Did you like scary movies growing up?
Love them?
Really? Love that? Should I start that over and say, what's your favorite scary movie? Did I do that? Is that better?
That one was a good one. I did love that one a lot, a lot.
Do you remember the first really scary movie? I mean, did you jump right into horror movies? And did you do like kid horror movies? First?
I think I just jumped right into that.
I think I honestly feel like Scream was probably my first.
I auditioned for Scream for which part Skeet Ulrich's part?
Oh, I did even wonderful?
They told me I was too young at the time. I was too young, but I actually auditioned first Scream.
How old is that? Were you?
Like?
I don't know. I was nine. It was what like nineteen ninety They.
Were high schoolers, they were, but I was. I was, but they were all not high school.
I might have been a high school in real life, but I was in Hollywood high school, right. No, I was probably only twenty, So that was in high school.
Because that was a good franchise to be a part of.
Yah. I didn't I should I should tell you what I actually meant. I auditioned to play Skeet Ulrich playing his part in Screen? Is that confusing?
Yes? Yes?
What kidding?
Oh my gosh, No, but nothing beats Nothing beats Saw Nothing.
Oh my god. Those movies, those.
Oh movies so good, they're so creepy.
Have you heard the theory that Macaulay Culkin's character from Home Alone grew up to be the main guy from Saw because he does all the things, like, he does all the things when they're breaking into the house, like he plants all the stuff. So that started his psychosis and his character actually turns it into the guy, the main guy from Saw.
The one that's laying down.
Yeah, it's a big it's a big Hollywood guy, the big guy with the I don't know the mask whatever his name of the main guys in Saw. That's Macaulay Culkin from Still.
Can't see anything like horse Head and not have a nightmare that night?
Really okay? So no Godfather for you?
No, No, I can't do any of that stuff. That's crazy. No, all right, I love them.
Well that's going to lead us into this week. But first of all, welcome back to Magical Rewind, the show that makes you want to grab your friends your pjs and your popcorn and go back to a time when all the houses were smart, the waves, Tsunamis and the high School's musical. I'm Wilfridell and I'm Sabrina Brian And you know what, this week, we're not going solo. We're going to bring in a third partner in crime.
Here professional If you will.
I will. I've never met this man, I hear he knows a lot about films. I want to make sure I'm getting this pronunciation right. He's from something called Boys Meet World something like that. He also has a podcast called POD's Meat This World I think it's pronounced. And his name, and this has got to be a stage name, is Rider Strong. Yes, so please help us welcome my old friend Rider Strong to the podcast.
Hid Hi, guys, Now there's a very specific reason you're here, Rider, and that's because when I told you about the new podcast that I was doing, you and Danielle at the same time tried to call the same movie the movie we're doing today.
Can you intro the movie that we're doing today? Rider? What did we watch?
We watched the movie Zombies, Yes, and yeah, I think Danielle and I both had the exact same experience, which is that this movie did so well with our kids, Like there were about three months of my life that were just all zombies all the time. Yes, I could not get in the car without having to put on the zombie songs.
Indy would be singing them constantly.
And then there are three zombies movies, so I've seen them all.
This is easily the best one. Okay, okay, but it's really.
Funny to go back and watch again for this because I hadn't seen it since I guess the pandemic, like it had been a while. So yeah, I mean I think he watched the first one right about when it first came out, which would have made him only.
Five years of twenty eighteen.
Yeah, so yeah, I think we probably watched it in like twenty nineteen and then like early twenty twenty, and that's yeah.
He was just just loved it. And so I told him that.
We were doing this, and he and I sat down and watched it again and I saw it with new eyes.
Oh did he watch it with you? That's so fun awesome, Monroe. My daughter watched this one, and I will say this is probably one of the first ones she's actually sat through the whole thing and.
Now how old wait refreshed me. How old is Monroe? Again?
Monroe's going to be four here two weeks?
So wow.
She actually normally she sits for a minute and then yeah, like me, she's over it, like I do the same thing. There was a moment where I thought I lost her, we'll get there, but she came back and she finished it out. So this was the first one. Okay, I'll you know, really pay attention to that.
Well, Danielle and Ryder called it at the same time rider run by a fraction of the second, So Danielle Fisher will be joining us for Zombies two Perfect Times, which, by the way, is what we call every single sequel Riders. This time it's personal. So I have a well documented phobia that everybody knows about. Frankly only one. Yes, I don't we the phobia, Yes you do. My musical phobia. Oh where I do?
Not?
I always sit there and go what did they all just get together and decide on the lyrics to the song, Like we're in the middle of a scene and they all break in the song. What. Yes, I'm starting to get better because we've seen now a ton really liked the first high school musical. I was the last person in the world who never seen it. I still have never seen that. Okay, so there's one left. But let's fire it up now, because this is our year, our episode.
This is gonna be see. There you go give a first installment in another modern day dcom franchise hit, following the now unstoppable formula of good looking young actors singing catchy pop hits. Zombies was first teased during the premiere of Descendants two on the Disney Channel, which is the type of setup you pray you get for your film. And also, we can say this now, A lot of negative reviews of this movie involve the idea that it's just a Descendants for zombies. Do either of you first
of all? Writer, I know Sabrina has because we covered it, But have you seen Descendants? Yeah?
You know the Descendants also tore through my house us time.
They just released a new one and so Indy watched. I think it's the fourth Descendants.
Yeah, and I cannot get behind Descendants well to the same degree that I can get behind Zombies.
Okay, yeah, I don't know.
Descendants just always felt like it should have been a feature that was like with a lot more money. I don't know, like it always felt like constrained by the Disney Channel of it like a.
Big Cinderella movie star.
Yeah, it was just too but also just like you wanted bigger effects. I wanted the characters to be a little more.
Remember it's the Disney Channel. These are not big cinema.
That's what I'm saying is that I think Zombi was a better use of you know, limiting at the high school for you know, with the Descendants, I wanted to be like in the world more. It was a bigger world. It was like all this like, you know, you had to build so much mythology with the Descendants about like how they lived on a separate island, you know, whereas this it's like you get that animated opening and I'm like, I'm in, we don't have to leave the high school.
I mean, that's what people are saying. That's why they're saying this is a ripoff, because Descendants and Zombies start the same way. Essentially, the zombies live on an island in Zombie Landing. They're pretty much saying it's the formula and they ran with it. But that's what we'll get into all that now. It wasn't always prime to be a success. Zombies in what we can only call the fuzzbucket method. Now, writer will elect you in on fuzz Bucket.
You remember Fuzzbucket, Well, I remembered it, and then you started telling me about it. I was like, oh, I had no actual recollection of it. Just like that sounds bonkers, buzzu It was was we we learned. It appeared to be made as a pilot, gotcha. And then what happened was these pilots that weren't successful on the channel or didn't they didn't know what they were going to do with they turned them into movies that weren't long enough.
So Michael Eisner would come in himself and record an opening introing the movie, and he would like to an extra fifteen minutes. It took him, apparently not exaggerating the thing we learned, it took him something like fifty takes to do the old opening the fuzz Bucket, which was the first one that he had ever get.
It's a pretty long monologue, so.
It's just insane him just trying to pump up fuzz Bucket. But this apparently this was coming. This was what we call the fuzz bucket method because Zombies was originally shot as a pilot for Disney. The original TV show was shot but never aired, and at the time was called Zombies and Cheerleaders. And I have to ask, is that a better title than just zombies Zombies and Cheerleaders.
No, well, I mean it makes more sense because the cheerleaders are just so much in this movie.
Says our resident cheerleader.
It's just so goad.
I feel like there's a better title that does include the fact that they're because like, zombies sounds like a horror film, right or right? It's like, yeah, so it could have been like zombie cheer or zombie Spirit.
Yeah, give me a zombie something, yeah, zombie spectacular something.
Toy that it's not a monster movie, that it's actually a high school movie, right, like zombie High Okay, zombie hands, ze Town and the cheer leaders, I don't know something.
So that's exactly what they tried with the pilot. So the pilot itself starred Luke Benward from the dcom Minutemen Sabrina, which we of course know well and Girl meets World Wrider as z and another familiar name to us. Maya Mitchell from Teen Beach Movie played Addison, and these are two actors nowhere to be seen in the eventual film versions that took off. Oh, so they actually shot it.
They shot it. Something else worth noting. This is the first Disney Channel original movie musical to become a franchise where none of the main cast members have played a main character in a Disney Channel series or a Disney Channel animated series prior to the first movie being released. So everybody in this movie was a newbie to the channel.
They I mean, they might have done something small here, but they'd never They didn't use any of their stars, didn't use the synergy, which is kind of strange.
Very strange for the channel. Yes, almost makes it feel like it was produced outside of the channel.
We've seen which, right, we've seen that before. We know it wasn't, but it doesn't has that feel of this isn't going to be one of our bigger ones. It didn't work as a pilot. Let's try to get it out there and see what happens. Yeah, writer, you always talked about and we've talked about this back in the day newsies. You know, these kind of old school movies.
If you were back in the you know, it's nineteen ninety two, you're thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old, and Disney Channel comes to you with the musical big dancing number. Would you have done it?
Well, okay, there's a very very good answer to this. I screen tested for Newsies and do you know who it was I was up against?
