music]  
[13:08] And then there were 12. I did wonder as well if 
this was playing in the religious themes with it  
[13:13] being tied to the 12 disciples. You also see 
all the zombies surrounding the base outside  
[13:17] a chainlink fence playing in the symbolism of 
how this is not a safe haven but instead just a  
[13:22] prison. We also get some foreshadowing for their 
fate and how they decide to just go and find an  
[13:27] island. Let's get in a whirly bird there. Find us 
an island someplace. Get juiced up and spend what  
[13:33] time we got left soaking up some sunshine. The 
group then heads into the bunker and we get our  
[13:37] first look at where they've been spending the 
apocalypse. This was shot in the Wampen mine,  
[13:41] Pennsylvania, which Romero just sort of knew 
about and decided to use when he had to confine  
[13:46] his script at the bunker. Previously, it had 
been used as a bomb shelter, an underground  
[13:50] storage facility where they held old Hollywood 
negatives, um, boats from the harsh winter,  
[13:56] and government supplies. The other scenes of the 
hallways, cafeteria, and lab were all part of the  
[14:00] management facility within the mine, and the crew 
basically utilized the entire thing. The mine was  
[14:05] so big, it even had a mileong lake underground 
where the crew would [ __ ] around and go swimming  
[14:10] with headlamps in. They also never found the end 
of the mine despite numerous little excursions  
[14:15] while filming. Romero even joked that the Morlocks 
could live in the deeper parts of the cave, and  
[14:19] a bunch of people got pretty sick from basically 
being trapped there for 3 months. And yeah, when  
[14:24] they have all the crap down there in the air, 
and even the bats, uh, you can understand how  
[14:28] you'd get sick. Like, at one point, we even see 
a bat scaring John. And I did wonder if that was  
[14:33] a real one, cuz there's a couple of bits where 
they're just flying around in the background.  
[14:37] The conditions were so rough, though, that 
they actually had a guy called Dr. Feelgood,  
[14:41] who would come in and shoot them up with B12. This 
was cuz they basically didn't see sunlight the  
[14:45] entire time they were shooting, as they'd start 
at 6:00 a.m. and then work until the night. Yeah,  
[14:50] pretty rough stuff. But let's get back to how 
these people are holding up in this neverending  
[14:54] hell hole. As the group return to the safety of 
the bunker, we're introduced to Seals and Rickles,  
[14:59] who I used to call BBop and Rock Steady. They take 
Sarah and Miguel to go and wrangle up some of the  
[15:03] zombies wandering the cave. And as they make their 
way to the zombie pen, we can also see a bunch of  
[15:09] cars and boats that were stored in the mine that 
we mentioned before. And I like to think some guy  
[15:14] in Pittsburgh watched this movie and saw how his 
boat was getting smashed up and thought, "What the  
[15:18] fuck?" This shows the 15th as the last time you 
took any out. That can't be right. Oh yeah, we  
[15:24] forget to write them up sometimes. You know, this 
also highlights that the standards are getting  
[15:27] sloppier and that the soldiers are losing their 
order due to the pointlessness of what they're  
[15:31] doing, which will eventually cause their downfall. 
It's essential. Then go to a makeshift pen, which  
[15:37] they use to capture the zombies and then deliver 
them to Dr. Logan, aka Frankenstein. Ricklesa  
[15:43] makes an off-hand comment about how they're scared 
of what Dr. Frankenstein will do to them. Scared.  
[15:50] You know what'll happen when Frankenstein 
gets him? Sarah says this indicates that  
[15:53] they're actually learning, foreshadowing Dr. 
Frankenstein's greatest creation, who we'll  
[15:58] meet later on. And he's the best character in 
the movie as well. I know I've said that before,  
[16:02] but I really mean it this time. But this is a 
major theme of the movie. However, I want to point  
[16:06] out how Romero portrays the zombies here compared 
to the humans. Romero presents the zombies here  
[16:11] as sad and helpless, which juxtaposes the living 
who are shown as violent, unprepared, and just  
[16:16] overall pieces of [ __ ] Come on, you piss braves. 
[screaming] What the hell's the matter with you?  
[16:21] This reminds me a lot of how Romero similarly 
introduces zombies during the tenement scene in  
[16:25] Dawn of the Dead. Here we have a similar situation 
where the zombies pose no immediate threat,  
[16:30] but it's the human stupidity and inability to work 
together that puts them in danger. This cemens how  
[16:35] we are the real threat to our own survival. 
As Steel and Rickles continue being idiots,  
[16:39] they capture one of the zombies, but we can 
clearly see Miguel is definitely not in the right  
[16:44] state of mind to be doing this. Guy's just being 
exhausted and forced to do this mission when,  
[16:48] you know, someone smart would have been like, 
"H, maybe don't take him on the job. He's just  
[16:52] going to [ __ ] it up." And [ __ ] it up he does. 
Miguel lets go of the noose that's holding the  
[16:57] zombie and it almost gets rickles. Fortunately or 
unfortunately, depending on how you look at it,  
[17:02] Sarah's able to grab the pole before it gets to 
him and she gets the situation under control.  
[17:06] Steel is furious though and he holds Miguel over 
the pen, but Sarah brings down the temperature.  
[17:11] It again shows that she's the only one in control 
and easily the most competent in the bunker.  
[17:16] Knowing she'll probably do it, Steel then lets him 
down and they take their rage out on the zombies  
[17:21] by torturing them. And honestly, they look more 
terrified than anyone. This is showcased with the  
[17:26] reaction of the woman zombie as she doesn't 
sound scared, but instead is just desperate.
[17:36] You can even see her look at her fellow zombie 
almost as if she needs comfort. It's a really  
[17:41] cool and subtle way Romero starts to make us 
sympathize with the zombies and it emphasizes  
[17:45] how they work together while we stay divided. We 
then meet back up with Sarah and Miguel where she  
[17:50] tries to convince him to take a sedative so he 
can chill the [ __ ] out. How about Miguel is  
[17:54] pissed that she made him look like a fool in the 
zombie pen and then slaps the [ __ ] out of her  
[17:58] not once but twice. [ __ ] piece of [ __ ] 
Now, he's clearly an absolute mess. And he  
[18:03] then breaks down in her arms, which allows 
her to stab him in the back. [snorts]
[18:10] And god damn, Sarah can just not catch a break 
here. I think it shows how caring that Sarah is  
[18:15] though, as even after being abused, she still 
wants to help him. As we later learn, the pair  
[18:20] are boyfriend and girlfriend. But you kind of get 
the feeling that they've kind of lost the love.  
[18:27] And if you thought the slap seemed a bit harsh, 
well, that's because Lori told the actor to  
[18:31] actually slap her so it looked authentic. Now, we 
then meet the rest of the military chuckleheads  
[18:36] along with the scientist Fisher. He's played 
by John Amplers, who also starred in Romero's  
[18:40] 1977 film Martin. The pair had a long professional 
relationship and he cameoed in most of his films.  
[18:46] This is also where we meet Captain Rhodess, 
who's taken over command of this clown show.  
[18:50] This gives us another fun detail in Romero 
Zombie verse, as Roads is played by Joseph  
[18:55] Pedo. If you cast your mind, you cast your mind 
way back back into time back to Dawn of the Dead.  
[18:59] H also played a police officer there. Thus, many 
believe that Plato is playing the same character  
[19:04] and that Road survived and made it out to this 
position. However, this theory is unfortunately  
[19:09] a bust as the credits of Dawn of the Dead, Plato's 
character being Randy Kovitz. But yeah, I'll let  
[19:14] people have their fun with theories. I [ __ ] 
love it. But the real reason that was recast for  
[19:18] day was that Romero used the same talent agency 
as Dawn and George thought he was just a really  
[19:24] good actor. pretty cut and dry, but I still like 
to pretend it's the same character. One thing I  
[19:29] will point out as well that kind of supports 
the theory is that we can see Roads wears the  
[19:33] same type of ring that Roger wore in Dawn of the 
Dead. According to IMBB trivia, this was Roger's  
[19:38] Police Academy ring, and this would fit with 
Roads being the same character from Dawn since  
[19:42] they both were members of the Philadelphia Police 
Department. However, it's most likely that they  
[19:46] just used the same prop for Roads, uh, because 
they had it at hand at the time. But I will never  
[19:51] forget those theory times I had over the years. 
Major Cooper, promise. Major Cooper is dead.  
[19:59] I'm in command now. Fisher then tries to advocate 
for more sanitary equipment for him and Dr.  
[20:04] Frankenstein's equipment, but Roads doesn't give a 
[ __ ] about any of that nerd stuff. He's not even  
[20:08] sure if they need any of the civilians in general 
and demands that they get results. I'm not so sure  
[20:13] we need you at all. [ __ ] a. I'm not even sure 
just what the hell it is you're doing in there.  
