World War Z ratings/spoilers

[Locutus of Bored]

Kirk would have still have been brain dead. So those are amazing nanites.

I didn't say they were nanites, I said they were probably cells in the blood that worked similar to the concept of using nanites to repair other damaged cells.

As far as brain death goes, it's the 23rd century, I'm sure Bones has some means to keep oxygen flowing to the brain and keep electrical activity going, he just needed a way to repair the radiation damaged cells. Hence the blood.

The point is IMO that I lilked both films and it seems odd that a suspension of disbelief for Khan's magic blood isn't farfetched whereas superfast zomibes wouldn't attack sick humans is.

They're totally different genres, set in totally different eras, with totally different medical conditions and technology at play. It just seems like you would compare it to other zombie/outbreak genre films before you went so far afield.

A cougar can travel at 45 MPH and as they pointed out in the film likely wouldn't attack sick prey.

Cougars are typically more ambush predators than sprinters, and they and other big cats prey on the sick, the old, the young, and the weak all the time because they're easier to kill, but that's beside the point. Was that really the example they used in the film? Because that's completely wrong if it was. I don't recall exactly what they said though, though.

Regardless in both Trek and Z - it's both fiction. I liked both films. Did you like Z?

It was fairly entertaining in the first two sections, though I thought it fell totally flat in the (most important) third act of the film once they left Jerusalem. Judging the film on its own merits and without comparing it to the book, which still bugs me, because they were just piggybacking on the name recognition while carrying over almost nothing that made the book unique or engrossing; but just for the film on it's own I'd give it a grade of "B-".

Another thing I thought was ridiculous --though this is a flaw of the novel as well-- is that there is just no way in this day and age off mass global media that a zombie plague could spread around the world and still take people by surprise as they're sitting in their cars in Philadelphia. Look at how the media reacts to SARS, Bird Flu, Mad Cow, and every other disease that pops up every few years and then tell me they wouldn't be all over a zombie outbreak in India and Korea like flies on shit within five minutes. Hell, one guy on drugs in Florida went cannibal and that was national news for a couple weeks and spawned all kinds of exaggerated spin-off stories.

Just like slow moving zombie not being able to be easily destroyed by the military, I guess it's a conceit of the genre that you just have to live with in order to justify the threat becoming global, but it's just so silly when they seem to forget that the media even exists.

I did appreciate that this film actually tackled the mass outbreak itself again, though, instead of just skipping to the aftermath by having the protagonist in a coma or something, as some other recent zombie/outbreak films/shows do.

 

[DarthTom]

One of the biggest problems I had was that the Zombies in the movie where uncontrollably drawn towards noise, seem like it would be very easy to just lure them somewhere and kill them at will.

Without spoiling the book if you haven't read it - that's part of the solution. The other part I'll leave unspoiled how that eventually ends the plague.

 

[DarthTom]

Another thing I thought was ridiculous --though this is a flaw of the novel as well-- is that there is just no way in this day and age off mass global media that a zombie plague could spread around the world and still take people by surprise as they're sitting in their cars in Philadelphia. Look at how the media reacts to SARS, Bird Flu, Mad Cow, and every other disease that pops up every few years and then tell me they wouldn't be all over a zombie outbreak in India and Korea like flies on shit within five minutes. Hell, one guy on drugs in Florida went cannibal and that was national news for a couple weeks and spawned all kinds of exaggerated spin-off stories.

If I recall correctly the book solves this problem by placing the initial outbreak in China The Chinese government hides the cases from the media, in rural provinces which they close. By the time it gets out of control and spreads to the US - the book suggests that the President and/or the governent hides the problem by suggesting that they have a cure - a faux cure - and the public is pacified until after the election - and until it gets out of control in Yonkers - which as you say is a major tipping point in the war in the US and isn't covered in the movie.

Also the book has the US Government moving operations to Hawaii and the government being run off an aircraft carrier. Hawaii obviously being a landmass that is easy to contain the virus on.

BTW - the Walking Dead I'd think has an even bigger problem with the media and spreading problem in terms of it being a believable scenario because the zombies aren't even as fast moving.

With regard to how the virus spread when the infection is so quick, I thought there was a throwaway line about how 5% of infected take a while to turn, presumably they're the ones spreading it? Still doesn't quite hold true, but at least partly explains it.

Now that you mention it there is a very brief line of dialogue IIRC in the bunker in Korea - where one solider says it takes up to a day for people to turn and Pitt disagrees and says it's a matter of seconds. In otherwords circumstances have changed on how fast the virus changes people.