Were you up against Christian Bale?
No? I was to play the younger brother. Okay, so I got to audition. I actually don't think I auditioned with Christian Bale. There were another set of There were three older brothers and there were three younger brothers, and they kept mixing and matching us and the other two younger brothers.
That I was up against.
The other one was Luke Edwards who got the part and went on to do it. The other one was mister Ben Savage.
No. It was the first time I met Ben Savage.
Was at Disney lot where they brought us onto the lot and we did a full filming to screen test for News's. They had a full crew. They shot it on thirty five millimeters. It was as if we were making the movie for a day, and we took turns doing it. And we had to do a wardrobe and costume, and we had days of singing songs and learning dances in order to prep for this filming day.
Then that filming day while.
We started, was the day of beginning of the Gulf War, of the American involvement in the Golf War. I have memories of us sitting around looking. They pulled the TV onto the on the Disney lot, and do you remember at Disney they used to have the New York Street, the old Yeah, that was built and there, and we then shot scenes on the Disney lot and I went.
Into the studio. They had a studio teacher.
And they had a classroom, and I went in and met Luke Edwards and then met Ben Savage, and Ben was the.
I never talked about that when you were doing Boy, like, oh my god. We met on news.
We must have, yeah, because we both remembered having been up for it, you know, but neither of us got it, so it didn't happen.
I So anyway, that's one answer. But the real answer.
Is I was always a horrible dancer and a very very average.
To poor singer.
But I was coming off of having done Lames Rob Yeah, and played Gavroge.
So I was sort of known you were, okay.
I mean, well, you know, Gavroche just kind of raps. He doesn't really sing, he's.
Just so, you know, okay, he's ahead of his t's my version. And I was definitely cast for my acting. You know, I wasn't like I was known in the the lay miss circles for being a very good gav Roge as far as my attitude. But I was never
a real singer. And but then because I had done La Miz, Yeah, I would always go up for these musicals or you know, yeah musicals and this they brought me in and I got really close on News's didn't get it and then yeah, and then I sort of fell into more traditional sitcom acting, which also kind of was an offshoot of theater if you think about it, you know, live audience and being bigger.
Sure, and that's how I found myself on boy Me's World eventually, yeh, to be serious.
But yeah, so and then I never once my my voice changed and I put that in quotes because I still sound like a fourteen year old boy.
Yeah, he sound exactly like you do.
What I mean the.
Difference between eleven and thirteen was great enough that by the time we started, boy, I definitely wasn't singing anymore at all. I never learned how to dance, so yeah, I would never have been asked.
You didn't give him any lessons will me on how to dance?
Of all my dance history and background.
Preats of dancing, you didn't give him one lesson. God, I know this guy for years.
I did I give him one lesson? It was don't listen to me when it comes to anything with dancing. On Zombies. The production began in May twenty seventeen. By the way, Zombies, which is spelled called z dash oh dash M dash B dash I dash oh. So it's like the letters. It's like cos yes, but it doesn't appear to be an acronym for anything. And yet so we don't know why. It's like a cheerleader is cheering it. That's what I'm guessing. Give me an oh, maybe that's what.
Okay, here you go, that's how they incorporated their cheer moment.
Hey, there you go, we just figured it out. The coin flip landed on tails this time, so it was shot in Toronto instead of Utah. Over ten weeks four weeks to rehearse and six weeks to shoot. It aired on February sixteenth, twenty eighteen, to just over two point five million viewers, which I know that fans of the pod here know that that sounds like a really, really low number compared to a lot of the other decoms
we've talked about. But you know, teen beach movies, some of these ones from early two thousands will have ten, twelve, fifteen million viewers, which just at this point in the modern era of twenty seventeen twenty eighteen just didn't happen anymore,
is not there. There's too much information from too many different places in the days of kids sitting down in millions of them watching one night were just kind of over So two point five million doesn't sound big, but it was considered a very big success for the channel, especially since what they started to do, which was really interesting, was the entire premiere weekend. It's estimated that nearly thirteen million people ended up watching it because they aired it
ten times over the original premiere weekend. Wheez, Yeah, quite a way to bump themselves up. In the Raiders now we are covering the original offering, but the zombies franchise has three movies out already, with a forthcoming in twenty twenty five. There's a new cartoon on Disney, plus a tour alongside actors from The Descendants, which was just announced
at D twenty three Toys Party Supplies Halloween Costumes. The list never ends, so to call the series of phenomenon would be an absolute understatement, and all from a failed pilot. Also a bit of a spoiler alert. Zombies three had a budget of wait for it, kids forty million dollars switch is aw d coom record here forty million bucks for Zombies three, so the studio was all in. Zombies one had how much do you know?
Not that much?
Not that much? I don't does not look like we don't. I don't think we have exactly what it was. But my guess is if we're right around where they were in d coms, it would probably be somewhere around four.
Yeah, that's that looks It looks definitely under tan forest tight geez.
For how many numbers there are? Guess, but I'm guessing that's that's because when we saw a high school musical there were as many numbers, and wasn't that around It was about a four million dollar budget.
Yes, yeah, the first one, but all.
Started bumping kids in a in a high school. This was not the makeup and everything, so it could have been higher, but it certainly wasn't forty, which is just crazy, as you could probably guess. As one of the most popular decoms ever. It's currently viewable on Disney Plus. So jump over there now and come back to the podcast, or just listen to us cold and go kick some rocks. Those are your three options. So what did you know about We always do this little segment here rider, So
before today, Sabrina, what did you know about zombies? If you'd even heard of it?
I had heard of it.
The director that did our Cheetah Girls three is Paul Hoan, who has done the entire series of Zombies, so I definitely knew about it. I knew there was cheering involved because him and I chatted and he's like, Oh, you should come and do some kind of cheercoach thing or something or whatever, and I was like, totally, I've never seen the movie, but you know, I'm in ycause he's amazing. So I knew it would be great. But that is it,
And I did know who the main character was. I knew that he was from the movie that we've already done.
We both liked prom Packs so much and we both called this guy out for how good he was, Yes.
And I knew he was a part of it, did not know how talented he was when it comes to singing and dancing.
Damn my god.
Yeah, wow.
I think he is definitely the best lead dancer and singer that we well, maybe not singer, but because there's been a lot of good, great singers.
But he gives Corbyn Blue a run for.
His money, and that's saying something.
And I think Corbyn Blue is a gem. Yeah, so wow, that's all I knew though.
I think he is so good and he is for me, just why this movie works. His performance is unbelievable.
Yes, absolutely so.
I don't know if you've seen Prompact, which which took it was an even newer d comm than this and took DM to whole different level where it was no longer a Disney Channel original movie. It was they were drinking, they're talking about sex, yet very very new modern version. And he was so good. And I saw that movie rider right after you started to call out people where you were like this person's going to be a big star. I'm calling this person now. And I remember on the
podcast saying writer did this. I'm calling Milo mannheim right now because he's so good.
He is a tour de force. Oh, he's so effortless. Like it is just he just oozes charisma. Yes, he manages to be a leading man who doesn't feel like a leading man.
Does that make sense?
Like he doesn't steal it, He's not like it's like he's like unselfish.
Yeah, and he doesn't, he just doesn't.
He just you just love him. Your heart like goes right out to him. He's so charismatic without being showy about it, and like he can kind of be like a lovable loser even though.
He's you know, beautiful and yeah, all the talent. So do you know who he is? Do you know who? Yeah, he's Cameron manheim Son. Yeah I know. And when I found that out, I was like, yes, this makes total sense because she is so talented.
And also I got to work with her on two episodes of the Practice and I was with her the entire time. Could not have been a cooler, nicer, more grounded and just like just into the industry for the right reasons, you know, like always just loved acting and loved and she would sit with me in the practice and just out and taught.
You know.
She was a regular on the show where she was winning Emmys, and she was so funny and so kind. I'm like not and I worked with her in ninety six or whatever, so before she was a mom, But I'm not surprised to find out that she's probably the greatest mom ever. And she raised this like incredibly talented triple threat who's probably a very nice guy.
Like I'm just I'm such a fan. Well, he That's one of the things We interviewed Cornelia Frame, who was the vice president of casting for Disney Channel for doing a lot of these movies, and we asked the question that you hear all the time is when somebody walks in the room, how do you know? And what is it?
Right?
And when you're watching this guy, you just go that that's it. That's the it that people are looking for every time he's on screen. He's funny, he's engaging, he's endearing. That's what we're talking about. So anybody who's wondering what it is, that's what it is. Hit factor in factor we know Ryder had heard of this movie, and I had heard of this movie because Ryder told me about it, So there go, i'd actually heard of one.
That one check he has never seen or heard any.
Of the movie, weirdly, because this entire show was his idea.
I knew this one.
Well, you probably know all the eighties ones, right, like eighties and maybe up to the middle.
Not really, no, not really. There's a lot we're finding where we're going. There's times where we just don't. Somebody be like, you're doing the Thirteenth Year and we're like, is it about bar mitzvahs? And it's about a mermaid and you're like you're, okay, there you go. Sometimes we get it. Sometimes you don't. Very quick answer both of you. Favorite song in the movie.