[20:20] Sarah then tries to tell him about how Miguel's 
completely lost it, but Roads again doesn't seem  
[20:25] to give a [ __ ] and just says they should lock 
him up. Roads then says he might just cut their  
[20:30] little love affair short so that the rest of 
the guys can have their way with her. This is  
[20:33] explored more in stuff like 28 Days Later and you 
do kind of wonder how a lone woman would fare in  
[20:38] these situations. It shows how the military 
are the real threat though, not the zombies.  
[20:43] Not only is road super creepy, but we see he's 
also fully willing to put his and other lives  
[20:48] at risk by not taking Miguel off active duty, 
despite just saying that he's sick of losing men  
[20:53] due to the scientist's little project. Like, the 
dude's so focused on being an [ __ ] that he can't  
[20:57] recognize Miguel's incompetence puts them all at 
risk. One thing I also want to point out is notice  
[21:02] how Roads is the only one who's clean shaven. He 
still dresses in full uniform just like me and  
[21:08] is trying to hold on to some semblance of order 
because that's what keeps him in power. He even  
[21:13] barks orders at the others and doesn't like any 
sign of disrespect. Yes, sir. [ __ ] you, sir.  
[21:20] This is such a great line as well, and you can 
see how it sits with roads. You better watch  
[21:25] yourself. I mean, physically watch yourself. All 
the guys know Sarah is in danger, though. But she  
[21:30] remains hopeful that they can knock some sense 
into the others. This shows she's the only one  
[21:35] willing to play ball and find some common ground. 
Everyone seems to just keep to their clicks,  
[21:40] but she's the only one who interacts with all the 
factions. This is why she'll be one of the only  
[21:44] characters to make it out of here alive. As though 
the pilots don't really give a crap about any of  
[21:49] this [ __ ] She's able to connect with them and 
thus they start to trust her. This parallels how  
[21:54] the disintegration of trust in society has turned 
people against each other and this prevents them  
[21:59] from working towards their common interest. Here, 
Romero shows how this fundamental lack of trust  
[22:03] in society extends to even those in charge who 
are meant to lead and protect us, but are unable  
[22:09] to see the bigger picture and work together. 
We're then introduced to Dr. Frankenstein,  
[22:13] who's working away in his lab and reviewing 
his data. As Sarah walks into the room,  
[22:17] we can see him surrounded by his experiments. It's 
a gory scene with him covered in blood and bodies  
[22:23] dissected on tables. A zombie even has most of 
its head cut off with just the brain remaining,  
[22:28] which we can't show because of YouTube. But it's 
very very horrible. I think the way as well that  
[22:33] we're introduced to the character, it kind of 
shows that Frankenstein's the real monster.  
[22:37] And that's a bit of Frankenstein subtext for 
you there, mate. Upon coming in, Sarah is almost  
[22:43] grabbed by Bob and we learn a lot more about 
him later on. How about notice how he doesn't  
[22:48] try to go for seconds after initially scaring her. 
Instead, he just kind of stares curiously at her  
[22:53] and almost kind of looks like he's sorry for what 
he's done. The now playing podcast also brought  
[22:58] up how he might even be sending up the Eddie's 
fascination with characters like Gizmo and ET.  
[23:02] They kind of um got dropped amongst humans and 
did very cute things like playing on music,  
[23:07] hitting the thumbs up and ultimately were just 
cute, goofy, and fun. Bob is kind of played up  
[23:13] in the same sort of way in a horror sense. Um 
with him kind of being a grotesque version of that  
[23:18] Frankenstein then goes into a bunch of sciency 
mumbo jumbo about how the zombies function.  
[23:23] I'll spare you uh the fancy scientific explanation 
of how the brain works, but he basically says that  
[23:28] the zombies decay attacks the parts of the brain 
that give us cognitive function. This leaves  
[23:32] only the primal instinct located deep in the 
core of our brains. He then kind of talks about  
[23:37] um that being the central prehistoric jelly that 
we inherited from reptiles. And while that still  
[23:42] doesn't really answer what caused this decay 
to happen, I think Romero's explanation here  
[23:47] um of the virus in general is actually quite 
fascinating to me. Romero's implying that the  
[23:52] violence and brutality that humans are driven 
by is a result of humanity's primal instinct  
[23:57] to hurt each other. As Dr. Frankenstein puts 
it, that is inherently within us all and has  
[24:02] led to our demise. It calls back to that infamous 
line in Dawn, "When there's no more room in hell,  
[24:09] the dead will walk the earth." That was to show 
how we've been so bad and sinful to one another  
[24:15] that hell was now filled to the brim. If we 
keep being evil, then hell shall be filled,  
[24:19] and it makes the zombie apocalypse inevitable. 
Yay. Frankenstein then continues to explain how  
[24:25] the zombies don't need blood or internal organs 
in order to maintain motor functions. Their desire  
[24:29] for human flesh is purely instinctual. This is 
when he reveals the brain guy. And little fun fact  
[24:35] here, uh, Cevini and the crew call this guy Moose 
[ __ ] No, I am not joking. The effect is not only  
[24:40] one of my favorites, though, but Ceini also pulled 
it off by using a real actor whose head went  
[24:45] through a hole in the table, and they then glued 
the moose [ __ ] to his neck. He's not credited,  
[24:49] but the actor's name was Barry Grass, who I 
couldn't really find much information on. But  
[24:54] shout out to that dude cuz you can see in some of 
the behind the scenes footage that he was gasping  
[24:58] for air, trapped under moose [ __ ] and unable to 
move for nearly an entire day. And I've given you  
[25:03] a big applause for the dedication to the craft. 
Back to Dr. Frankenstein. And he then shows that  
[25:08] despite the zombie no longer having its primal 
instinct at the core of its brain, the body's  
[25:13] still able to move. This proves that the zombies 
can still function without the primal instinct to  
[25:17] kill and possibly be taught reason. However, 
Sarah isn't really impressed, and she starts  
[25:22] pointing out how a 15-hour complicated surgery 
that only a few people in the world can do isn't  
[25:27] a practical solution to bringing back humanity. 
But the mad doctor knows that he is getting close  
[25:31] and will potentially create a solution. Sarah 
then kind of sides with the army though and  
[25:35] sees him as trying to define the problem rather 
than cure it. Here we can also see how the theme  
[25:40] of not letting go applies to Frankenstein as 
he's unwilling to accept that humanity's gone  
[25:45] and will stop at nothing to bring it back. Even if 
it's basically an impossible task at this point,  
[25:50] you cannot train every zombie to be Bob. He's 
blinded to the reality though that humanity  
[25:55] is the reason they're in this situation which his 
own science pretty much proves. This calls back to  
[26:00] the question that Romero proposed to us in Dawn 
with logic versus humanity. Do we do the logical  
[26:05] thing and kill the zombies without emotion or 
do we maintain our humanity and figure out a way  
[26:10] to handle the zombies without more violence? We 
saw in Dawn of the Dead how losing our humanity  
[26:15] inevitably leads to more death. And here we see 
Dr. Frankenstein has fully turned away from his  
[26:20] humanity in favor of logic to bring society back. 
This creates a paradox in which him losing his  
[26:25] humanity is what prevents him from solving 
the real problem and saving the human race.  
[26:31] We can see this represented as Sarah says he's 
just going nuts slicing up zombies and notices  
[26:36] one of his experiments just sprawled out on the 
floor, which he just brushes off as a failure that  
[26:41] needed to be destroyed. We then see the full 
extent of how far Frankenstein's willing to  
[26:46] go as Major Koopa's jackets lying on the floor as 
well. And oh my god, Moose [ __ ] is Major Cooper.  
[26:54] Sarah's of course terrified though because if the 
grunts find out, they're going to probably kill  
[26:58] them. We then get another one of the doctor's 
[ __ ] up projects which tries to get up off  
[27:03] the operating table. He then just spills his guts 
all over the floor and then the doctor just drills  
[27:08] into his head. And yeah, it's just a horror show 
uh where he's not really making any progress. But  
[27:15] you're just proving theories that were advanced 
months ago. Now, for the shot of the zombie's guts  
[27:19] spilling onto the floor, Sini, of course, used 
real pig guts because, as he says, nothing is  
[27:24] as good or splatters like the real thing. The pig 
intestines were then shoved into a fake torso and  
[27:29] wrapped together with a fake rubber intestine so 
that when the actor turned, the real guts would  
[27:33] then slide down the rubber one and splatter out 
onto the ground. If you think that's bad, just  
[27:38] wait until you see how bad it gets when they try 
the same effect with roads later. Bob then recalls  
[27:43] in terror seeing the driller as well and it shows 
that the creatures feel fear. We then cut back to  
[27:48] the cafeteria where everyone is once again sitting 
around arguing. Also love how you can see Terry  
[27:53] Alexander almost crack up laughing as McDermott 
tells Steel to [ __ ] off about his drinking. Pay  
[27:58] close attention and you'll notice he puts his hand 
over his mouth not to break character, but I seen  
[28:03] it. I'll have to lay off the [ __ ] booze, Steel, 
cuz there won't [ __ ] be any of it [ __ ] left.  