The reasonable solution to the problem is the virus has mutated as it has spread.

I'll repeat what I said earlier. I wish more people would give this film a chance. For all films this summer the competition has been fierce though.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

I'll repeat what I said earlier. I wish more people would give this film a chance. For all films this summer the competition has been fierce though.

I did give the film a chance, and graded it on its own merits without comparison to the book (in which case it would have rated much lower, IMO) despite not liking that they used the source material almost solely as a means of generating name recognition and not as a template for the script. I would have been perfectly open to some of the obviously necessary for conversion to film format changes, as long as the general spirit of the novel remained. I gave it a B-, which seems to be roughly around the critical consensus, IIRC. It's not like I gave it a D or an F.

 

[DarthTom]

I gave it a B-, which seems to be roughly around the critical consensus, IIRC. It's not like I gave it a D or an F.

Critics on Dirty Rotten Tomates gave it a 68% and the audience 86%

Interestingly enough though critics gave Man of Steel a 56% and the audience gave it an 82%

Yea that makes a lot of sense - the critics and the audience both liked Trek and Z better than Steel yet Steel blew Trek and Z out of the water at the box office.

Go figure.

BTW, I meant people other than you to see the film. Several posters in the Sci-Fi Fantasy forum decided to skip the film because of the trailer. The film IMO is better than the trailer leads one to believe.

 

[Goji]

The film was okay but I have no trouble with Man of Steel outpacing it at the box office. It and Star Trek are both better movies.

I haven't read the book World War Z. Maybe I will at some point, but I'm not comparing the film to the book at all in my evaluation of it. The movie succeeded in entertaining me despite the fact that Brad Pitt's character couldn't have had less personality if he tried, and I felt that all the action sequences prior to the suspenseful sequences in the health organization (which, I gather, is where the reshoots start) were pretty generic and underwhelming. The zombies coming over the wall scene gave me flashbacks to Starship Troopers, a movie which did the same thing better 15 years ago.

 

[Gaith]

WTF is with all these unmarked Trek spoilers?

Again, the cold, the flu, virtually ANY disease or infection can be "deadly" in the right circumstances. So wouldn't the zombies pretty much ignore the vast majority of the population? And even if you're not suffering from a viral infection you still "have" every one you've ever had, you're just immune so it doesn't make you sick anymore.

That plot thread doesn't hold up under much scrutiny. I *liked* it because it was an interesting take on things and if they go ahead with more movies it'll be interesting to see how the build on it but it's not something that holds up under much thought.

The whole plot sense makes absolutely none.

1) Where was Pitt's family going, and why were they in such a hurry in the first scenes? It's obviously not a school day, because kids aren't that excited to get up for school, unless it's Justin Bieber visit day or something. So why is the breakfast so rushed?

2) Why is the Navy command center 200 miles off the shore? Unless the zombies can swim, ten miles should be plenty; any more is a waste of precious helo fuel.

3) How did General Brewster survive being shot by the T-X, and why was he transferred to the Navy? Come on.

4) Why did the SEALS let the doctor handle a weapon?

5) Why, in both Korea and Wales, did our heroes decide to move around at night? Significantly increased risk of failure for no immediate gain.

6) Just how long can zombies survive, anyway? Where does their energy come from?

 

[DarthTom]

The whole plot sense makes absolutely none.

Snipped all of the nitpicks in Z.

You must really have a shitload of nitpicks with The Walking Dead then because the whole thing makes even less sense with slow moving zombies and that they could overtake the entire US military not to mention the fact that over 50% of Americans own some type of firearm.

 

[Gaith]

You must really have a shitload of nitpicks with The Walking Dead then because the whole thing makes even less sense with slow moving zombies and that they could overtake the entire US military not to mention the fact that over 50% of Americans own some type of firearm.

"Why did the SEALS give a civilian a firearm" is a nitpick. What you describe are legitimate objections to core story problems; "uberpicks", if you will. Anyways, I always suspected TWD was a stupid show; thanks for the confirmation, and the warning against ever trying it.

Fact is, I tend to think the zombie genre is hopelessly dumb and played out. Although I'm sort of curious to see what the sequel to this will consist of, I'd rather Pitt were in better films. Oh, well. I bought a ticket to this; I accept the consequences.