That was one of my things. I will say the music wasn't it for me?
Big disagree or disagree.
I remember any of those songs.
No, this is what makes this movie stand out for me. Watching it again was like, oh, I actually really really mostly like the songs, and I think I think Someday is just a beautiful song, and especially the repriese.
So the second time they sing someday, it's oh, my god, it's just I it like.
And what I realized is that because I was like when we were watching that this time, when they started doing Someday for the first time, I was like, wait, wait, this isn't the version I listened to. And I realized that I always listen to the reprise because it's more just it's slower. They were really just singing to each other. Their voices are beautiful, the melody is amazing, the lyrics are great.
I think Someday.
Is like one of my favorite musical songs ever, but just the reprise the actual original song was like.
Oh, this is more of a dance number.
It's still a good song, but man, when they bring it back, I because I like the emotional musicals.
My favorite musicals are the lay.
Misses, the like you know, the like buldeol songs like Yeah, I like it where it's like expressive ballads and stuff like that.
So when they do like the pop.
Songs as musicals, I kind of check out. But this one for me, I like pretty much all the songs, the what's the one where they go into zombie town and they're damn like bam okay, that one. I don't love the song, but the number is is.
Here's my thing with these performances.
I'm gonna say it now, this is probably my favorite choreography I've seen from any of them.
That's including my own freaking.
Movie already watched. This choreography is so good. And the first not the reprise, but the first one. I got lost in how great the choreography was.
The staging, the certain things Paul really knows how to.
Do, different stage telling that they're able to do with their like all the lights and like when they make the disco ball out of the little.
Totally.
So I thought so much of that was so great. I didn't catch on to the music. The music and Descendants because of course, obviously you're going to watch this, and if you've seen one or the other, when you're watching the other one for the first time, you are instantly kind of comparing and contrasting.
Sure's great.
Sure, And I will say the Descendants songs were very catchy.
I think they were more repetitive or there was.
Something about it that those songs played in my head and got stuck. This music didn't as much. But the dancing, besides the cheer stuff, right.
We'll get well, we'll get to what you think of the cheer stuff.
But the dancne it just it took me away. I was intrigued.
The music in this movie gave me some of the songs especially gave me real Hamilton vibes, which I dug quite a bit. That makes the big fan of combining the two. So anyway, all right, well we're gonna get into our synopsis, which I think everybody knows by now. Students from the correctly named zombie town are transferred to a normy or Sabrina what are they called in Harry Potter again when you don't have come on.
Oh my gosh, we've done this twice now. Oh it's never going to stick.
The Muggle high school, the normy or Muggle high school in a suburban town preoccupied with uniformity, traditions and pep rallies. We've heard some early thoughts right now, So you loved it, writer.
Yeah, I mean, you know, watching it back the second time, like I said, I have, I have criticisms and thoughts, but in general I am just so impressed.
Like in general I think.
That they thread of very this is a very tricky pitch, Like how do you I mean, you have characters that literally want to eat other characters and they're supposed to be the heroes. That's like, that's a crazy and a horror thematic to bring to a children's story against.
And I think that they pull it off because the whole thing is also about racism, right, So it's like there's that underlormity. There's a lot conformity class, it's all there. There's a lot working and there's so much going on.
They also have bringing in the cheerleaders.
They also have for the first time that I see that not first time, but there's a few characters that you know, are a little bit more boundary breaking.
Type character, which I think is great.
And I think the Channel just does a great way of it being so normal and so it's wonderful.
It's which is great where they just kind of throw it out there and it's just it's what it is.
Yeah.
My hot take on this is it is by far my favorite musical. We see Wow. It's not my favorite dcom. I think Color of Friendship, Color even Going to the mat with Going to the Movie with Andy Lawrence, those two as movies I liked better. As a musical. This to me blew every other one we've seen Out of the Water. Out of the Water.
You got to watch those because you'd probably really like this. Yeah, they're great messages.
Color of Friendship was you told me about after you watched it, you were like, No, this was a really good.
Movie, a really good movie.
I was texting Sue during this, going like, this is a musical and I'm loving it. I love everything about it. It's so fun, it's so well done. I'm so happy. Great I am, I am.
It just makes me so happy.
We'll get into everybody. The movie stars Milo Manheim, who has just talked about as zed. This was only his second gig ever and he only briefly appeared in an episode of The Ghost Whisperer nine years before Zombis. The reason he was in The Ghost Whisper as a little kid is because his mother, who he just talked about, actress Cameron Mannheim, who is one of the stars of Ghost Whisperer and is best known as Eleanor on The
Practice and Lieutenant Kate Dixon on Law and Order. Milo has since been in all of the Zombie sequels as well as The Connors Are reviewed dcom prom Pact, which we really liked and the recent Eli Roth movie Thanksgiving. Meg Donnelly is Addison, a double threat pop star actress who, beyond being in all the Zombies movies, has released a ton of music and also starred on TV on The American Housewife and voices Supergirl in the Justice League cartoon.
So there's a good chance I've worked with her and never met her. Much like most voiceover actors do, Donnelly and Mannheim have actually become producers on Zombies three and four, which is great. Again, like Prompact, they're starting to bring their younger talent to the other side of the camera, which I think is phenomenal. Trevor Torjman is Bucky h Bucky, the over zealous cheerleading captain. The esteem Dancer also plays Parker Preston on the TV show Bunked. Kylie Russell plays Eliza.
She was great. She's already appeared in another dcom jump in which we're going to get to, and also on
Girl Meets World and Modern Family. So Eliza was also on Girl Meets World spoiler alert, we're talking to her next and we're going to ask her exactly who she was on Gromets World and Kingston Foster plays Zoe Kingston has appeared on Good Girls, Just Roll with It, and was recently seen as Eda in Zack Snyder's polarizing Rebel Moon, and was also in prompat The movie is ninety four minutes, officially moving us away from our target number and taking
us back into what could they have cut territory to get to the ninety minute bullseye perfection. It was directed, as Sabrina Said by Paul Hoan, who's behind the camera for all of the Zombies movies and has been a mainstay on kids TV for decades, from TV shows like Sabrina the Teenage Witch to Even Stevens to Live In Maddie and movies like Cloud Nine Just for Kicks and Cheetah Girls One World, which we haven't seen yet but I hear it's cheetah tastic. Don't even get me into
the cheetah chatter. And Zombies was written by David Light who wrote the TV pilot but had only written on You Gi Oh the cartoon before that, and Joseph Rasso, also from the pilot, who had only written on the show called Seed on City TV, whatever that is. I give them a lot of credit for this, the right.
I mean to be able, like I said, to pull this off and to like how you know, coming up with like the Z band, you know, like that's such a perfect dynamic. Yeah, figuring out how to pay it off by having a malfunction being able to make him a normal person to go And I was like, this is really complicated, it's really tough storytelling.
And they pull it off. I was like, yeah, I'm in I'll buy it. I'm totally fine.
And the conformity thing, like having her the really genius stroke of having her have that hair hair issue which I don't want to spoil, but does come back in all these three No, I can imagine, but I don't think they had the plan. They weren't seeing ahead, so they actually just inserted it here, as you know. But it's so smart to have her have this you know, deformity, abnormality or whatever that she then has to sort of.
It's so it's such a stroke of brilliance in screenwriting, and it's really really smart.
I agree. The writing was phenomenal. The show itself was full of green new actors and a lot of crew that were just cutting their teeth, and they did really make audience magic for Disney now. The soundtrack was produced by George S. Clinton, not that George Clinton, but George S. Clinton, who is a crown jewel of Disney Channel Synergy, and made it to number fifty five on the US Billboard two hundreds and number one on the Billboard US Kids
Albums Charts. George S. Clinton also did another little film called Trojan War, starring a young idealistic WILFERDLL. Wow. And before we get into this movie, let's do a role call. Who likes zombie movies in general because they are their whole sub section. What are your favorite zombie movies? And would this movie technically be scary for kids? And I think we've kind of established not really. No.
Well, interestingly, when we sat down to watch it, Indy was like, shouldn't this be PG, shouldn't this be PG thirteen?
We're watching zombie's mom Yeah, Like yeah, baby, but it's gonna be fine.
Yeah.
But then Indy was like, you know, don't get scary at one point, and which I guess. And then when when Zed turns and like there's like this people screaming running, there is a zombie moment, like a genuine football game being taken over by zombie moment.
The actors did so well with it.
They did, so I don't think it's scary at all. I don't think it's too scary for kids at all. But I'm kind of extreme in that, like I think we shouldn't like separate kids, and I think scary is good for kids as a general rule. I think being scared in movies is actually great. So I'm glad that they leaned into the monstrosity for at least a scene or two, and they did.
Yeah. Well, I remember kids kids movies that were about I mean, Monster Squad growing up. For me, it was like one of the coolest movies ever. Yeah, so yeah, yeah, hold no really, I haven't seen it out.
I just remember such a great idea and I loved it when I was a kid too. But you watch it again, you're, like Shane Black wrote it, it's pretty Uh, it's pretty edgy in like the worst eighties ways. But but but the idea of like monsters being fun and adventurous.
Yes, yes, No, Zombie Land great movies. I even like World war Zo. Yeah, I guess so for me, I do.