[28:10] McDermott then comes to the chilling realization 
that they are probably the only ones left.  
[28:14] In what's also a little nod to Dawn, he also 
says and all the shopping malls are closed.  
[28:20] You also get a quick cameo from Greg Nicotero. In 
case you don't know, he's a special effects artist  
[28:24] who was the protege of Ceini and went on to become 
a horror legend in his own right. Nicotero is the  
[28:29] mastermind behind the effects for The Evil Dead 2 
from Dusk till Dawn and also The Walking Dead. The  
[28:34] effects there are, of course, a massive evolution 
of this, and we also see him pop up later as a  
[28:39] head in Dr. Frankenstein's lap. Sick of all the 
men's bickering, Sarah then gets up to leave,  
[28:44] but Roads threatens to have her shot. Sarah 
then calls his bluff, but Roads doesn't back  
[28:49] down and orders Steele to shoot her. Shoot 
that woman. Bang, you're dead. [laughter]  
[28:56] I absolutely love this interaction. As you can 
see, Steel thinks it's all a joke and plays  
[29:01] along while cackling with Rickles. However, he 
quickly realizes it isn't. And yeah, it's such  
[29:06] a tense moment. Realizing this is no longer just a 
regular day at the office and that roads will 100%  
[29:12] kill her, Jon then goes to step in front of Sarah 
to protect her. However, she instead decides to  
[29:16] take his advice and sits back down. Really quickly 
as well, I just want to point out how not only do  
[29:21] we see Jon is willing to step up to protect Sarah, 
but you can also see McDermott go for his gun when  
[29:27] Roads pulls out his. This shows that he's also 
willing to involve himself in this little shootout  
[29:31] to protect her. I love this little character touch 
as well. And despite what they said earlier about  
[29:36] not giving a [ __ ] about anybody else, both Jon 
and McDermad are still willing to put themselves  
[29:41] at risk for someone else. Roads then makes it very 
clear that there will be no more [ __ ] about on  
[29:45] his watch and that they need to start remembering 
they're at war. Fisher then tries to stand up to  
[29:49] Roads, but he riles up his troops by reminding 
them of the men they have lost and that they  
[29:54] should be killing the zombies on site, not keeping 
them as pets. Now, I think one of my big problems  
[29:59] with the script is the fact that we don't really 
get much about Koopa or even how the character  
[30:04] died. I think you'd add so much of the movie if 
we saw the rule under Koopa, how bad that was,  
[30:09] and also had like Roads waiting in the wings and 
just acting like a [ __ ] the whole time. Think if  
[30:15] then you had Cooper die and Roads taking over, 
you'd have a sense of how bad things are going  
[30:20] to be now he's in charge. Out of the frying pan 
into the fire. I thought Cooper was an [ __ ] but  
[30:26] he was a sweetheart next to Roads. Hell, you could 
even have him be the reason for Cooper's death and  
[30:31] show that he's willing to kill even his higherups 
just to get a hold of power. Roads' power trip is  
[30:36] then interrupted by Dr. Frankenstein, who comes in 
saying that they wouldn't be able to kill all the  
[30:40] zombies even if they tried. They now outnumber the 
humans 400,000 to one, which holy [ __ ] they are  
[30:46] [ __ ] Frankenstein then just ignores Roads nearly 
popping a blood vessel in his forehead and sits  
[30:51] down asking if there's any food which is really 
[ __ ] up as well as he's still covered in blood  
[30:56] and we just saw him playing around with brains and 
guts and that clearly did not affect his appetite.  
[31:00] This is a direct contrast to Sarah who nearly 
vomited just seeing his experiments. Further shows  
[31:05] his loss of humanity and yeah the guy has almost 
a ghoulish look to him himself. Roads then starts  
[31:11] going, but Frankenstein's still unfased, and he 
says the situation's hopeless unless they can  
[31:16] control the zombies. Frankenstein tells Roads that 
he believes he can control them, but Sarah tries  
[31:20] to calm down Roads's expectations. If Roads dares 
to look at his research, then there is a chance  
[31:26] he'll see he stole Cooper's body. And based on 
the speech Roads just gave to the group, he would  
[31:30] definitely kill them all, which we see later is 
exactly what he tries to do. So, yeah, good call  
[31:35] Sarah. Frankenstein then basically lays it out 
that they don't have the equipment to reverse the  
[31:40] virus and instead just need to teach them how to 
do tricks and [ __ ] Do a flip, hit the thumbs up,  
[31:45] that sort of thing. Even the way he entered kind 
of shut down the idea that they have the resources  
[31:49] to kill them all. Where does it say we should do 
any one thing but shoot the mothers in the head.  
[31:55] We [ __ ] We don't have enough ammunition, 
Captain, to shoot them all in the head.  
[31:59] Time to have done that would have been at the 
beginning. Now, before we move on, I want to take  
[32:04] this moment to talk about Roads and Joseph Pledo's 
performance in general. This scene in particular  
[32:10] is one that many point to as being super cheesy 
and the actor just going way over the top. Cisco  
[32:16] and Eird even use this scene specifically in their 
scathing review of the film as an example of how  
[32:22] [ __ ] Day of the Dead was. And from the actor's 
point of view, I would think the actors would be  
[32:26] smarter than this. And that is if you start 
screaming in the first scene of the movie,  
[32:31] you have no place to But obviously, you know, 
this is a subjective thing. Um, and maybe it  
[32:35] works for you, maybe it doesn't, but it was how 
Romero intended to portray Roads. He said he  
[32:41] wanted him to be fanatic and that he wasn't really 
sure how far to go with it and seeing how great  
[32:46] was when he would just completely flip his [ __ ] 
Plato even told Romero that he felt it was a bit  
[32:51] too much and did not let him go so over the top, 
but Romero just said that he loved it. Plato  
[32:55] also had his own words for the harsh critics of 
the film as well and even stuck up for Romero.  
[33:00] They were saying I was over the top. I I say no. 
I said this is the point of view. It was like this  
[33:07] is [ __ ] [music] stupid. Kill him. When you're 
dealing with living dead people, uh [laughter]  
[33:15] you got to get a little intense. which is 
actually a really good point. Like imagine, right,  
[33:21] the world is complete [ __ ] and everything and 
everyone is most likely gone. You're humanity's  
[33:26] last line of defense, stuck in a bunker with a 
bunch of scientists that you don't even understand  
[33:31] what they're doing. And then they come to you 
with some [ __ ] about keeping the zombies as pets  
[33:35] and making them do tricks. Like, dude, what the 
[ __ ] Does sound [ __ ] stupid. And you combine  
[33:41] that with a guy who's been taught the only way to 
keep order is through violence. It's not too hard  
[33:45] to imagine that this is how they would react. 
Roads was right. I say roads is also incapable  
[33:50] of accepting their situation and believes that it 
can be solved by violence and brute force because  
[33:55] that's how the military's always done it. He sees 
them as being at war and thinks that the only way  
[34:00] to win is by crushing the other side. He views 
everything with a military mind state. We can even  
[34:05] see this in just the way he talks as he doesn't 
say he's going to kill everyone, but instead will  
[34:09] court marshall them. They get court marshaled. The 
government is gone, my dude. Who's going to court  
[34:15] marshall them? They literally just talked how 
society's basically gone, but Roads still falls  
[34:20] back on his military orders and doesn't recognize 
how silly he sounds. Last thing as well before  
[34:24] moving on, Sarah also mentions here how there 
could be survivors in Washington because they have  
[34:30] more sophisticated shelters. This foreshadows the 
protected city states we see in 2005's Land of the  
[34:34] Dead. Um, which is basically just picking up the 
idea of the original dropped ones for day, even  
[34:40] though it came out like 20 years later. And to 
me, this has always just been a trilogy. I don't  
[34:45] know. I don't know if the other stuff counts. If 
it does to you, let me know below. But to me, it's  
[34:49] all it's always been a trilogy and always will. If 
only we could do that with Indiana Jones as well.  
[34:54] After their intense meeting, Sarah and the others 
then talk about how she almost got popped. And  
[34:59] Jon tells her and Fisher that they need to start 
keeping their heads down. However, Sarah still  
[35:03] believes that they should all be working together. 
But Jon tells her that's exactly what caused the  
[35:07] world to go to [ __ ] Maybe if we tried working 
together, we could ease some of the tensions.  
[35:12] We're all pulling in different directions. Well, 
that's the trouble with the world, Sarah, darling.  
[35:16] People got different ideas concerning what they 
want out of life. Yes. Thank you. Thank you, John.  