I do wonder, though, what effect, if any, this franchise will have on the perpetually-in-development Y: The Last Man project. Like the vast majority of Y fans, I'd most like to see an HBO series adaptation, not movies. Maybe the globetrotting-apocalypse Z flavor will put a kibosh on Y film development? And how does X feel about all this?

 

[DarthTom]

Although I'm sort of curious to see what the sequel to this will consist of, I'd rather Pitt were in better films. Oh, well. I bought a ticket to this; I accept the consequences.

I'd be very surprised if they make a sequel unless Pitt does it virtually for free. The film cost $190 million to make and its unlikely at this point that it will even break even. Paramount which owns the rights currently to the film and IIRC the film rights for the book isn't likely to sink more good money after bad on a franchise that cannot make them $$.

Shit at this point also expcet to see a scaled back Trek for the next film and it's on Track for a 50% profit margin for Paramount which was also under expectations as well.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Anyways, I always suspected TWD was a stupid show; thanks for the confirmation, and the warning against ever trying it.

Well, if you won't even try a show because of something that happened offscreen and isn't even an important aspect of the series, which is very much character driven drama with the zombies only serving as an occasional means to an end and other humans being by far the more dangerous creature, then yeah, I'm glad you're not watching it and commenting in the threads.

Darth Tom feels this weird need to compare everything, and unfortunately he missed the point of The Walking Dead massively in his description if he thinks how the military fought the zombies was of any importance to the story, since it wasn't even shown in any detail. By the time we catch up with the main cast the fighting is already over and it's just small band of survivors struggling to stay alive and overcome the zombies, other groups of survivors, and themselves.

 

[DarthTom]

Darth Tom feels this weird need to compare everything, and unfortunately he missed the point of The Walking Dead massively in his description if he thinks how the military fought the zombies was of any importance to the story, since it wasn't even shown in any detail. By the time we catch up with the main cast the fighting is already over and it's just small band of survivors struggling to stay alive and overcome the zombies, other groups of survivors, and themselves.

We see the remenants of what happened at least. A big fire fight at a hospital where Rick finally leaves where apparently a large battlion of the US army presumably armed to the teeth is overtaken by slow moving walkers.

And we see Atlanta being fire bombed from the sky.

We also see the left over of the fight at the school where they try to get supplies to save Carl.

We don't see - at least in the film - in Z a large scale engagement with the military either except in Isarel either.

The point is, if someone believes the whole zombie genre is dumbass to begin with and pokes holes in the plots of - how can they do this, that and the other against a superior foe - the Walking Dead which is very popular is even less probable in terms of a scenario in which the zombies could win to the extent they have been depected to have done so.

But yes - I agree TWD isn't overall about how they overtook the US army but rather about a small group of people fighting them.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Yeah, I know what little they showed of the military fighting the zombies in The Walking Dead (hence my remark about "not showing it in any detail"), just as I knew what was in the novel of World War Z when you told me everything that happened in that too. Explaining things that I've already seen and read too and that don't alter my point in any way is not really useful.

The point is that how the zombies took over the world in TWD is not really important to the story. It's just something that had to happen in order to get to the story they really wanted to tell, which is that of a small group of survivors learning to cope in the aftermath of this massive ongoing tragedy.

 

[Trekker4747]

Yeah, I know what little they showed of the military fighting the zombies in The Walking Dead (hence my remark about "not showing it in any detail"), just as I knew what was in the novel of World War Z when you told me everything that happened in that too. Explaining things that I've already seen and read too and that don't alter my point in any way is not really useful.

The point is that how the zombies took over the world in TWD is not really important to the story. It's just something that had to happen in order to get to the story they really wanted to tell, which is that of a small group of survivors learning to cope in the aftermath of this massive ongoing tragedy.

Indeed, TWD isn't so much about zombies as it is about the characters and society trying to rebuild itself.

Since seeing WWZ and TWD S1 and S2 I've been thinking a lot about the "Zombie Apocalypse" when I look at people and I'm pretty much convinced the vast majority of the people I see every day wouldn't survive. I mean when you can barely go the the grocery store and buy food without making it the world's most difficult decision it'd be pretty hard to survive on one's own instincts and foraging for food on your own.

Hell, after a week or so past running out of my medication I wouldn't be able to make it because by then my seizures and headaches would likely cripple me.

 

[sidious618]

I enjoyed World War Z a hell of a lot more than I thought I would. It had some pretty stupid aspects but there was also a lot of cool ideas and unique imagery. I thought the ending was as good as could be considering that Zombie stories can't really end unless you get rid of all the Zombies, which would be stupid, or kill off all the characters, which would be lazy. That said, there's definitely a better film trying to get out and I want to get my hands on JMS' original script.