I do like zombies. Zombie movies. I am so sick of them. I'm so sick of zombie's stuff, and like this movie came out, but it's walking dead.
Yeah, I mean.
Wacky dead stuff. I tried and I was like, no, I can't.
Yeah, I find it hard to do with it. It's just it's just like, how many times can we go back over the zombie thing.
Right, It's like when Buffy the Vampire Slayer was big and there was vampires everywhere for the longest time, and then it simmered, and then Twilight came out and then we're here on It's like, sometimes it's just.
Too much, you know.
I agree. There was team Jacob and Team Edward. I was team please don't do any more Twilight movies, which is which didn't make for as good a poster.
Zombie as a monster keeps coming back, sure, much like the undead creature itself.
And I think.
That that's partly because it speaks to it speaks to something that keeps coming into our culture. Like you know, when you think about like the Return of the Living Dead or The Night of the Living Dead that came out like in an era of television and mass media being a new thing, and then you had like Dawn of the Dead in the eighties, which was all about mall culture and shopping consumer and how it's turning this
into zombies. And then I think, you know, nowadays you have the Internet, you have like you know, the ways that people are sort of like becoming zombie like you know, and so it's a metaphor that just keeps coming back and we always find new ways to you know, and of course with the pandemic, zombies again feel like a good metaphor for like, oh.
Have you caught it? Are you turning? Do you have? You know?
And it's like, so it's a it's a very in some ways simplistic metaphor, but it has so many permutations and it can be so that it's the gift that keeps giving does But I want to go back to your your original question.
Favorite zombie movies.
Nothing beats Sean of the Day of the Dead, and it's a comedy zombie movie. I agresso am a huge fan of twenty eight Days Later. Okay, there's some debate because they are fast zombies and that some people do not count as zombies that you know, these technical definition of zombies have to be slow.
And Santrala needed to get sober and that's why she was there twenty eight days later. No, no, that's twenty eight days. That's just twenty eight days. Oh different, yeah right, ooh, different movie, different movie entirely.
Oh well, almost made that mistake.
Let's go through the film here. The movie opens with the opening credits overview. We learn all about the cookie cutter suburbs of Seabrook through animation and graphics. They all have perfect homes for to a family, and everything was marvelous until an accident involving the local lime soda factory that turned residents into brain eating zombies. Perfect. I just made.
This is this is the best way to make zombies.
Okay for kids.
Ye, they're all zombies because of lime soda. It's green, it makes sense. It's ridiculous, and I'm like, great, I'm on board. Now it's cute. Now it's fun. I'm totally fine with them. One of the eat because they have lime soda poison here. Yes, yes, perfect, and it's related to the local industry. It's like their own fault. It's like the original sin was there. Wow, dare they make lime soda with bad chemicals?
Perfect?
Perfect for moms out there trying to get their kids off the Soda Kicks, Stay.
Away from Lime. Oh, I love it. It was dark times in Seabrook, but eventually the residents built a huge barrier to protect themselves from attacks, which helped their society grow into what it is today. Fifty years later, they found a much better way to deal with zombies, and of course that is the Z band. We all love how instantly they get you into the story. You're caught up right away, let's go, we know what's going on. It till thirty seconds we're in. So now we meet
Z our main character. He's a pale, green haired zombie but also kind of a hoty a Zodie can we call it.
He explains that all ZAIDI I like it, he's a Zobie.
He explains that all zombies are now forced to wear government issue overalls follow a curfew and wear that Z band.
And he's talking to camera yes, which I had breaking yeah, And when he started doing I was like, so, I just always have like a talking to camera phobia like you do. But I have to say it helps with the music musical factor, because it's like you're already breaking the fourth wall when everybody like you say, well.
Just suddenly noses so it me in.
I was like, oh no, this totally worked because then she also talks to cameras like yeah, right, let's just it.
The weird part is though it happens in the beginning, and then you go for a very long time before it happens again, and then it starts happening frequently, and you're I started, no, please stop stop talking to me.
I just have a friend to talk to. I can I can catch up, have a.
Character, a feeling.
It was a rewrite, and they were like, we can't just have them like leaving there. We have to like just explain it to the kids, just to make them comfortable with the zombie thing. And so they were like, okay, let's rewrite the scriptures haven't talked of the.
It's also we found it as we're as we're jumping up in time through the Disney Channel, we're finding it more and more. They're breaking the fourth breaking the fourth wall mom Kimberly Brown's movie, all those of the words she had the forty two Kids or whatever it was.
I also think that for the for the generation that this is targeted at, you know, my son's generation, they influencers are everything people talking to them like, my son, I never allowed YouTube in our house.
We still don't. But he, by the age of five.
Would be like if I was filming him and you started realizing that I would be filming him, you know, just doing normal.
Stuff, he'd be like, wait, wait, dad, you're filming. I'd be like yeah.
I'd be like, hey, guys, it's Indy. I'm like, how did you get influencer voice? How did you learn this? Like, hey, guys, But he does it, and they.
All go, so today we're gonna make We're gonna do this today.
I'm gonna brush my hair.
No, you're right. I mean that makes a whole lot of sense. He's a zombie influencer. He's his influencer. He's going to keep I'm gonna keep making out. I'm just gonna add z O to everything. And that's what we're going for right now. So the Z band that they have to wear, it's a bracelet that stops all impulses to eat people's brains. Kind of important if you're gonna
be around people. Things have evolved now and zed and all the zombie pals or zal's I'll stop are attending a regular high school for the very first time ever, and Zed really wants to try out for the football team. Now we meet Addison. She is a cheerleading standout who's about to try out for the illustrious Seabrook cheerleading squad. She really wants to make the team because she is a perfectly normal team, which she wants to let you know,
which is a big deal at Seabrook. But we actually know that she's different because she has bright white hair she can't fix no matter what she tries. I'm glad to hear it comes back because I would have gone with something bigger. She had gills, she had something hidden that because it seemed like your hair is a different color, wasn't that big a deal. But I get what they were going for, and I liked what they were going.
For, and it wasn't purple, it was white. Yeah, I feel like it.
Yeah, they could have pushed it a little farther, give her, you know, a second arm or something like that, well, or a third arm off in Zombies three. Okay, good, But then.
We're going towards again. Then we're leaning towards the descendants a little bit.
Yeah, right, that's exactly okay, but that we're good. She's wearing the wig because anything in Seabrook that makes you different is bad and she wouldn't be able to cheer. Zed's family is worried about him trying out for human football and the fact that humans don't like zombies, and this is when it becomes a little obvious that this movie is about race relations and or class and or conformity.
Or immigration, like you know, there's also because I love that the zombies have their own language, which kind of sounds polish a gumes like it was like, you know, yes, And I thought that was so clever because it expands the metaphor, right, because if it was just race, if it was, it would be but it can be all of these things.
It's just about being separated and different. Yeah, and how there's more that connects us then separates us. And when you break down the barriers, the literal wall around Seabrook, then you realize that you have a lot more in common than you thought.
And this is I mean again, like it's Romeo and Juliet, It's West Side Story. This is the tale as old as time, and the fact that they were able to because that's the pitch, right, let's do Romeo and Juliet with zombies and cheerleaders, like, and.
That's awesome pitch. How do you pull that off? And I think they did.
This is how they pulled it off with this structure. It's really great.
This is where we learn that Adison's bomb is the mayor and she really wants her daughter to make cheer, especially since it will stop the zombies from making the team. But she tries to warn her make sure your wig stays on. Her dad is very tough on zombies because he is the zombie chief of police. So we know obviously how this household swings when it comes to their political feelings about zombies. Everyone is now off to school, the high class humans and the lower class zombies. And
that's when we get our first musical number. It's all about optimism as Addison sings about her cheer tryouts and zed raps about his first day at school and football for a track called Our Year. I love the first number. I was in this point. This was very Hamilton to me. I just thought kind of the vibe of it. We also show the differences between Seabrook and zombie Town, which we also see is right next to the charred and
burnt out lime soda factor. This is where we now meet Eliza's Zed's best friend, who is not sold on the new relationship between humans and zombies. She's a bit of a pessimist about the whole thing. She thinks zombies need to rise up and stand up for what is right. They shouldn't have uniforms or curfews or special rules. We also meet third friend, Bonzo, who's a total bonehead zombie. He only speaks in grunts, and there is also he
speaks zombie. He speaks zombies, but he's also sometimes just goes, eh, what's it. There's like one throwaway line where we have fifteen words for it was fifteen words for for brains, brains, we have twenty eight words for brains.
Right, how many Inuit words are there for snow exactly?
Yeah, I love it. I was like, that's so clever. Native American words for cod We're totally just thrown away. But I was like, that's a good joke. That's somebody we have twenty eight words for brains. Yes, And then we also meet Bucky the School Bucky the schools agatistical cheerstar and captain. I am now turning this over to our dance expert. You've told me already, but the dancing in this movie is phenomenal, correct.
Yes, phenomenal.
I loved it the first I wasn't ready for it, honestly, I really you know, it's not that the other movies have bad koreokoy, but it's just when you think musical, there's a kind of a style of musical choreography. This was a lot more hip hop influence, break dancing influence.