[35:22] He's finally spelling out what we've been talking 
about throughout this entire trilogy about how  
[35:27] no one being able to work together is the reason 
they'll never be able to defeat the zombies. Jon  
[35:32] gets it. However, him recognizing this is also 
what prevents him from wanting to work with the  
[35:37] others, and it only adds to their problem. We then 
cut to Sarah walking away from another nightmare,  
[35:41] and she looks over to see Miguel waking up as 
well. How about when he turns over, we see his  
[35:45] torsos being held together with surgical tools, 
and his guts then just spill out on the floor.  
[35:50] Sarah's experience that day is now giving her 
nightmares and she's starting to lose her grip.  
[35:54] Sini actually pulled the same trick here with 
using the real pig guts in a hollowedout chest,  
[35:58] but it was extra gross for the actor who played 
Miguel as he was in fact vegetarian. Think Sarah  
[36:03] also realized as well that whether they die by 
zombie or bullet from roads, they're going to  
[36:07] end up on Frankenstein's table which is [ __ ] 
terrifying as well. Not only do you get eaten by  
[36:12] a zombie, but then you have to be operated on by a 
mad scientist. And who knows, maybe when you turn,  
[36:17] there is still a bit of you that remains in 
there and experiences this all without any  
[36:21] anesthetic. We then get a little breakup scene 
between them where she kicks him out and hey,  
[36:26] good on you. Wanting to clear her head, she then 
goes for a walk and sees the army guys clearly  
[36:30] drunk and fighting. Again, it's just a subtle way 
of showing how they're the real danger to her and  
[36:34] the others and them fighting amongst themselves 
is what's going to bring them down. But luckily,  
[36:38] McDermott happens to be walking by and he shuffles 
Sarah away. He even gives her a bit of his booze.  
[36:43] Good man. We then get to see John and McDermott's 
sweet digs as he takes her out of the trailer away  
[36:47] from the [ __ ] There it is. There it is. We see 
that they've made a nice little cozy place for  
[36:54] themselves, complete with a God bless our home 
sign. There's also an image of a beach showing  
[36:58] where Jon wants to retire to. He says that it's a 
little more dangerous living this far out, but it  
[37:02] keeps him away from the troubles. Ultimately, 
this is the fate they'll choose in the end,  
[37:06] and they journey to a dangerous paradise to stay 
away from the overreach of the government that  
[37:10] exists in locations like this. Jon also urges her 
to speak her mind. It's literally the first time  
[37:15] any of the men here have asked her anything about 
what she thinks. However, she kind of starts to  
[37:20] cook Jon and McDermott. You have the protection 
of this facility. You eat our food. You drink  
[37:24] our water. And you don't lift a finger to help 
neither one of you. John just laughs it off though  
[37:30] and explains that they don't really believe in 
what the military and scientists are trying to  
[37:33] do and that it's just all a waste of time. He then 
goes over the government records, movie negatives,  
[37:39] and various other things that used to be stored in 
the cave to show how none of this matters anymore  
[37:44] in a world run by zombies. No one gives a [ __ ] 
anymore. He calls the bunker a 14-mi tombstone  
[37:49] where their research and attempts to bring 
society back will all just be forgotten along  
[37:53] with all the other relics of the world buried in 
the cave. This is a great big 14mile tombstone.
[38:03] Also, love how we have the response from the 
zombie there, which is almost kind of backing  
[38:07] up the point that he's making. You ain't never 
going to figure it out. He says, "We've been  
[38:12] punished by the creator who put a curse on us 
to show what hell was like and for destroying  
[38:17] what we created in trying to figure it out. We've 
been punished by the creator." Now, to me, this  
[38:23] feels like an an excellent parallel to Peter's 
line into one of the dead about there being no  
[38:28] room left in hell. This is our punishment and if 
we rebuild, we have to make sure we don't repeat  
[38:33] history. While this seems like Jon and McDermott 
have accepted their zombie overlords, we can see  
[38:38] they are also in denial. Despite Jon's big [ __ ] 
the world speech, they still play house in their  
[38:44] little trailer. Even him saying they could restart 
humanity highlights he hasn't lost hope and that  
[38:48] the world may be able to return. We then find 
Sarah back in the lab where Fish is trying and  
[38:53] failing to feed a zombie some beef. Sarah realizes 
this is stupid, but Dr. Frankenstein then comes in  
[38:58] and explains that they're attempting to satisfy 
their urge to consume flesh. He then calls back  
[39:02] to Peter's line in Dawn of the Dead, saying the 
zombies are us and they can be tricked by being  
[39:07] good little boys and girls. He says, "This is the 
same way we were tricked with a promise of some  
[39:11] reward to come, which is why we do pretty much 
everything. Frankenstein has some serious issues  
[39:17] that we'll see more glimpses of in just a bit, but 
we can see how he treats the zombies as children.  
[39:21] He talks to them like how you would a small child 
and even shuts the lights off and leaves them in  
[39:25] the room. The zombie even looks around scared and 
it highlights it's regaining its humanity. Now  
[39:29] we can also hear the gunk theme from Dawn of the 
Dead playing during the scene transition. [music]
[39:42] This sounds familiar. It's because it's the 
theme playing in the credits of Dawn. [music]
[39:50] Frankenstein then takes Sarah to prove his 
theory and we officially meet Bob. We learn  
[39:54] that Frankenstein named B after his father with 
whom he clearly had issues. Stad told him he'd  
[39:59] never be rich and that he was wasting his time 
with science. Later on, they find a tape in which  
[40:03] Frankenstein talks to himself as his mother, 
where he's punishing a zombie for not doing  
[40:07] what it's told while telling his mother that he 
only needs five more minutes. This reveals that  
[40:12] Frankenstein's a fullon psycho, which yeah, 
we pretty much already knew, but h godamn.  
[40:17] Based off what Frankenstein says here as well, 
we can see that his quest to save humanity stems  
[40:22] from some serious family issues. Frankenstein 
is clearly traumatized by a sort of love or  
[40:28] acceptance that he looked for in his parents as he 
was conditioned to behave on the promise of being  
[40:32] rich, a reward if you will. This goes back to his 
emphasis on civility needing to be rewarded. They  
[40:37] can be tricked into being good little girls and 
boys same way we were tricked into it on promise  
[40:43] of some reward to come. Now that the world has 
gone to [ __ ] though, in his mind, Frankenstein  
[40:48] is trying to prove to his parents and himself that 
his research has value to him. If he can reverse  
[40:53] the zombie outbreak, he will finally be rewarded 
with recognition for his achievements. This is why  
[40:57] Frankenstein treats Bub and the other zombies like 
children, as he believes he can beat them into  
[41:02] submission like he was. He's not realizing though 
that he's creating the same cycle of trauma that  
[41:06] he received from his father. He's even becoming 
a surgeon just like his father originally wanted  
[41:11] as his research has become more about dissection 
than actually studying uh the creatures. Can you  
[41:17] imagine a surgeon called Bub? This further shows 
though that while Frankenstein is right about  
[41:22] being able to teach the zombies, his inability to 
let go of his trauma will only contribute to them  
[41:26] learning more about cruelty and violence. This 
also prevents him from being able to recognize  
[41:31] the true results of his own research as he only 
focuses on how to reverse it instead of the cause.  
[41:36] Just as Sarah mentioned earlier, Frankenstein's 
research proves what Romero has been trying to say  
[41:40] throughout the entire Dead trilogy in that this is 
all a result of the terrible things we do to each  
[41:45] other and that violence is an inherent part of 
human nature. Romero is basically saying that  
[41:49] restoring the world how it was will only lead to 
the same result. He then shows Bub how to do some  
[41:54] tricks and also says, "Well, let's say that I let 
him continue to exist." Now, him saying, "I'll let  
[42:00] him continue to exist," shows how the mad doctor 
has developed a bit of a god complex. God punished  
[42:06] us for getting too big for our own britches, and 
he brought hell to earth to destroy our hubris.  
[42:11] Ultimately, this place is destroyed as well, 
and in trying to play God, it all comes crashing  
[42:16] down. Sarah and Fisher then start cracking up 
laughing, thinking Frankenstein's funny lobster,  
[42:20] as he presents Bob with a toothbrushing razor. 
However, they are soon made fools of when Bob  
[42:25] grabs the razor and starts rubbing it against 
his cheek as if he was shaving. What? [screaming]  
[42:31] We also get a little notice Stephen King with 
one of the items Dr. Frankenstein gives Bob  
[42:35] being a copy of Salem's lot. Again, the pair did 
creep show together and we're just super tight.  
[42:40] We can see that Bob is also a fan of King as well 
as he starts to flip through the book to Sarah's  
[42:45] amazement. This proves that he remembers things 
from his life and can be taught to control his  
[42:49] urge for human flesh. Now, while seeing a, you 
know, a zombie reading uh could be quite silly,  
[42:54] I think it actually makes the whole thing even 
more terrifying because it basically proves that  
[42:58] the person is still trapped inside the mind and 
forced to be piloted by this decay. Something they  
[43:03] discuss quite a lot in the Bone Temple, and 
Bob definitely lays the groundwork for that.  
