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G.O.R.E. Score: A Christmas Carol of the Living Dead

Posted by Tony Schaab on December 21, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
Christmas Carol of the Living Dead (2010)
Christmas Carol of the Living Dead (2010)

Original Release Date: December 5, 2010
Publisher: Zombo Books

There are a lot of “zombie mash-ups” out there these days.

For those that may be unfamiliar, “zombie mash-ups” are a trend that started a few years ago, when someone takes a classic or pre-existing archetype and inserts zombies into it. Authors and filmmakers have “mashed” a wide variety of genres and characters with zombies. Some of the genres we’ve seen zombies dropped in include Westerns, Sci-Fi, Romance, Anime, and even Porn (!); zombies have been inserted into superhero comic books and re-written stories about fairy tales, The Wizard of Oz, War of the Worlds, Robin Hood, Alice in Wonderland, and Huckleberry Finn. Even The Beatles have recently received the “zombie mash” treatment.

When an author mashes-up a story with zombies, though, it’s probably best to make sure that your “source material” hasn’t been used before, or else you’d better have a damn amazing take on the tale that would trump the predecessor mash-up. For example, one version of “Zombeo & Juliet” might be stomach-able, but if another author were to try their hand at the exact same mash-up…you get the idea.

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G.O.R.E. Score: The Last Christmas

Posted by Tony Schaab on December 19, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
The Last Christmas (2006)
The Last Christmas (2006)

Original Release Date: November 15, 2006
Total Number of Issues: 5 (Miniseries, collected graphic novel)
Publisher: Image Comics

Happy Holidays to everyone! In the spirit of the season, however you choose to celebrate, I would like to share with you the first Christmas-themed G.O.R.E. Score ever written for this site, released at this time last year: the quirky graphic novel “The Last Christmas.”

“The Last Christmas” is a five-issue mini-series published by Image Comics. The story was written by Gerry Duggan and Brian Posehn. Duggan is a comic-book writer who doesn’t appear to have many credits to his name, and some might recognize Posehn’s name from his stand-up comedy and minor roles in various recent movies and television series. According to their thank-yous in the back of the graphic novel, the two creators said the idea for this story was “hatched by two idiots playing Halo,” and I’m sad to report that this is exactly what the book feels like – a haphazard story thrown together by someone who didn’t really think things through too thoroughly.

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G.O.R.E. Score: The Undead That Saved Christmas

Posted by Tony Schaab on December 17, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
The Undead That Saved Christmas (2010)
The Undead That Saved Christmas (2010)

Original Release Date: October 14, 2010
Publisher: Independently by the editor via CreateSpace

What’s the only thing that can make Christmas carols and holiday-related stories even more enjoyable during this time of year? Why, adding zombies, of course!

So to kick off the 2010 Holiday season here at The G.O.R.E. Score, I want to present to you a very unique anthology novel, “The Undead That Saved Christmas.” Lyle Perez is the editor of this book, and its apparent to anyone who knows anything about the genesis of the anthology that this is not your average zombie antho. As Perez explains in the Introduction to the book, he created this anthology specifically to help foster children, as all of the net proceeds from the book’s sales will go directly to Hugs Foster Family Agency to help them give their foster children a very Merry Christmas.

Perez’ passion to this cause and this project are exceedingly commendable, and many folks quickly heard about this project and helped him take up the cause. In addition to the variety of amateur writers and artists whose works were included in the book, the average zombie fan will also recognize some familiar names as well, including S.G. Browne, Tony Faville, Cal Miller, and TW Brown.

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G.O.R.E. Score: EMPIRE

Posted by Tony Schaab on December 14, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
EMPIRE (2010)
EMPIRE (2010)

Original Release Date: April 1, 2008; re-released March 12, 2010
Publisher: Permuted Press (original); Gallery Books (re-release)

If you are planning on reading David Dunwoody’s “EMPIRE,” then I’ve got news for you: prepare to have an opinion about it when you’re done.

Not just any opinion, but most likely a far stronger opinion than you get when you finish reading an average book. You see, “EMPIRE” is one of the most unique works of zombie fiction available, and it’s all attributed to one major character in the story: Death, the Pale Rider himself.