There was a lot more of that kind of stuff, and it.
Was Australian breakdance influence, and some of them very Australia. Yeah.
Yeah, I saw her in there a couple of times.
I thought there's a lot of acrobatics too. Yes, an Area Sky could do them. You could see that he did not have a stunt double. He does his own back flips.
The guy who played Bucky, Yes, yes, yes, yeah, he's incredible.
I was like, oh, that's actually him. Whenever it got to Addison, who was like they were hiding her.
Face, was like, yeah, you could tell that.
I was like, kindy, that's actually the guy. I'm like, real, they all actually sing, do we think they think they are.
I think.
I think at this point with the Disney Channel, they don't have to bother with somebody who doesn't sing.
Right. Wow, they've gotten over that Zach Effron the last time. They're like no, and they let him get the second one.
Absolutely, But I will say when we get to the pep Rowley, the cheer choreography was not great, okay not great, and it was like, ah, man, they could have just brought somebody in who does that right, Like like you.
I should have brought you. They should have brought you.
They should have I could have thrown in a couple better arm motions. I would think, you know.
Anyway, the school bell rings, but the humans and zombies are still segregated, even at the same school. Chain link fences appear to keep them apart, and zombies can't even enter without a police escort. Bucky Fuck hates zombies, but Addison thinks they deserve a chance, and Seabrook's snotty principle confines them to a basement classroom with a janitor turned teacher and their band from trying out from any clubs or teams so at the first chance he gets, which
I absolutely love. The scene It was brilliant that sneaks out for football triumphs, but instead he slams his foot up against something, so he's like, oh, walking down the hallway, which makes him look like a zombie, and so a human pulls the school zombie alarm. Everyone starts freaking out, running in every direction, and then Addison and z end up bumping into each other while hiding in an empty zombie free room. Brilliant idea too. They have zombie safe
rooms throughout the school. Meet cute, Meet cute zombie. It's it's a tough meat cute because they start conversing but Addison can't see that she's talking to a zombie. We get some immediate flirting, but the minute she sees he's a zombie, she punches him in the face. It is a domestic violence meet cute. It's awesome, great.
It was such a good punch and it was so funny. I just I had to rewind it and watch it again. I love that kind of like comedy. Physical comedy is my fave.
And she nailed both of us.
And immediately she's like and like, I just think it's so good. You're likely right away because between these two actors just leaps off the screen. They are great together. You're right, your root for them so much. So, yes, quite a meet Coot. But then Bucky interrupts and he turns out that he's Addison's cousin and if a zombie ends up touching her, it won't be pretty. Bucky is also an unsung hero actor in this movie.
You Can't Great Villain danned him.
He is so good as the dancer, as the singer, but as the act when.
He comes on and does his jazz hands, like, it's just like he jumps through the poster and they slow it down so he's exactly the same face as the poster.
He just jumped through, and then there's another one behind him.
It's like he comes through and then it reveals more Bucky behind him.
I thought that was brilliant. I'm like, yes, dude, genius. You can tell he's having fun too.
Oh yeah, he loves this.
What a great role.
You know, like to play him not as like what is it's really just his ego, you know.
I just love that it's all about Bucky. Yeah, he's not evil, He's he's on the cars, he's on the posters. Oh, it is so.
Funny, so good.
At the football tryouts the seaside and yes, no joke, folks, the seaside Mighty Shrimps. Why because it's awesome. I kind of love it. I love it. I love the colors, I love all the pastel.
Colors, logo of the shrimp, and the cafeteria would make me not want to eat.
Ever so bad.
It was great, though. The football squad is not going to be good this year, so everyone makes the team except Zed, I thought again. One of the funniest people in this entire movie was coach.
The coach is still good.
I want to just watch him. Oh my god. Everybody makes a team except you. Not the zombies, Oh my god.
And what does he make the asides about his wife like he's just because then maybe my wife's gonna come back.
So, oh my god, he's so funny, so good.
Okay, you can give this. Do we see him again?
I honestly don't remember. Okay, I hope so, because man, he was good. I love he admits he is not a trailblazer, the coach. He is a follower soever the principal says goes.
He says, they don't even do that.
I don't even do that very well. Oh it's so good. So later on, Z tells Eliza and Bonzo he thinks a cheerleader Addison might actually like him, but Eliza is disgusted. Humans suck, but things need to change around here, and being all love w with one of the humans isn't
going to change anything now. At cheerleading tryouts, which we've already heard from Sabrina is the best cheerleading ever, Bucky is running a tight ship, very difficult to get on the team, which leads up to our second song, Fired Up, which is Bucky's manifesto about his cheer squad and Addison's determination to make it alongside with her new friend Brie. It's got lyrics like we were made for this, didn't come here to lose. Nothing's going to get in our way,
so get up and out of our way. And this is the song I would have pulled.
This is your four minutes.
To I knew we.
Needed Obviously we need a number cheer tryouts make sense. I would rather the football triouts got a song and like we did that instead, and it was funny.
But they do that in don't they have that? Indscendants?
This just felt this just felt like a descendant song ripped, you know, and as opposed to the other ones, this is one of those like auto tuning sounding pop songs where I was like, this doesn't this just is not.
This doesn't feel zombies to me. It just felt like inserted.
I wasn't.
So this is the one song.
Yeah, I'd pull this four minutes. I know, we need the energy to keep it. There you go, there's their four minutes. We just made it back. But the choreography is just incredible. I imagine that you and your team, Sabrina do large choreography with songs that you all know right off the bat am I right with the team?
Yes, that's what I figured. Yes, are they are your team ninth ninth grade through twelfth grade?
Yeah, but michaels that I specifically work with our dancers, and we work alongside of the cheerleaders. So my girls are like stunting, they're dancing and dancing.
Gotcha?
Fair enough.
Addison does end up making the team, but Bree barely becomes a stand in. The team is set, but Bucky needs them all to protect the cheer squad from these new zombies. Lines are being drawn more and more that night, Addison brief partake in cheer initiation Oh no, they're driven, and then dropped off in zombie Town and told her remind the freaks they don't belong in Seabrook. And in the scene directly out of Camp Buy Me Love, they have to egg the house of the zombies. They're left
to fend for themselves. They quickly realize how bad the life of a zombie is. Also, Zad sees them and realizes their bad intentions, and now he kind of hates the girl he thought was so cute. The next day is the first PEP rally, which sure feels like a fast turnaround for these brand new cheerleaders. They didn't get a whole lot of time to train, but anyway, Addison wants to stand up for the zombies, but she also has to watch out for herself and of course her
real hair, which she has to keep hidden. But she still visits the basement schoolroom even though humans are forbidden from mixing with zombies. She wants to apologize to z which is kind of nice. She is coming into his world twice now, apologize for going into zombie town with that stupid initiation. She invites the zombies to the PEP rally, and even though Z and Eliza still have differing thoughts
on humans, they all decide to go. The PEP rally is a celebration of Bucky, which again includes him jumping through the gigantic poster of his face, only to reveal that another untouched one right behind it. Absolutely brilliant directing, It was so funny. The rally turns into another cheer number, but Bucky has involved firestick props that will one hundred percent freak out Bonzo, a zombie with a very low IQ. It seems like this is.
Where I was like, oh the CGI fireworks where you can tell that they're not it doesn't And you know why they couldn't do it is because fire martial laws, like you cannot, I mean, you can't have.
Actors running around with real fireworks with giant fire. But it just just looks so fake. I know, I know, it freaks him out like Frankenstein back in the day, and he runs out of the stands and knocks over the football team and the cheerleaders, but Z the football team stands back up. He saves the day. He slams in first. Well, okay, it's it's interesting the way that they have to do this his brain. He slams down on the ground, which hits his his bracelet, which gives
him just a little bit more zombie. He then turns around, slams through the entire offensive line of the Mighty Shrimps football team, and manages to catch Addison from falling from a stunt. His bracelet really seems like it's fragile. It goes right back to where its supposed to be. Afterwards, he's now kind of like the hero of the school elegant elegant scene. There's so much going on.
Yes, a lot happens.
He makes it onto the football team, saves the girl, proves that zombies are still scary to other people.
We now know that these are glitchible.
Yeah, also talk about the z band.
Yeah, all the aspects of the story are set in place, and it's like, boom, a great let's go where Oh my god.
The football coach, of course sees this and wants Zed for the team because of what he saw at the rally. So Zed says he'll join if they let zombies fully integrate into the school. To make a deal, the principle allows zombies into the regular cafeteria to start, and the more football games he wins, the more zombies can integrate
with humans. It's a big deal at the school, even though the zombies still have to sit alone at lunch, but the interspecies flirting between Addison and z continues, and Addison admits she likes the zombie, which I thought was the sweetest scene where she looks over and says, my hands are sweaty that I can feel it in my stomach. Wow, she's got a crush on a zombie. The school, especially
Bucky and Eliza, are furious. These groups are not supposed to intermingle, and people start thinking Addison is different and they don't even know about her hair yet. Addison and Zed pout about their societal beliefs in the hall, and Addison confides in him about her real freakish hair. She knows what it's like to be different. He's been in abject poverty and thrown into the bad side of town. Her hair is slightly different, maybe not on the same level,
but that's okay. She's had to wear a wig to fit into be a cheerleader. Might not be the same, but anyway. Uh. And they have to hide from schoolmates to conceal their interest in each other. We get a new song which everybody loves someday, a song about how one day a girl and a zombie could actually be together. And now I think this song was written even before the script. It might have been.