[43:08] How about the little science party then crashed by 
Roads and Steel, who come in to find Bob reading  
[43:12] Salem's lot, a zombie reading heresy. But Bob 
doesn't even look at the newcomers, and he's just  
[43:18] fully engrossed in the book. This shows that not 
only is Salem's lot a great book, but that Bub's  
[43:22] ability to control himself extends past the people 
he's built a rapport with. Bub mimics saying hello  
[43:28] onto Alicia on the phone and even gives a salute 
to Roads. Roads refuses to do it back though, so  
[43:33] Frankenstein salutes him instead and then decides 
to give the zombie a gun because why not? What  
[43:39] could possibly go wrong? Bob then inspects the 
gun for a moment before cocking back the chamber,  
[43:44] pointing at Roads, and then pulling the trigger. 
And yet I am with roads. Kill it. Kill it right  
[43:51] [ __ ] now. This does foreshadow their showdown 
later on. H but it also highlights that Bob is  
[43:56] able to judge. We then get a tense standoff and 
cut at the cafeteria where roads goes absolutely  
[44:01] off it. But as Frankenstein explains them showing 
civilized behavior must be rewarded. We can also  
[44:07] see that Frankenstein starting to crack a bit 
when he says civility must be rewarded. and  
[44:15] if it isn't rewarded,
[44:18] there's no use for it. It's almost like he's 
trying to convince himself just as much as he's  
[44:23] trying to convince Roads. I do wonder if he's 
kind of remembering what his parents said and  
[44:28] clearly cracking a bit. It also shows how his 
inability to let go of how things used to be  
[44:32] is driving him even more insane than he probably 
already was. With everyone in a stalemate, things  
[44:37] go back to business as usual. They round up more 
of the undead, but Miguel once again [ __ ] up.  
[44:42] The zombie rips out the throat of one of the guys 
and he then fires, hitting another. Gee, who could  
[44:47] have seen that coming? Sarah then takes control 
of the situation once more and shoots the zombie  
[44:52] in the head. But Miguel fully loses it. He gets 
bitten on the arm when trying to take his rage out  
[44:56] another zombie and runs off being chased by Sarah. 
Steel actually handles the situation calmly though  
[45:01] and kills his pal who begs for a bullet over 
becoming a creature. The side of the character  
[45:05] that you don't see that much in the movie and it 
shows how his bravado all just a bit of an act.  
[45:10] We then get an awesome moment where Sarah hacks 
Miguel's arm off with Jon's machete. This would  
[45:15] also inspire some stuff in The Walking Dead, and 
it adds the idea that you can catch it before it  
[45:19] spreads. We can't really show it cuz it's YouTube, 
but they have Miguel's hand moving about as Sarah  
[45:24] sinks in the blade. This is a clever editing 
trick by Ceini where they used a fake arm for  
[45:29] the shot of Sarah initially hitting it with the 
blade and then used Deleo's real arm with a fake  
[45:34] cutout machete as she's slicing it down. They then 
replaced it with a fake one when she slices it  
[45:39] completely off. It's all cut together. It looks 
really good. Um, and yeah, just the the little  
[45:44] detail of the hand moving makes it just sells it. 
Just that little bit of detail just sells it a bit  
[45:50] more. Don't know why I went Irish there. Jon Mcder 
then follow her lead and help make a torch to burn  
[45:55] Miguel's arm stump and seal the wound while Steel 
Roads and Rickles show up for revenge. Obviously  
[46:01] now they have a reason to kill him as well as he's 
potentially got the disease. What we get though is  
[46:06] a classic Mexican standoff, but Roads ultimately 
lets him keep a girl to prevent a full-on  
[46:11] shootout. He also calls Jon Fly Boy with his 
also being Steven's nickname in Dawn. And yeah,  
[46:16] I know it's just a nickname for a pilot, but it 
just helps to reinforce those roles. This moment  
[46:21] also allows Jon and McDermott to finally choose 
a side. They also look after Miguel, and Jon  
[46:26] willingly stays back with someone he thinks might 
become a zombie, but they're no longer resigned to  
[46:31] their apathy. And ultimately, this is what will 
save them from becoming zombies themselves. Back  
[46:36] in Frankenstein's lab, we then pan across more 
of his brutal experiments as McDermott realizes  
[46:41] the true horror of what's been going on behind the 
scenes. Also, notice the X-ray scan of a skull at  
[46:46] position like it's looking directly at Sarah. It's 
not even a scan of the brain. It's just of the  
[46:51] skull. Um, which foreshadows one of Frankenstein's 
most disturbing projects. It's here that they then  
[46:56] find the recording, which gives us some insight 
into Frankenstein's history. Also, I feel like  
[47:00] the scene may have been on by the recordings that 
you find around zombie games, um, like Resident  
[47:05] Evil and The Last of Us. Romero did write a 
script for a Resident Evil film in 1998 that  
[47:10] was ultimately rejected, but that's a story for 
another breakdown. As the tape plays, McDermott  
[47:15] then discovers the severed head of the soldier 
who was just shot in the zombie pen. It literally  
[47:19] happened like moments ago, and Frankie has already 
wired him up. He begged not to be turned into a  
[47:24] creature, but you could definitely argue this 
is a much worse fight. Again, this is also the  
[47:30] mechanical head of Greg Nicotero, and it's what 
landed him the role in front of the camera. Before  
[47:34] the film's budget was reduced to nothing, Nicotero 
and Cevi created the head to be used in the  
[47:38] original version of the film before the scene was 
cut. So, they cast Nicotero in the film as one of  
[47:42] the soldiers and wrote the scene so the robot head 
didn't go to waste, which I'm glad they did as  
[47:46] well because it's a really good effect. Realizing 
how insane this all is, McDermott then says they  
[47:51] just need to take the chopper and get the [ __ ] 
out. However, they run into Frankenstein in the  
[47:55] hallway, who's on his way to give Bub his reward. 
Also, notice how Frankenstein greets Bob, saying  
[48:01] his name with a southern accent. Hello, Bob. 
This is just like how he introduced his father,  
[48:06] and it shows how he's projecting his [ __ ] up 
family issues onto Bob. He also tells Bob that  
[48:11] quote unquote mother is very proud of him, which 
I'm not sure if he's referring to himself here,  
[48:16] as he sees himself as Bub's mother, or it might be 
like the mental projection he has of his mother,  
[48:21] which is very Norman Bates. mother is very proud 
of you. Very, very proud indeed. In Psycho, Norman  
[48:29] Bates, of course, keeps his mother alive and well, 
he keeps her corpse around, but it just nicely  
[48:34] plays in the idea of zombies. Bob's also locked 
into the tunes and you can see considers biting  
[48:39] the dock when he tries to take them off, but he 
decides against it and thus Frankenstein shows him  
[48:44] how to play the recorder. I love Bub's reaction to 
Beethovven's ninth symphony as well, and it just  
[48:49] blows whatever is left of Bub's mind, like giving 
an iPhone to a a 16th century Renaissance child.  
[48:57] Frankenstein then gives Bubs his reward, and we 
can see him no longer interested in Beethoven as  
[49:01] he starts to chow out on some flesh. Hm, I wonder 
where Frankenstein got that from. Meanwhile,  
[49:06] Sarah and McDermott are watching this all 
go down from the next room, and the parties  
[49:10] then crashed by Roads in his likies. Also, I 
love McDermott's face during this whole thing,  
[49:14] as this is the first time seeing all this 
weird [ __ ] that Frankenstein's been up to.  
[49:19] Roads then grabs Frankenstein and demands to 
know what he's giving Bob. They discover he's  
[49:24] been keeping the bodies of the dead soldiers 
and feeding them to the zombies. This gives  
[49:28] Roads the excuse he's been waiting for, and he 
immediately empties his clip into the doctor. Now,  
[49:32] if you thought Roads was crazy before, and this 
pretty much sends him over the deep end. He shoots  
[49:37] Fisher in the head without hesitation. And you 
could say Fisher is now sleeping with the Fishers.