Truth time here: as a fiction writer myself, I am insanely jealous of Dunwoody’s brilliant idea to include the character of Death into a zombie novel. And why the Hell wouldn’t he? What is a more natural pairing than the personification of the end of one’s life with a story about folks who return from said un-life-less state? Quite frankly, I can’t believe that it took 38 years – from 1968 (when Romero first introducing us to zombies) until 2006 (when Dunwoody first began releasing “EMPIRE” chapter-by-chapter as an online serial) – for someone to create a story that directly associated the character of Death with the undead characters of zombies. (My apologies if there are any publically-published zombie stories that exist prior to “EMPIRE” that incorporated Death as a character, but I’m not familiar with them, and an exhaustive search on the topic produced no results for me.)

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G.O.R.E. Score: Z-Motors

Posted by Tony Schaab on December 8, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
Z-Motors (2010)
Z-Motors (2010)

Original Release Date: November 15, 2010
Publisher: New Line Press

New Line Press is a publishing company that has been in existence since 2003, and seems to specialize these days in putting out short e-books at a low price for the consumer, usually just a dollar or two. I like this idea and the format, and I give New Line credit for being up-front and honest about the entire system, instead of attempting to minimize the fact that what they sell are essentially short stories and novellas at a very reasonable price.

NLP’s main genres of publication are paranormal and romance, which seems like an odd pairing, but the stories they publish fall into one category or the other, I haven’t seen any crossover, “Twilight”-esque stuff on their site. While I am obviously going to leave the reviews of the romancers to other sites, I did recently have a chance to review one of their zombie e-books, “Z-Motors,” written by Colorado-based novelist Terry Wright.

“Z-Motors” tells the tale of Dean Zyla, owner of Z-Motors auto shop in tiny Rolling Oaks, Colorado. Of the many problems Zyla faces, one of his primary concerns are that his mechanics are inept and usually cause more damage to the cars they are trying to fix. Understandable, really: all the mechanics are mindless zombies.

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G.O.R.E. Score: New Zed Order: Survive

Posted by Tony Schaab on December 3, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
New Zed Order Survive (2011)

New Zed Order Survive (2011)

Original Release Date: September 4, 2009; re-released February 15, 2011
Publisher: Permuted Press (re-release)

I love a good tale of triumph, and although I could be speaking about some of the characters and situations in Todd Sprague’s “New Zed Order: Survive,” I am speaking more about the journey Sprague’s book has been through. You see, Sprague decided to self-publish his book on his own, doing all of the compiling and editing by himself, and released the book via Amazon in September 2009. A little over a year later, the book has now been picked up by Permuted Press, and will get a shiny new re-release under the company’s banner (and the marketing and name recognition that comes with it) in early 2011.

As a man who has released a self-published book myself (I compiled and edited the current version of “The G.O.R.E. Score, Vol. 1” all by myself, ah thank you), I understand many of the trials and tribulations that Sprague has gone through, and I definitely congratulate him on the successes his book has seen so far. While “NZO:S” does have some room for improvement (as does most media, really), it is a solid tale of the zompocalypse whose heavy focus and emphasis on family and long-term planning strategies really help set the book apart from the average tale of zombie terror.

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G.O.R.E. Score: Woke Up Dead

Posted by Tony Schaab on November 29, 2010 in G.O.R.E. Score Reviews
Woke Up Dead (2009)
Woke Up Dead (2009)

Original Release date: October 2, 2009
Run Time: 84 minutes (compilation of 22 “webisodes”)

In the classic 1985 film “The Breakfast Club,” Principal Vernon tried to intimidate one of the students under his Saturday-School jurisdiction by saying to him, among other things, “Don’t mess with the bull, young man. You’ll get the horns.”

Speaking as one of the group, I can tell you that zombie fans are a passionate bunch who can usually tell when someone is pandering to them or trying to pretend like they are “one of us” in order to sell us something. Had I, or any self-respecting zombie fan, been given the scripts to the web series “Woke Up Dead” in advance of the production of the episodes, I would have quickly and emphatically offered Vernon’s advice directly to the creators of the series.

“Woke Up Dead” is an absolute disaster from top to bottom. I would say spoilers are forthcoming in this review, but that would insinuate that anything I could say might spoil any enjoyment you would get out of watching the series, and I don’t think you have anything to worry about in that department – unless you are a mostly-blind albino monkey who enjoys the warmth of a TV or monitor simply being on, there’s no way you would enjoy watching any part of this dreck.

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