I think it's like this was like the proof of contact. Let it go with Frozen, Yes, where you you have a song this good and you build a you know, because the lyrics.
Like the fact that he's able to.
Say, girl, you look delicious, I mean gorgeous, It's like, what that's so?
I mean, it's just like it's a great, great song.
And I feel like they built the movie around this number because the choreography, everything tells the whole story.
It's it's it's perfect, it's great, and they're falling in love and we're watching it and we're now all of a sudden, we're at the first football game and Ze is officially on the team, but as teammates at this point aren't not happy about it. They're even helping the opponents by letting z get smackle tackled over and over again. Bucky in the cheer squad best cheerleading I've ever seen watch on am I wrong, Sabrina as Seabrook gets creamed, with only Addison caring about what happens with his new
zombie athlete. The coach and the principal are super mad Zed isn't living up to his promise, and at halftime, the evil principle says if the team loses, it is back to the basement for the zombies. There are real stakes for all of his friends and everybody in this game. So to save the day, Z goes to his computer whiz friend Eliza to jail break his z band let him tap into a little zombie energy for the second
half to win. It's dangerous decision, but desperate times. And it's like also a steroid metaphor, Yeah, and what do you have to do to help people?
And uh huh but like okay, Also she does this whole like swipe left not right?
Isn't that like a dating app? Ing?
Is he?
Yes? I don't know which one, but yes, I was like, is that are we?
I don't know, especially in twenty eighteen. Yeah, you must swipe yees. Swiping right is good. You want to be swiped right or you want to I've never been on a dating app in my life.
I don't know. I have no idea it's one or the other though, But then.
The irony is he has to swipe that whatever he swipes one direction to go on a date with her.
So I was like, oh, this is really clever. It's like a very joke that none of the kids are gonna get.
Yeps watching might be like, oh yeah, it was great, brilliant, really clever.
So they jail break it. It's dangerous. Next play, he becomes a little bit zombie unstable, just a little bit, and we see some of his true zombie cell for the first time. Crazy veins at all, but he becomes a pig skin beast, touchdowns, field goals and above all else. Every time I say it, I cringe little. The Mighty Shrimp win and Zed was able to finally turn off his Z band and go back to normal, no harm, no foul. We get our first addison in Zed hug
and Bucky does not look happy. But then again, other than when he's jumping through posters of his own face, when does he ever look at Ze keeps winning football games, still cheating with a Z band, so the school and community are really coming around on zombie love. Eliza was even able to join the computer club. All the Seabrooks zombies are actually becoming popular. They're now mobbed at lunch, forcing students to be either pro zombie or pro cheerleader,
and most are now into the zombies. But sadly, Addison, who's only wanted to be a cheerleader her entire life, picks the cheerleader side. Now she painfully has to publicly ignore z and communicate only through written notes. They do decide to meet privately in zombie Town for a date, though,
so they won't get caught. We also get an incredible shot of zombie Town here, and it might be the best looking atmosphere in any dcom we've scene so far, and I'm including the opening scene of Descendants where they're running through the market. Yeah, on their own island. I think this looked cooler and better.
Yeah, I liked it a lot.
The set decoration on this movie was next level from again. I even thought the high school pastel colors and the kind of redekeylessness all just worked. It really did. Now, Okay, writer, you're a director in your mind while you're watching this. Could you direct a musical? You obviously could, But would you have done it the same way? Yeah? I was so impressed with this music.
I mean I think that especially this segment when they go into zombie Town and like you're saying, the production design, like the way the atmosphere and you know, budgets are limited when they have to like have high walls for every like the zombie town, like you never see out of it except for like when they do some computer generated skylines.
It's very limited locations.
They do not have the kind of money that like a major feature film musical would have, so you have to make it somewhat theatrical, and you have to use what you do have. And man, I think this director nailed it. And I think like kids don't notice, you know,
like they don't they're in it. They just see And this sequence in the zombie Town party, this number, the choreography shines the fact that they're able to incorporate zombie references and zombie noss into the dancing, into the storyteller and like the spring floor like that that thing.
It's so genius.
First I was like, wait, did they all have knee pads on?
But like that hurts.
That's the thing. It's not supposed to be a spring floor though I think it's supposed to be a regular floor, which the show as a zombie. Yes, you have you can do that some powers in which I thought was great.
Yes, and because it does not look like it's an actual spring floor at all.
Now it looks normal.
They're just bouncing off of it and you're just going, I mean, I was like, what this was?
It was such an incredible number.
I mean, this must have been like a whole week of shooting. Oh for sure.
I was like, they spent so much time in there. There's really like three separate numbers.
Within the one sequence. Yeah, and I thought it was perfect. Here's the thing, though, we're learning more and more about d cooms is you think that you have they have a lot of time, and they don't, and then you find out about it that Like, you know, we were talking to Bart Johnson where who was in high school musical and they do this huge number in the cafeteria and he was like, oh, they had like two days to shoot it.
Yeah, so they well but they had four weeks of rehearsal, you said at the beginning, Yeah, yeah, so they got the dance.
Is the difference?
Yes, So they're able and if in a good director can figure out, Okay, on the day, I'm going to be able to shoot it from here and here and and save money and time so.
That by the time you get there, it's just doing it. Yeah, but that's still I mean, that's such a huge number. Oh it is. And the actors that we've talked to that have been in these musicals that come in and we interview all the same thing is you just shoot it all day, all day long. You're shooting the same thing over and Oh, you just want to be the number to do the number. The number. You do not have kids, Yeah, no, real high schoolers.
You go crazy and you're shoot in Canada, so you don't have union laws. Well only half either Canada or Utah. They flip a coin, were either in Utah or we're in Canada.
Z does confide in Addison though, that he has been messing with the Z band to win games, and also takes her to an underground zombie dance party, which we were just talking about, a town celebration for all the strides that zombies have taken lately. It had real blade two vibes where you've got to actually see the vampire rave which is kind of cool. Then they get the performance mid party from DJ Bonzo Z and Eliza rapping all about how it's finally time for zombies to shine.
The song is called Bayem with two MS, and it's pretty intense, rave like set with a cool flashlight setup and these light up brain balls. It was phenomenal. But no matter how cool the party is, Zed is starting to have major issues with his Z band. He might have taken this a little bit too far, and while walking around the party, Addison runs then into Zed's kid's sister, Zoe, who's like eight and at a ring. It seems a bit problematic, but it is. Addison tries to become friends
with her, but is confronted by Eliza. She isn't having this co mingling, but she quickly softens up and now realizes they're actually have a lot in common and they're slowly becoming friends. Everything is coming up zombie z and then we get a slower reprise Rider's favorite version of Someday, the song that once only hoped a human zombie relationship could work, and now it actually is working, which is why this song coming back works so well. That is
the right or strong reprieve kiss me. They're right about to kiss, and then all of a sudden, a zombie patrolman ruins everything. He's looking to break up the zombie party for curfew. Zed runs off and the cop takes Addison home to a very angry evil mom, who's the mayor and police chief Dad. She admits that she was seeing a boy and her parents demand to meet him or she is no longer allowed to cheer. Strange kind of thing.
Such a weird it's such a.
Weird ghuy to meet the boy, or you can no longer do the thing we really wanted you to do it.
Okay, yeah, right. Also, you have a team. I feel like that's letting down. You can't from team activities as.
You're messing with the team. And everyone knows how good she is Wig and all. So the problem is she obviously doesn't want to introduce them to Zed because they know that they're big zombie racists. But back at school, it's time for the big homecoming football game. Eliza Warnzed to stop manipulating his z band. It is not a
smart thing to do. He promises, just one more game and he'll stop, but unfortunately, some snooty cheerleaders overhear this, and now they know he's been cheating, and they run off to tell Bucky, who's praying to the cheerleading gods glory to all that is firecracker, firecracker sis boombah for a sign to stop Zed, and now he has it. So as a plan, the snoody cheerleaders invitalize it to the new VR room, and since she's a nerg she doesn't even notice another cheerleader sneaking up behind her to
steal her computer. And I also love how they gave her like an old computer that looks like she had to cobble together herself. Britt and even worse, the entire VR invite was fake. Meanwhile, Zed uses his Z band in a brand new and so clever way to completely turn human to meet Addison's parents before they date. By the way, we got confirmation swiping right is good. Swiping left and you pass, so swiping right was human and
that's why she said don't ever swipe right. But even though that's the good one, she said, don't ever do that, which is very it works, which we're all kind of confused about. But anyway, the mayor of the school nobody recognizes him as the zombie that's also the now new star of the town and the football team. He's just the new kid. Where did you meet him? Great? But also this has officially pushed his c band too far. It is now unstable and it is actually hurting him.
We get shots of his wrist where you can see a kind of poison leaking into his body. It's very Tony Stark with the palladium in his chest.
And also very hulk like. Yes, but he's gonnaulk out it any minute.
I don't know a lot about those things, right, but I did get hulk feeling.