[49:50] Know what the [ __ ] that was. John then arrives 
to stand his crown and it says he'll not fly them  
[49:55] out if Roads doesn't let Sarah McDermott go. Roads 
just tosses them to the zombies while Steel beats  
[50:01] the [ __ ] out of Jon. Kind of a piss po rescue 
there, John. We then see the zombies making their  
[50:06] way to the dinner bell. Sarah and Mcderma then 
decide to take their chance and head for a silo  
[50:10] deeper in the cave. We then see Miguel leaving 
the bunker and this moment of freedoms Mid and  
[50:13] Bob who frees himself from his chains. Now Miguel 
is who brings down the zombies, but I personally  
[50:19] think that you should have given that role to 
Bob. Hell, when watching this for the video, I I  
[50:23] didn't even start to think like um that you 
don't even really need Miguel at all. He offers  
[50:28] no support to Sarah and the gang and spends half 
of the movie lying on his back. I personally think  
[50:33] Romero should have had Bub escaping, coming 
across the Dead Dock, and then have it so he  
[50:38] was the one who brought in the zombies. Hell, 
I don't even know why Miguel's so broken in  
[50:43] general. He's like the only guy in here getting a 
shag. But yeah, back in the cave, all hell breaks  
[50:47] loose with McDermott cutting his zombies head in 
half with a shovel. Also love how you can see the  
[50:51] top half roll away and its eyes moving back and 
forth as Sarah and McDermott run past it. This  
[50:56] was actually building off another brutal kill 
from Dawn where Sveni's character Blade killed  
[51:00] a zombie with a machete but he felt it would be 
cooler with a shovel. Jon also manages to get the  
[51:04] better of roads but decides to spare him to go and 
find Sarah McDermott. Going by the rules of these  
[51:09] movies as well. This more or less guarantees his 
survival as he refuses to continue the killing and  
[51:14] instead chooses to help the others. On the flip 
side of this, we see the opposite side of the coin  
[51:19] with Steels and Rickles who find that Miguel's 
bust up the controls for the lift. Unlike Jon and  
[51:23] the others who chose to work together, Rickles 
and Steel instead immediately start attacking  
[51:28] each other when they realize neither can fix the 
elevator. In the pair refusing to work together,  
[51:33] they ultimately seal their fate and are consumed 
because of this. We then quickly cut to Jon making  
[51:38] his way through the cave to find Sarah McDermott. 
This gives us my favorite scene of McDermott  
[51:43] basically just going crazy with a shovel and 
barking at one of the zombies. [groaning]
[51:51] died. It's just so random, but it makes 
me laugh every single time. Meanwhile,  
[51:55] Jung continues taking the zombies out left, 
right, and center, armed to the teeth, a lot  
[52:00] like Peter was in Dawn. We then find ourselves 
above ground where Miguel opens the gates to the  
[52:05] zombies. As the undead begin to flood into the 
compound, Miguel rushes back to the elevator to  
[52:10] grab the controls and he just lies down to accept 
his fate. We also see him sign a cross over his  
[52:15] chest and put his saint pendant in his mouth 
as the zombies start to go to town. However,  
[52:19] notice how he doesn't put his dog tags with the 
sane pendant and it's left on the ground. This  
[52:24] symbolizes how in Miguel's final moments, he's 
finally accepted the new world and it's a new  
[52:30] zombie overlords. Now, I did even wonder if this 
played into the Jesus allegory and how Christians  
[52:34] consume the quote unquote body of Christ in 
communion. But all he can do is hope to find  
[52:39] some salvation and give the others a chance to be 
better while getting his revenge on those he feels  
[52:44] have wronged him. It's a pretty brutal way to do 
it. Uh, but fair play to Miguel. Would have been  
[52:49] nice for him to come to this moment of clarity a 
couple of hours earlier, but yeah, suppose he he  
[52:54] came through in the end, I guess. Zombies then 
start tearing Miguel apart with more flooding  
[52:58] in as he screams in agony. How about Miguel holds 
on? He waits for more zombies to gather around for  
[53:04] their free lunch. And this is so he can use them 
to swarm the compound. And the army guys don't  
[53:09] react well to it. Also, I love how the zombie 
trips when getting off the elevator. And yeah,  
[53:14] I imagine there was a lot of uh pushing 
each other on this and people kind of  
[53:18] a bit scared as they were going down. Health and 
safety nightmare violation. Roads then immediately  
[53:24] hauls us out of there and he hops into a golf 
cart and basically leaves steels and rickles in  
[53:29] the dust along with this guy. He's just uh kind of 
been around in the background, but this is another  
[53:34] Romero regular. That is Tesos Stavarakis, who was 
Tom Zeini's assistant on Dawn of the Dead. Now,  
[53:40] you might remember him as the guy who got his 
guts ripped out at the end, uh, which was great  
[53:44] times. And they basically do an evolved version 
of that kill, um, with the character getting  
[53:50] killed in pretty much the same way. Starraus 
basically became a stunt man on Dawn because  
[53:54] they couldn't afford any professionals and needed 
someone to brutalize for some of the more violent  
[53:58] kills in the movie. Rickles gets a similar fate, 
too, and almost kind of cackles as he screams in  
[54:03] agony. The absolute worst part of this as 
well is how you can hear his scream become  
[54:08] super high-pitched as his vocal cords are being 
stretched until his head pops off. [screaming]
[54:19] Cini actually didn't realize this small 
detail himself until years later when someone  
[54:23] pointed it out to him. So, shout out to the sound 
guy who mixed this. Sini also was never really  
[54:28] with how this effect turned out as the fake body 
he made was meant to stretch and tear as an homage  
[54:32] to the thing. But the zombie hands cover the body 
too much and thus the final shot didn't achieve  
[54:38] the same effect, which I can see what he means. 
Uh, but I do think it it it works okay. Anyway,  
[54:43] with it now being every man for himself, we see 
hundreds of zombies infiltrating the bunker, not  
[54:47] only from the elevator, but also from the zombie 
pen, which they forgot to close, you [ __ ] idiot.  
[54:53] She said at the start it was important. With 
Bob, we then sees he finds Dr. Frankenstein  
[54:58] and completely breaks down. Also, yeah, maybe 
I'm uh just a little [ __ ] but I think this is  
[55:03] very sad. And uh this moment broke me. Bob's 
like, "I'm I'm here, Dad. Look what I did."  
[55:08] Very stupid, but very emotional, too. He then 
notices Sarah's gun that Roads left in the lab.  
[55:14] And this sets us up for Bob versus Roads. Now, 
another small detail to point out here is notice  
[55:19] how Bob doesn't even try and eat the Doctor. 
This shows that Bob's love for Frankenstein  
[55:24] has overcome his primitive drive to consume human 
flesh. And it proves Frankenstein's theory that  
[55:29] zombies can be taught to control their instincts. 
How about we can also see how Frankenstein's  
[55:34] greatest success is also his biggest failure. As 
he still taught Bub violence by projecting his  
[55:40] own trauma onto him, which is why the first thing 
Bub does when realizing Dr. Frankenstein's dead  
[55:45] is pick up a gun. He gave him a gun earlier and 
thus created the same violent cycle that caused  
[55:49] the world to fall upon the first place. Last thing 
before moving on as well, and this might be a bit  
[55:54] of bit of bit of a theory time. Uh, but it also 
seems to be implied here that whatever caused the  
[55:59] dead to rise is now missing from the world. We 
don't see Frankenstein come back to life despite  
[56:04] not being shot in the head. And the original 
script included Jon dying early on and having  
[56:08] his body slowly decomposing rather than becoming 
a zombie. We never really learn what caused it in  
[56:14] the first place, and its disappearance here is as 
mysterious as its arrival. steel cornered as well.  
[56:20] And among the horde, we can see a ballerina who 
still has her foot pointed as if she's dancing.  
[56:24] There's also this clown guy who kind of becomes 
a running gag for Romero and was included in both  
[56:30] Land of the Dead and Diary of the Dead. Steel 
is then sworn but realizes he's screwed and  
[56:34] thus decides to take himself out. Now, originally, 
Steel's death was pretty cut and dry. Um, but Gary  
[56:40] Howard Claw, who played them, he he asked Romero 
if they could change it while they were shooting.  
[56:44] He does a cross thing, does a crucifix, prays 
to God. And you may notice that the post that  
[56:49] we used to chain above basically resemble a 
crucifix. This goes up behind him and further  
[56:54] plays up the religious symbolism which I feel 
represents how despite Steel's pleas to God,  
[57:00] he's already damned by taking his own life and 
refusing to become a zombie, Steel is essentially  
[57:05] also trying to avoid God's punishment. Back in 
the cave, we then see Jon has finally caught up  
[57:10] to Sarah McDermad. And the three of them open 
fire on the zombies with machine guns to clear  
[57:14] a path. They then climb out the cave and make it 
to freedom, showing how if you work together, you  
[57:18] can find a way out of this. Come along, Johnny. 
Counting on you to fly us to the promised land.  
[57:25] You might also notice that Jon puts down his 
gun akin to Peter losing his rifle at the end of  
[57:30] Dawn. In shedding this weapon, he's casting away 
violence and deciding to stop the killing to work  
[57:35] on salvation. This is Meridan Roads as well, who 
we cut to arming up. Confronted by Bob, he's shot  
[57:40] while he tries to flee and he ends up crawling 
away while Bob catches up to him. I love the  
[57:44] symbolism here as well of how Roads is all bloody 
crawling and hunched over with a limp looking like  
[57:49] a typical zombie. On the flip side of this, Bob is 
walking upright and using a gun just like a human.  