 

[Mister Fandango]

So the zombies in World War Z have some kind of super detection ability that, even when faced with a perfectly healthy appearing person, causes them to utterly ignore them? Regardless of what the ailment is?

Eh?

Uh, yeah, I didn't care for the movie at all. The level of Dumb was just too much for me. Especially since, unlike The Walking Dead, the zombies were the main focus of the story, as was the solution(?).

Sure, I could say I enjoyed it more than I thought I would, but that's because I thought I'd enjoy it about as much as I'd enjoy a root canal without any anesthetics.

I've never read the book, just a blurb on Wikipedia, but I'm pretty sure I'd rather have seen a movie based on that than whatever this was supposed to be.

 

[Gaith]

I'd be very surprised if they make a sequel unless Pitt does it virtually for free. The film cost $190 million to make and its unlikely at this point that it will even break even. Paramount which owns the rights currently to the film and IIRC the film rights for the book isn't likely to sink more good money after bad on a franchise that cannot make them $$.

Box Office Mojo:

Journalists have been writing World War Z's obituary for months, but ultimately audiences didn't care much about the behind-the-scenes drama: the zombie action movie shocked everyone when it opened to $66.4 million, and had already amassed $123.7 million through the end of the month. It's on pace for a final tally well over $180 million, and with good overseas grosses it should be well-positioned for a sequel.

​

AV Club:

Flush with success at the box office, Paramount has announced it's working on a sequel to the Brad Pitt-vs.-zombies blockbuster World War Z. The project was originally intended as a trilogy, was then scaled back to a single movie whose production was nearly scrapped after a troubled shoot, only to see the movie bounce back to become an unexpected hit—so pretty much anything could happen at this point. Still, the film's $66 million opening weekend was enough to convince the studio that perhaps people will go to see a movie with Brad Pitt in it after all.
​

 

[ATimson]

Since seeing WWZ and TWD S1 and S2 I've been thinking a lot about the "Zombie Apocalypse" when I look at people and I'm pretty much convinced the vast majority of the people I see every day wouldn't survive. I mean when you can barely go the the grocery store and buy food without making it the world's most difficult decision it'd be pretty hard to survive on one's own instincts and foraging for food on your own.

I know that I would be totally screwed in the event of an apocalypse - I'm in terrible shape, and my skill (computer programming) wouldn't be useful in the slightest. But you know what? I'm okay with that. I can be the distraction while everybody else runs.

 

[Starkers]

For me what gives TWD an edge is the

Spoiler: Just in case people have only seen season 1 of TWD

whole notion that everyone is infected anyway, this is the factor that essentially makes any long term hope for rebuilding civilisation quite tenuous. You don’t just have to worry about the zombies outside of your walled township, you have to worry about all the healthy people inside the compound because everyone, including yourself, is a potential fifth columnist. You can kiss your wife goodnight and be woken two hours later when she’s gnawing your leg off because she had a heart attack in her sleep. Little Timmy and his friends can be running around a deserted building having a right old time, till Timmy trips down the stairs, breaks his neck, and next thing you know he’s a zombie, and likely pretty soon so are his friends.

Now imagine this in battle, you not only have to worry about your fellow soldiers being bitten, you have to worry about friendly fire too (and the impression is that this wasn’t common knowledge in TWD universe) as well as accidents and disease. Especially in the early days I wonder how many (non-zombie bite related) wounded soldiers were carted back behind the lines to medical facilities where they subsequently died and turned?

I liked WWZ much more than I expected to, though I did find it ironic that I wasn’t allowed to see Pitt bludgeoning zombies' heads in in a 15 certificate film in the cinema, when I can see Andrew Lincoln do it on the telly!

 

[davejames]

Finally saw this, and geez, they weren't kidding about it turning into a completely different movie at the end! I can't remember the last time I've seen an ending that felt so completely cut off from the style and tone of the rest of the movie like that.

As for the movie overall, I thought it was OK. There were some genuinely intense moments here and there, and there was a freshness and originality to many of the action sequences (like at the South Korean airport or in the zombie-infested plane) that I really liked.

But the whole thing flies by so fast-- with zombie attacks that are so quick and bloodless-- that the movie never really has any real weight or impact. It never feels like this is really happening, but instead like you're just watching a shortened, videogame version of the events or something.