You would not like to see me when I'm a zombie, absolutely right. We skip forward in time now it is now the final seconds of the homecoming game, and it all comes down to the last play the Mighty Shrimper down by five, which never happens in a football game. There's no such thing essentially as being down by five. You can there's people out there that are like, if you get a safety in a field goal, yeah, I get it. You're very rarely down by five.
Weird.
It's weird. Addison decides to cheer for the zombies to hype up the crowd, but that is the last straw for her cousin Tucky. Okay boop kicks her off the team, and at the same time, Bucky's crony cheerleaders hack into Eliza's computer with three seconds left, stopping z z band from working. So he'll need to score just as his regular self. But with this in mind, they passed the ball to Zed, who magically does score on his own shrimps win Well. I started to get teen Wolf vibes right around.
Oh my gosh, this is totally wolf playing the sport as a monster. Should I use my monster ability?
Should I not? I was like, Wow, there's a lot of team Wolve him here, even the same literally the same scene where everybody jumps on top of him and he throws them off and comes up the wolf. They come on top of him, he throws them off and comes up the zombie. I didn't notice that, but you're
one hundred percent right. It is absolutely teen Wolf. So the cheerleaders take the whole thing one step further and they just say his z band entirely, and then he goes full zombie and he is hungry for human or one of the twenty eight ways they say brain. Then they do to make it even worse, they do the same thing to Eliza and Bonzo's bands. The crowd is terrified. They're running for their lives, which we get that whole fine.
Zombie vibe Z tracks down Bucky, but right before he's gonna eat the idiot, he stops himself without the aid of the band, which gives you hope that maybe you can change who you are. But if a zombie patrolman stuns him and takes him off in cuffs, Eliza and Bonzo also get caught.
What do you what, it's stunned gun.
It's like.
It's like a it's like a huge you iron clothes.
It looks like a big iron like you like like it was so big, like you.
Couldn't have just like a taser.
I don't know. Just they have cattle prods that are like this big. Now, what are you doing? That's very true, oh man, So everybody's running around. He stops himself, though, so you never know what can happen. But Addison, who's been screaming and crying watching the scene unfold, tells her school to be civilized and not fight zombies just because they're different. She's so mad that she breaks into a song. This is the song I would have cut.
I this is the song I would have cut.
I was not understanding why people were like walking around her, and yeah, when she comes out of it, it's a dream sequence type thing.
Right, when she comes out of it, it makes real sense.
And to a full music video, it's like what is going on in her head? Yeah, and going into it, it wasn't quite clear.
Now I got the same thing as as Baby Be singing in Baby Yes.
In high School musical where she's by herself.
And it's you know, it's this drama aspect.
I totally get it. You know, I'm in for that.
But it just was a little too long and just a little too not so.
Necessary what I would have done if I was directing this all right now, budget and being you know, probably limited, wouldn't have been able to do this. But if she had somehow like stayed in normal motion and everybody else around her went into slow motion, so like indicate like.
I feel like that we're now, and then we do that a little.
Well, they do the like close ups and it's all like kind of fuzzy around her or like a focus. No, just not enough because I was like, is she singing this? Are they seeing her sing this?
And then is she talking to them?
Because it seems like she is, but no one's hearing her.
And then I was also like, she's saying like, you know, the song is like I'm gonna take a stand. It's stand up, stand up. And I was like, well, you you are like you right now you're singing like isn't this you taking a stand? And hasn't she already kind of taken the same time She's done this, I know, but the bottom But.
At the end, when she rips off her wig.
I realized what the song was and I was like, that's cool. Like it's no longer about telling everybody to welcome the zombies. It's about admitting who you are and standing up for yourself.
And I thought that made the whole number make sense. I was like, I was on.
Board with that A million years to get there. That was my issue.
It was it would have been my four minutes.
Yeah, it was the four minutes that was taken up. It took us so long. But then you're right. As soon as she pops that wig off, I was like, oh, it's cool, Bam, I'm back into it.
Bam, she looks great with the white hair.
Yeah, I wish she could.
I don't understand why the wig had to be so ugly. Why couldn't it have.
Been like a cute, you know style, because she looked really good.
I agree. And then we get something here that we've now seen in a number of dcoms, where for some reason we get a montage basically seeing the entire movie. Again, that's happening a lot. And then weirdly, Bucky joins in her singing about sadness, but he appears to be developing a heart. Maybe he's seeing another side because the guy didn't eat his face. And as she's hitting the highest note,
she rips off her wig. Everyone sees her weird white hair, and there's that moment and then they just start booing her, which is really funny.
Big moment they're like, I guess that's why it had to be not like a good looking wig. I guess is why, because they were going to dismiss her on that.
No, no, we don't like it.
Eventually, Zed, Eliza and Bongo are released and get dropped off back in zombie Land, and thanks to Zed now everyone's z band will be updated, so they can't be messed with, and all the kids are forced into zombie only schools. There are serious repercussions to this, but the bands do now have Wi Fi. Eliza wants an uprising. Either they become equal or she tears it all down. She's sick of waiting. Bucky. He's building a civil war of sorts with his cheer team, all in the prep
for the big championship day. Unbeknownst to him, Eliza is setting up the sabotage of the event, which feels like terrorism is a dark place to take a decop, but that's where they went. It is now the day of the Championship competition, and Addison is in the audience, now without her wig. Now this is this is intense.
You have the big game, which usually is the third act in the big climacting moment.
Now we have a whole nother event.
Yeah.
I'm like, wow, this movie's back.
It is.
It just keeps going. I was like, all right, and it gets bad. I mean her parents are like not even sitting with her. You know, there's been serious of serious repercussions to all this stuff going on.
Here we are again in a DCM with bad parenting oh.
Some of the worst parents ever seem to have Disney Channel kids that can sing. Zed finds Eliza under the bleachers scheming and tries to convince her to stop this type of behavior. That's when Addison joins them, and you think she might be against the fid attack, but she's like, no, I'm down for it. Go kill all my blow it up.
But in the end Zed convinces them it's not the way seabrock Cheer takes the stage and honestly, this is another time we see what Rider and you were talking about before, where the actor who plays Bucky is a phenomenal dancer. Yeah, he's and when I notice how good the dancing is, you know how good the person is, because man, this guy can date incredible. But because of the heavy hand and all the recent changes, his team falls apart. The six people that are still on his
team fall apart. Everyone turns on him during the performance, until Zed's sister Zoe jumps up to help. It was very camp rock, which we just saw, but very cute. The booze continue, but Addison realizes it'll take more than one person to change things. Addison and the Zombies take the stage to celebrate their differences and perform a routine they magically just know without any practice, very decom and
instead of joining the revolution, Bucky quits the team. But we watch history unfold as humans and zombies team up to perform a rendition of Fired Up, and the judges love it. Nothing combats prejudiced like good cheerleader and guess who even ends up jumping in Bucky. That's right, Zoe hands him his captain's whistle back changes his mind and now, just like that, Bucky is my favorite character of the
entire movie. He gets an ensemble final performance because the zombie and cheerleader have changed the world with their love. They say they love each other in zombie language, but we don't get a kiss. They didn't end up winning the championship somehow, but they did bring everyone together, and now they've thrown a great zombie and human blank. The party quickly turns into another performance, with everyone from the movie now performing a reprieve of Bayem as the credits
roll and Zed and Addison wave goodbye. Zombie and human together in love, and that's Zombies Won No teas a sequel. So that's a little surprising. We've had that in the past. We had that with Teen Beach Movie and some other ones, kind of an ac credits scene. I mean they didn't know again, they were turning off a pilot.
Yeah, but then you guys would getting ready for Werewolves.
Oh geez, oh geez. And I think that. I think the fourth one is called The Dawn of the Vampire, the one that's coming out in twenty twenty five.
Were Wolves, then Aliens and yeah, but I will say the second one is actually pretty good.
But the songs just don't cut, don't die. I don't want to know, I don't want to open. All right, you guys are doing it all right? All right, now, writer, there comes a time where Subrina and I do something fun called real reviews. We are going to read a five star review and then a one star review of the movie. These are all real Sabrina. I think you have the five star this week. Could you read it?
I do, and I love it because it is so it's such a team writing it that I feel real cool doing this. But I'm totally gonna be super goob and mess it up. I'm sure this five stars from Peter c. This movie absolutely smashed. I watched it with my friend at three AM, and we couldn't stop laughing at the incredible acting and performances. So many of the characters were absolute savages and took every opportunity to roast
either themselves or the main characters. A one million out of ten for me, and the songs slapped boom.