[57:55] Once again, it plays in the idea that people 
have become so removed from our humanity that  
[57:59] we are the monsters and the zombies are now more 
human than we are. Which is why those who are able  
[58:04] to hold on to their humanity and work together 
are always the ones who make it out alive. Roads  
[58:09] then opens the door to a horde of zombies, which 
is just like Sarah's nightmare in the opening.  
[58:13] Bob then shoots him again in the gut, and you can 
see that he uses his other hand to steady the shot  
[58:18] before he takes aim. Before he was just kind of 
firing from the hip with one hand, but this shows  
[58:23] he's remembering things more and more. This also 
shows that he now doesn't need Frankenstein to  
[58:27] teach him, and he's truly once more able to learn. 
As the zombies then start to swarm around roads,  
[58:33] Bob gives him one final salute before walking 
away and letting the zombies tear Roads in half,  
[58:39] literally. But any other zombie would join in on 
the meal, but Bob is now controlling his urges.  
[58:44] Also, I love how how sassy Bob is as he does 
it. With Roads finally getting what he deserves,  
[58:49] though, he gasps for breath as the zombies tear 
off his legs and he tells them to choke on them.  
[58:54] Now, we could easily move on cuz the character is 
dead. Uh, but yeah, there's a lot of really gross  
[59:00] stuff behind this um that is almost even worse 
than what we just saw. Like all the other gut  
[59:05] gags in the film, Sabini used a real pig 
intestine strapped to Roads's chest that  
[59:09] was supposed to spill out and be eaten by the 
zombie actors. Okay, great. We've done it 100  
[59:13] times before. Should work. Classic zombie eating 
guts effect. However, when shooting the exterior  
[59:19] scenes in Florida, um, someone forgot to plug in 
the fridge and these guts all rotted. This was  
[59:24] throughout the whole production as well. Um, so 
I'm talking them rotting for weeks, not realizing  
[59:30] this until the day of the shoot. They had no more 
time to run out and get more pig guts. So they  
[59:34] just stuffed the rotting guts in Joseph Palato's 
fake stomach and then shot the scene. To this day,
[59:43] I can still smell it. This took 4 hours to do 
and was so bad the crew and zombie actors had  
[59:50] to stuff their noses with putty just to stay in 
the room. Except for Joseph Palato. You would of  
[59:55] course have been able to have seen that. H So he 
just had to breathe in the rotted guts for hours,  
[60:00] which you might think, "Wow, Paul, that's crazy. 
How could it get any worse?" Well, remember how I  
[60:05] said Roads was gasping for air as he was getting 
ripped in half? Yeah, he was like literally  
[60:10] gasping and breathing in all all those pig guts to 
his lungs. Road's line of telling the zombies to  
[60:15] choke on them was also supposedly improvised and 
given what we know um might have been directed  
[60:21] towards Tom Cevini and Romero. We then see the 
bunker is fully overrun with zombies feasting on  
[60:26] the remains of everyone we just saw get killed. 
We also get a kind of cameo by George Romero as  
[60:31] a zombie pushing a medical cord, but we only know 
this by seeing his signature scarf hanging from  
[60:35] his waist. We never actually see Romero's face, 
which I don't know if they cut it or not. Um,  
[60:40] but yeah, something you would only really 
catch if you're a major Romero fan. Will  
[60:44] have a photographic memory and remembered that he 
wore this during his cameo on Dawn of the Dead.  
[60:49] So that is the character confirmed dead. We 
then cut back to the surface where Sarah,  
[60:54] John, and McDerma are making their great escape. 
We then see them hauling ass the helicopter to  
[60:58] ride off into the sun. But when Sarah opens 
the door, bam, grabbed by a zombie. But wait,  
[61:03] just as Sarah is about to get her face eaten 
off, we jump cut to her waking up from another  
[61:08] nap. Rather than waking up in Hello, we see that 
she and the others have made it to their island  
[61:12] paradise. Jon and Mcderma are fishing, feeding 
the birds, and just having a grand old time. Not  
[61:18] a single zombie or mobile phone in sight. Sarah 
then takes out a calendar showing that it's now  
[61:23] November 4th, 5 days after we start this insanity 
and we fade out to the credits. Wait, what? Now,  
[61:30] before we get to explaining this ending, we have 
to take a quick moment to talk about the film's  
[61:35] release because it was an absolute mess and a 
lot of people hated this movie. A major issue  
[61:40] that hindered the film's success came from the 
confusion between Romero's Day of the Dead and  
[61:45] Dan Oannon's Return of the Living Dead. This 
was released the same year and was written by  
[61:49] John Russo, aka Romero's writing partner on Night. 
That is sort of an alternate sequel to Night. Uh,  
[61:55] but it has nothing to do with Romero and isn't 
part of his zombie universe. But this confused a  
[62:00] lot of people at the time and caused many to just 
not sure because they went to the wrong movie.  
[62:05] It was also the serious tonal shift from Dawn of 
the Dead, which was more rooted in comedy. A lot  
[62:09] of people came in expecting that same comic book 
feel, but when they were met with the more dark  
[62:13] and serious tone of day, many felt disappointed. 
and that Romero had jumped the shock. Lori, who  
[62:19] played Sarah, even recalled people booing at the 
New York premiere. That all really affected Romero  
[62:24] and is pretty much why he didn't make another 
zombie film for 20 years. But this all comes  
[62:28] back to Romero's initial decision to wait so long 
to make Day. This resulted in the script having  
[62:33] to be cut and him having to compromise his vision. 
We can also see this reflected in the film itself,  
[62:38] as one reviewer, Rob Gonzalez, made the parallel 
of how Day reflects Romero being forced to cut  
[62:43] down his vision to appease the ones funding it. 
The scientist basically represents the artist  
[62:48] and the soldiers are the money guys who breathe 
down their necks demanding results. This makes  
[62:53] Day of the Dead almost a personal expression of 
Romero's anger and depression. He goes on to say,  
[62:58] and I I find [music] this absolutely brilliant. I 
think part of the reason many Romero fans reacted  
[63:05] against Day so strongly is that they showed the 
writing on the wall. Day of the Dead shows Romero  
[63:11] at a low personal [music] eb, forced to cut down 
his vision to appease the guys with the money.  
[63:17] With that in mind, you understand why the soldiers 
in the film are depicted as hostile thugs.  
[63:23] If you read the scientists as film artists [music] 
and the soldiers as the money guys who breathe  
[63:28] down your neck demanding results, the money 
[music] and the movie become a rather personal  
[63:33] expression of Romero's anger and depression. While 
day has been able to gain a following years later  
[63:38] as people start to get it, let's see if we can 
bring some justice to Romero. Now, in order to do  
[63:44] that, we're going to have to talk about the ending 
and go into what the hell just happened. So,  
[63:48] what what the hell did just happen? Well, I think 
when you jump cut your climax and reveal that the  
[63:54] shock was a dream that people are going to have 
some questions. Personally, I just take it that  
[63:58] they got to the helicopter and kind of wanted 
one last scare before giving us a happy ending.  
[64:03] However, there have been some theories that this 
entire happy ending is infectious to dream. So,  
[64:08] I do kind of want to explore that as I definitely 
think it's worth talking about. Firstly, we've  
[64:13] seen Sarah waking up from horrific nightmares 
multiple times throughout the film. So, the idea  
[64:16] this was all just another nightmare was already 
set up for us. We also get the call back to the  
[64:20] calendar that we saw in the very first scene 
of the movie, which turned out to be a dream.  
[64:24] This new calendar Sarah makes could be Romero's 
way of symbolizing that this is also a dream, and  
[64:29] Sarah is envisioning them reaching their perfect 
safe haven. Now, beyond that, the biggest detail  
[64:34] pointing to the island paradise not being real 
was given to us in the very beginning. When the  
[64:38] group first touches down at the base, the first 
thing they do is debate refueling the helicopter,  
[64:42] but they instead decide to wait. No, wait till 
it's dark. There too many of them out there.  
[64:48] Fast forward to their great escape, and we get 
a call back to this line as Sean mentions that  
[64:51] he hopes someone ended up doing it. Let's hope 
they filled up the gas team from the other night,  
[64:56] which is actually the last line in the entire 
film. Now, you could say that one of the soldiers  
[65:00] did it during the night, as Sarah recommended, 
but we never saw anyone leave the bunker after  
[65:05] they first sealed themselves in. The elevator 
also sets off a loud alarm when it's in use.  
