TV
Review's and news of Horror related TV shows.
The Zombie Factor - Pilot Episode
Think of Big Brother, boring yeah? Ok add zombies! Add a death each week, sounds awesome right! That is the basic premise of Matt Cantu’s new TV series The Zombie Factor.
In recent years TV has been taken over by reality TV shows, The X Factor and Big Brother to name a few. More importantly thought Zombies have been popular since 1968 when George A. Romero made Night of the Living Dead. Zombies are cooler then reality TV, a lot cooler.
We are introduced to the main characters in the Zombie Factor early on when they are interviewed as they are transported from the street to a abandoned warehouse which has been converted into a living area. The characters are all uniquely different, the blonde dumb girl, the hard as nails girl, the worried gay man and the angry black man.
The Davina McCall type presenter could become increasingly annoying as the show progress but this is normal, as Davina McCall and the two short Geordie blokes from the X Factor increase in annoyance throughout the series.
The show is set out perfectly as a reality show, the characters are all annoying but likeable.
Zombie hat day seems like an interesting idea, the contestant’s are forced to try and grab the hats, the zombies are wearing on their heads. Funny and a tad scary, I like forward to seeing more odd and unusual challenges. This is when we see our first zombie attack; Jason is grabbed during the hat challenge which is a comic relief from something I was starting to think would get a little bit repetitive and boring.
The group seem to gel real quickly and when they are performing the challenges, they encourage each other well reminded me of the Crystal Maze but with zombies. Zombies would have made the Crystal Maze a hell of a lot more fun.
We were lucky enough to have the opportunity to ask creator/director Matt Cantu a few questions:
HH - How did the idea for the Zombie Factor first come to you?
MC - Like many ideas, this one was conceived in a bar. Initially, it was a send-up on a Steve Irwin nature show, but with instructions on what to do when the zombies come. After some writing and development it turned into more of a satire on reality TV, with contestants battling in zombie-based challenges. Once the location was locked, a partially abandoned warehouse down river from downtown Detroit, the concept was adapted to fit in what we had and many new ideas came to light. We had to improv quite a bit over the course of the shoot, both the actors in their performance and myself in crafting the setups to get everything we could.
HH - Did you watch any reality TV shows to get the idea for characters?
MC - I only watch a few. I think our hostess was definitely modeled after Heidi Klum on Project Runway which I do watch somewhat regularly. The cast is just an amalgamation of all the other shows out there, most of which I try to avoid. I also follow Top Chef and Deadliest Catch. In fact, one of the challenges featured in the flash-forward through the season is entitled "Undeadliest Catch" where contestants have to haul zombies out of a crowd and hog-tie them in a moving flat bed truck.
HH - Will the Zombie Factor be made into a full series and released anywhere?
MC - That's the plan. The 22min pilot was produced as a proof-of-concept to be shopped around and to hopefully get us a pitch meeting at a network, which we are still eagerly working toward. If we acquire a deal, we would reshoot episode 1 again starting with 13 contestants.
HH - How did you think of the various zombie "Challenges" for the characters to perform?
MC - That was one of the most difficult and fun parts of writing/developing TZF. We had to stick with challenges that were practical and not beyond our meager budget. I have bigger challenges planned, but we'll need to hold off til we get funded for some of them. Many of the ideas come out of classic horror. One that we planned to do on the pilot shoot was "a machete into a zombie's head challenge" (just like Savini swung at the mall in DotD) with points given for blade depth, but it proved a really tough gag to pull off. We had to stick with what would work easily as we only had two days to shoot.
HH - Whats next for yourself? (Film wise)
MC - I am developing a musical/comedy feature with some other talented folks based in Detroit. We are working on an adaptation of a theatrical play that has run in both Detroit and New York entitled "Cancer! The Musical" and we will be building a crowd-sourced funding drive soon for that one.
For more information on the show, please click HERE
James Voller
In recent years TV has been taken over by reality TV shows, The X Factor and Big Brother to name a few. More importantly thought Zombies have been popular since 1968 when George A. Romero made Night of the Living Dead. Zombies are cooler then reality TV, a lot cooler.
We are introduced to the main characters in the Zombie Factor early on when they are interviewed as they are transported from the street to a abandoned warehouse which has been converted into a living area. The characters are all uniquely different, the blonde dumb girl, the hard as nails girl, the worried gay man and the angry black man.
The Davina McCall type presenter could become increasingly annoying as the show progress but this is normal, as Davina McCall and the two short Geordie blokes from the X Factor increase in annoyance throughout the series.
The show is set out perfectly as a reality show, the characters are all annoying but likeable.
Zombie hat day seems like an interesting idea, the contestant’s are forced to try and grab the hats, the zombies are wearing on their heads. Funny and a tad scary, I like forward to seeing more odd and unusual challenges. This is when we see our first zombie attack; Jason is grabbed during the hat challenge which is a comic relief from something I was starting to think would get a little bit repetitive and boring.
The group seem to gel real quickly and when they are performing the challenges, they encourage each other well reminded me of the Crystal Maze but with zombies. Zombies would have made the Crystal Maze a hell of a lot more fun.
We were lucky enough to have the opportunity to ask creator/director Matt Cantu a few questions:
HH - How did the idea for the Zombie Factor first come to you?
MC - Like many ideas, this one was conceived in a bar. Initially, it was a send-up on a Steve Irwin nature show, but with instructions on what to do when the zombies come. After some writing and development it turned into more of a satire on reality TV, with contestants battling in zombie-based challenges. Once the location was locked, a partially abandoned warehouse down river from downtown Detroit, the concept was adapted to fit in what we had and many new ideas came to light. We had to improv quite a bit over the course of the shoot, both the actors in their performance and myself in crafting the setups to get everything we could.
HH - Did you watch any reality TV shows to get the idea for characters?
MC - I only watch a few. I think our hostess was definitely modeled after Heidi Klum on Project Runway which I do watch somewhat regularly. The cast is just an amalgamation of all the other shows out there, most of which I try to avoid. I also follow Top Chef and Deadliest Catch. In fact, one of the challenges featured in the flash-forward through the season is entitled "Undeadliest Catch" where contestants have to haul zombies out of a crowd and hog-tie them in a moving flat bed truck.
HH - Will the Zombie Factor be made into a full series and released anywhere?
MC - That's the plan. The 22min pilot was produced as a proof-of-concept to be shopped around and to hopefully get us a pitch meeting at a network, which we are still eagerly working toward. If we acquire a deal, we would reshoot episode 1 again starting with 13 contestants.
HH - How did you think of the various zombie "Challenges" for the characters to perform?
MC - That was one of the most difficult and fun parts of writing/developing TZF. We had to stick with challenges that were practical and not beyond our meager budget. I have bigger challenges planned, but we'll need to hold off til we get funded for some of them. Many of the ideas come out of classic horror. One that we planned to do on the pilot shoot was "a machete into a zombie's head challenge" (just like Savini swung at the mall in DotD) with points given for blade depth, but it proved a really tough gag to pull off. We had to stick with what would work easily as we only had two days to shoot.
HH - Whats next for yourself? (Film wise)
MC - I am developing a musical/comedy feature with some other talented folks based in Detroit. We are working on an adaptation of a theatrical play that has run in both Detroit and New York entitled "Cancer! The Musical" and we will be building a crowd-sourced funding drive soon for that one.
For more information on the show, please click HERE
James Voller