There is your five star review that says it Mike Zombie, Mike drop. I have the one star this week from Logan f I. I'm gonna read it exactly as written, Okay, as I always do. I thought this movie wasn't very accurate to zombie culture. Zombies are dead people brought back to life, and this movie does not embrace that. And there were many mistakes in this movie. For example, Addison wears a wig to cover up her white hair, but there is no way her wig wouldn't fall off while
doing flips. And that's not the only mistake. There are way better and more creative movies. One star, very damn. We also like to play It's This is Sabrina's favorite part of the program right now. Producer Jensen likes to give us a game every week where it's some sort of trivia something along those lines. Sabrina is not the best at it all the time, let's just say, and she's starting to be convinced that it is because Jensen
hates her. I disagree the feature. This week, we are playing a game called Can You Survive a Zombie Apocalypse? This movie has us thinking about what exactly we do if our friends turned into zombies thanks to an issue at the local Lime soda factory. So, according to the website nerd Fitness, there are easy steps on how to survive a zombie apocalypse if one actually happens. So we will get a piece of advice and we have to guess if it's actually on their website or if it's
just made up. And if we do it, we'll end up dying faster than everyone else. If we get three of them right, we win. Neither Sabrina and I know any of the answers, So here we go. Number one, is this from the website telling you to really do this? Or was this made up? Focus on sprints when running as exercise.
I would think that that would be a really good option to do.
Okay, Writer Sabrina thinks it's real, So I would vote against her.
No, I would say no, no, you gotta, you gotta, You've gotta be marathon.
You gotta outrun the zombies. You have to.
Yeah, you can maybe move fast, but then what then you're in a barn and you gotta bar the door.
They still break in. You gotta outrun and out last.
Listen, guys, even a clock is right twice a day. She got it right. No need to be a marathon or use the treadmill to learn how to run in spurts to get away from You.
Gotta give fast. You gotta be fast, all right.
There are races in this country that you can do where people chase It's like part of the marathon of the race that you are running all night and like actors are chasing after you with zombies and yeah no, it's like some of these extreme, you know, themed races that people do love it.
Number two Learn parkour.
Yeah what I don't say that in front of writer your dancer.
Parkour.
Parkour is like extreme walking where you like jump and climb things like in streets like of like yeah, like the athletic ability to like I.
Did for the Olympic opening ceremonies. Back guy, Yes, okay, okay, so learn park Yeah, yeah, I mean I think that would be very very beneficial definite skill.
You both say yes, I'm gonna say I'm gonna say no.
Listen, she's on fire zombies and you probably live in a city or suburb. Obs will need to be avoided to stay safe.
Yes, exactly. Wow, she's two for two.
That is something that I do in my dreams all the time. By the way, she's a dream part for the mob. And I am really good. I mean I can, I can do all of it.
I love it. Number three Avoid being in a large group. Stay nimble.
No, no, you want to well, I don't know, I guess maybe No, No nimble good zombie you want to you want to find other humans to be around.
That's what I would say. I'd say, you want to be in a big group. If there's a lot of food at the buffet, there's a letter chance they're going to grab you.
Power in multiples.
Yeah, start pushing the kids into the zombies.
That's right, I listen, I mean, I guess she'll she'll survive a zombie apocalypse. Survival is more likely in a team. Everyone has different strengths, and you'll need as much power as possible.
Okay, and so you've already won. And number four is only shoot if you know it will kill a zombie. I'd say yes because you want to save the AMMO.
Yeah, that's a gap there, you what it is?
Yeah, and the zombie thing is is like you got to take out their heads, you know.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's tough.
Keep as many bullets as possible.
Agreed? Can we very quickly do? Sabrina sees? What do you got this week? Sabrina?
All right, So the first thing is right in the beginning. I know you guys loved the cartoon, but could they have done maybe a little bit more of a complicated barrier. I don't believe that the zombies could have not just hopped right over that. I mean you could have stood on one person's shoulder to get over that. That was a little crazy, Like you said, Rider. There were some really funny lines in this. My favorite of hers of Addison was the only thing deadlier than my high kick is my low kick.
It was so good. I was like, damn, that was so good. The police officer Gus that comes after the zombie bash. Yeah, how does she know him?
Where did he come from? Why do we know his name is Gus? I get it that he's a police officer. But that just felt really random time.
Her dad is the chief of police.
Okay, but that does not mean you just know Gus.
Gus came out of nowhere and she was like Gus, like Gus had a name.
It was weird. I told you guys already about his thing that he gets a giant, giant thing crazy.
One thing that I will say is they did save certain things within the budget to make some of this other That first one is the wardrobe. Did you guys notice that everyone has the same outfit on the entire movie?
Is because they said the zombie Yeah, the zombies are forced to wear are forced to wear uniforms, but everybody else's too.
Yes, the cheerleader's only wear stuff.
Yes, yeah, it was so.
Weird to me.
And like the principal, why does the principal have one pink suit? Why the coach we already know how he feels about his only pair of sweatmans.
I totally didn't notice you For me, it like existed in this like comic book kind of world where it's like, no, brown doesn't change your shirt, so it's fine.
You know.
It just was kind of interesting that they're going along day after day and everyone is wearing and I noticed it with the principle. I'm like, man, this lad a lot of pink ones. Yes, a lot of pink suits. And then I'm like, wait no the coach and then they go wait a minute. I start kind of just scrolling back. I'm like, they never changed my last one?
Is I understand that she's wearing a wig. I'm wondering in the second movie, We're gonna have to wait for the sequel, will why does the mom have a wig on? Because that is clearly a blonde wig?
That was a wig too.
Do we dive in there or.
Is it just an actress that has been their hair and they flap a blonde wig.
That's my guess, but we'll have to see.
But I'm like that would be like, does the mom also have this white hair that she is you know? Or is her hair purple or something that she's because she is absolutely wearing a wit.
Okay, third movie reveals I can't wait.
I can't wait, So I guess have to put a pin in it for an hour.
Mom has been sleeping with zombies for years, but anyway, she has been getting some zombie strange and that's just the way zombie you never go back, never go back once you go zombie you. Now we are at the portion the end of our show here where we like to rate the film. We've done Rider and we always rate one out of ten, but we pick different rating systems every week. So this week, would we like to
do one out of ten? Cameron mannheim Sons one out of ten, zombie DJs one out of ten, manipulated z bands one out of ten, Cheer Championship, terrorist attacks one out of ten, not so weird white hair one out of ten, light up brain balls, or one out of ten Bongo Fears of Fire? Can I make a stress please?
Yes?
One out of ten? Mighty Shrimp?
Oh, I love it.
That's what we're doing as a best Rider one out of ten mighty shrimp? What do you give? Zombies one? This Zombies one gets a full nine mighty shrimp for me. Wow, solid score of a nine mighty shrimp. Sabrina, what do you got?
Oh man?
I did really like this movie, the choreography, and it was extraordinary to me. I like I said, this is my favorite choreography we've seen, and that's gonna bump it up to an eight point five for me Okay, my eight point five mighty shrimp.
Like half a shrimp, like it's half. It's just like gross.
Because I it's hard when we know there's a sequel, because you're going we know the budget's going to be better. I can't jump too high because I feel like it's going to get better. Although I know rider, you did say that this is your favorite for me.
Yeah, wow, okay, first one.
I'm interested. Now we're going to be I.
I agree one hundred percent with our guest this week. This is this is my favorite musical so far. I might even go to a nine point five based solely on a tail on my Milo's performance. You I watching Milo, You're seeing a star. I mean, you're just seeing a star.
I I actually think it's I mean, as much as he might be having fun and he's now a producer on the films that's green, like he could be a movie star. Like this might be holding him back, like he will well he should be doing it right now, you know what I'm saying, Like, go watch prompacked.
Prong Pack feels much more like a movie on a pacts like feel like a channel.
A regular old school romantic comedy, high school teenage romantic comedy. They're phenomenal.
Slave.
He was great, so good, So I'm gonna give it a nine point five. I really enjoyed this movie. I really liked everything about it. I'm now going to lower my expectations for Zombies two. This time it's personal. In Zombies three, now it's even more personal, so that'll be good. But Ryder Strong, thanks so much for joining us for Zombies. Yeah, thank you, guys, thanks for having me.
This was so fun.
This was so cool and so fun. And we're so happy that you're here. And we're not gonna let you off the hook yet. We will down the line drag you in for some other films. I'm gonna do some where you've never seen them before. We're gonna I'm gonna pick one and be like, hey, you are coming here to watch whatever next please, And yeah, I want to go weird. I want to go into like the obscure eighties. Seven. Okay, well,
here you go for rear. This is the perfect time to wrap it up then, because our next movie out there, Fans is one that I picked and I've never seen it, but I loved the poster and that's all I went by. It is a real throwback nineteen eighties The Ghosts of Busley Hall. It's available on Disney Plus, so jump ahead and get ready for an all new episode. But in the meantime for our park Opper episode over on our own magical rewind feed, we are digging even deeper for
zombies with actress Kylie Russell. The computer with zombie Eliza herself. We had a great, great time talking to her all about the routines and her wrapping, and she is going to get in a little bit about what she was thinking about blowing up the school's gym. Let's listen to a little bit of that right now. I don't know what it is like in the rehearsal space.
I can follow along and I can kind of keep up, but it wasn't until like I got on camera and they're like action where like something just kind of like clicked and I was like, okay, I.
Got this, Like I can do it, Okay, cool, Wow.
It stards in the rehearsal space, I feel like rehearsal time, and then on screen it just kind of like how did.
Yeah, where did that happen? Thank you everybody so much for joining us, and remember to subscribe to our feed and you can follow us at the Magical rewind Pod on the Instagram Machine. Thank you, Righter Strong, Thanks guys, Thank you again, Sabrina, Thank you guys.
Every wh