[65:09] And you'd think that someone might have picked up 
on it. Jesus Christ, that's the elevator. To me,  
[65:15] there's really no real reason to add in 
this random bit about them not fueling up  
[65:18] the helicopter and for it to never be mentioned 
again until the exact moment they're about to  
[65:22] escape other than to point us to this perfect 
island being [ __ ] Because of that, there is  
[65:27] the read that Sarah and the others got eaten once 
they reached the helicopter and her waking up on  
[65:31] the island is her mind tripping on whatever crazy 
chemicals get released in your brain when you're  
[65:36] about to die, which I know is bleak. Uh, but I 
think it fits in with the theme of humanity being  
[65:41] punished and the complete zombie takeover 
that Romero's been presenting us. However,  
[65:46] in Romero's book, The Living Dead, he revealed 
that Sarah McDerm did make it to the island,  
[65:51] but ultimately did not survive, and they 
eventually became zombies. Yay. So, there you go.  
[65:57] Theory time debunked in real time. Now, maybe I'm 
an idiot. Or maybe Romero wanted to give us a more  
[66:02] definitive answer after deciding to make four more 
films 20 years later instead of ending it off here  
[66:08] like he originally planned. Who is to say? Whether 
it's a dream or not, though, I think it ultimately  
[66:13] doesn't matter either way, as the end results 
the same, and it still emphasizes Romero's  
[66:17] entire point of the Dead series. The world is 
damned. There is nowhere left that is safe.  
[66:22] This is our punishment and no one can escape it. 
Now, this brings us back to Bob and the religious  
[66:28] symbolism of the film. Bob is more or less playing 
the role of zombie Jesus and he'll usher in this  
[66:33] new zombie world. As we saw with Bob, not only 
did the zombies retain some of their sense of  
[66:37] living consciousness, but their minds have been 
brought down to their most primitive state,  
[66:42] essentially making them a blank slate without the 
human social conditioning that we've developed in  
[66:47] society. This calls back to how Frankenstein 
treated them like children. Because yeah,  
[66:51] they basically are. They're enable to process 
things like caution or reasoning and simply driven  
[66:56] by desires. However, Bub proves that like a child, 
the zombies can over time learn social behaviors.  
[67:03] In Dawn, Romero showed us how capitalism is 
what caused people to lose their humanity,  
[67:07] and this resulted in us turning on each other 
and being punished to hell on earth. Now though,  
[67:12] Bob and the other zombies have been whipped of the 
influence of consumerism and capitalism. And thus,  
[67:17] Romero implies that there is a chance the zombies 
could in fact make a better world if they can  
[67:22] avoid making the same mistakes as us. This, in a 
way, parallels the Christian idea of someone being  
[67:27] cleansed of their sins in order to be accepted 
into heaven. We [ __ ] it up. So, God restored the  
[67:32] whole thing to basically give the world another 
chance. Bob being the first zombie to reign his  
[67:37] humanity has essentially been resurrected and 
reborn as a new form of humanity that could lead  
[67:42] the other zombies towards a better world. This 
is symbolized by the cross that Bob was chained  
[67:46] to for most of the movie and where he began to 
regain his consciousness. According to the New  
[67:50] Testament as well, Jesus was first born from the 
dead, ushering in the kingdom of God. He then went  
[67:55] about forgiving sins, baptizing repenters, and 
ascended to heaven. In a twisted way, you could  
[68:01] say that zombies are killing us. And by becoming 
part of the undead, we're baptized and forgiven  
[68:06] of our sins. It's also traditionally believed in 
Christianity that the bodily resurrection with  
[68:10] the restoration to life of a transformed body is 
powered by the spirit which is literally what we  
[68:16] saw happen with Bob as he was transformed into a 
zombie body powered by his primal instincts but  
[68:21] was resurrected by restoring his consciousness. 
Bob chooses to help the other zombies and teaches  
[68:27] them compassion instead of violence. Humanity 
can eventually return and be forgiven for what we  
[68:32] did to the world. However, Romero still leaves us 
with a sense of dread. As we saw, Bub has already  
[68:38] learned cruelty and violence from Frankenstein. 
When figuring out that Bub was regaining  
[68:42] consciousness, one of the first things he did 
was give him a gun and had him read Salem's slot.  
[68:46] That is a book all about community mistrust and 
violence as everyone in the lot becomes vampires  
[68:51] and begins killing their family and friends. So, 
there's an equal chance that Bub will just create  
[68:56] the same cycle that led to the apocalypse in 
the first place. Yay. with Romero doubling  
[69:01] down on the idea that the end is inevitable and 
humanity cannot be saved. I think that it fits in  
[69:08] more with what he's been doing. This is why Romero 
ultimately leaves Bub's fate open-ended, though,  
[69:12] because our time is up. However, I do feel like 
it's a bit more optimistic and leaves things in  
[69:18] the air about whether violence is inherent to our 
nature or if we can learn to regain our humanity  
[69:24] and trust each other once more. Now, I know this 
all sounds insane, but it perfectly concludes  
[69:30] everything Romero has been setting up since 
he first introduced audiences to the ghouls.  
[69:34] In Night The Living Dead, Romero brings in zombies 
as terrifying monsters that come to destroy the  
[69:38] family unit, which is represented by our survivors 
trapped in the farmhouse. In Dawn, Romero then  
[69:43] shows the destruction of community. He presents 
zombies as funny and pathetic and shows the human  
[69:48] characters committing most of the violence. There 
he introduces the idea that we are in fact the  
[69:52] monsters and have done this to ourselves. In day, 
Romero brings this all together by representing  
[69:58] the zombies as victims and making us actually root 
against most of the human characters. We root for  
[70:04] Bob when he's hunting down roads. And when the 
zombies start coming after the other soldiers,  
[70:08] we cheer on because we know they deserve it. Now, 
apply this to like a billion people. Though we  
[70:13] know there's a few good people left, which is why 
they survive, they're overwhelmingly outnumbered  
[70:18] by the bad. Ben, the sole survivor of Night who 
tried to save everyone, was gunned down by the  
[70:23] mob. And in Dawn, Peter and Fran are the only 
ones able to hold on to their humanity. In day,  
[70:28] everyone in the bunker is already insane, which 
leaves only three out of the group and perhaps  
[70:32] the world with some sense of their humanity left. 
This represents the underlying terror and social  
[70:37] commentary that Romero was trying to convey 
in these films of humanity being doomed and  
[70:41] that we in fact deserve it. Romero also saw the 
dead films as an allegory for humanity having  
[70:47] failed and needing to make a new path. Day of the 
Dead just brings things full circle from that very  
[70:52] first film and it shows the zombie uprising 
as being complete. And while Day of the Dead  
[70:58] is widely considered the worst of Romero's Dead 
films, it actually has a lot of deeper layers  
[71:03] I think most people miss that make it a perfect 
conclusion to this original Dead trilogy. I mean,  
[71:08] we got zombies listening to Beethoven and shooting 
a gun. It's absolutely ridiculous. So, I don't  
[71:13] blame anyone for um not liking the movie and maybe 
the symbolism going over their heads, but hey,  
[71:19] if it didn't, I wouldn't have a job. Not everyone 
is a Romero expert knows his strong social views,  
[71:26] but it was always the central theme of these 
movies and what he ultimately wanted to convey to  
[71:29] audiences with his stories of ghouls and monsters. 
Now, I know this video has been a lot of tangents,  
[71:35] but I think these things are important 
when discussing these movies, as it was  
[71:40] always Romero's intention to use the zombies as a 
vehicle for social commentary. So, thank you for  
[71:45] sticking around. And while this was always my 
least favorite, I have grown to appreciate it.  
[71:50] Going through just given me a new found respect 
for it. And yeah, I can see why Romero had this as  
[71:56] his favorite. And if you've been keeping up with 
our breakdowns of these films, h then hopefully  
[72:00] you have too. and I've come out with a better 
understanding of what Romero wanted us to take  
[72:05] away from this. Or you can still hate it. That's 
totally fair, too. But as always, I'd love to hear  
[72:10] thoughts in the comments below. Do you think Day 
of the Dead's Romero's worst? Will you bow to our  
[72:14] new zombie overlords? Let me know in the comments 
below. Also, huge shout outs to our researcher and  
[72:19] writer TJ, uh, who's gone through all these movies 
with me, being a massive help when discussing all  
[72:24] the society stuff. We living in a society. And 
yeah, if you want to follow him on Twitter,  
[72:28] that'll be linked on screen right now. You can go 
check him out. Do you know as well that members of  
[72:32] the channel also get early access to videos like 
this every single week for just 99 cents a month  
[72:37] and yeah for that low low cost I think it 
is anyway you'll get access to at least four  
[72:42] breakdowns a week a week before anyone else 
sorry not a week a month [ __ ] hell I'm not  
[72:46] writing all this [ __ ] all the time but yeah 
huge thank you for joining us and I'll see you  
[72:50] in the next one and I hope you've enjoyed us 
going through these three movies out the way  
[72:54] though I've been your host Paul you've been the 
best and I'll see you next time take at peace.