Cool News
AMC Greenlights To Series Frank Darabont’s Zombie Thriller WALKING DEAD!!
I am – Hercules!!
AMC has greenlit to series “The Walking Dead,” writer-director Frank Darabont’s adaptation of Robert Kirkman’s graphic novel series.
The funnybook, set in a world overrun by zombies, follows a handful of survivors in search of a safe place to live.
Jon Bernthal (Manny Rodriguez in "The Pacific") will play Shane in the six-hour project.
Veteran writer-producer Charles Eglee ("Moonlighting," "Murder One," "Dark Angel," "The Shield," "Dexter") has also signed on to the project.
Darabont wrote and directed the pilot. His big-screen writer-director credits include "The Shawshank Redemption," "The Green Mile" and "The Mist."
AMC is the channel behind "Breaking Bad" and multiple outstanding-drama Emmy winner "Mad Men."
Find all of Variety’s story on the matter here.
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That's great news!
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looking forward to this
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Mar 29, 2010 4:59:40 PM CDT
Can we get Woody Harrelson's character from Zombieland...
by kravmaguffin
Get it done! gfy
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Mar 29, 2010 5:00:33 PM CDT
Looking forward to it...but it can't beat the gn's so far
by hint_of_smegma
Theres no way they won't tone it down immensely, which will be a shame. Plus they've cast Johnny Lee Miller as the lead -so that doesn't wildly fill me with confidence either. But it's gotta be fun somehere along the line.
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They can do more of the bloody and swearing stuff, like on the Sopranos.
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isn't Johnny Lee Miller; it's an actor from "the pacific", at least according to the Variety article. Anyone seen the Pacific that can vouch for Jon Bernthal?
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How original!
This is how "Hollywood" and these TV studios view their audience; as a bunch of Zombies, feeding off remakes and rehashed ideas until the end of time.
Pure crap!
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That there's a big prison sequence in the comic book.
Oh, Darabont... You and your prisons. -
This is a great graphic novel series my friend turned me on to the comic and I ran out and bought them all
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Kirkman has stated he's going to run the "funnybook" as long as possible, but it would be nice if the TV series had an ending of some kind to aim for...
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He was a minor character killed early on during the Japanese offensive at Guadalcanal. Played Rodriguez or somesuch. Seemed ok to me. I have high hopes for this one.
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Mar 29, 2010 5:40:48 PM CDT
This makes sense since the central conceit of the comics...
by rbatty024
is what if George A. Romero wrote a TV series instead of a series of films. The end result is, not surprisingly, pretty damn good.
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...Ben Browder winds up as Rick and Robert Knepper winds up as the Governor.
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...Ben Browder winds up as Rick and Robert Knepper winds up as the Governor.
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Awesome.
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Is if Darabont was allowed to make the series black & white like how it's presented in the GN. He already did a stellar job with The Mist in B&W, it wouldn't surprise me if he wants to do the same for The Walking Dead.
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I think Mark Pelligrino would be perfect as Rick Grimes... hey Lost is over now... Jonny Lee Miller is alright I guess...
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Grimes hasn't been cast yet. Although Johnny Lee Miller is currently the front runner.
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Mar 29, 2010 6:02:22 PM CDT
*SPOILER* COREY HAIM SHOWS UP IN EPISODE 2
by richard_gere_raped_my_gerbil
His zombie performance has been called 'extremely passive' by those that have seen it. I believe his character name is 'Lying Down Zombie'.
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Unfortunately, a surprising number of people between the ages of 18 and 22 haven't even seen a black and white film. AMC probably doesn't want the knuckledraggers to be scratching their heads, wondering how a zombie apocolypse also destroyed the light spectrum.
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And has been for some time now--but this news just took it to another level.
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Mar 29, 2010 6:33:28 PM CDT
I want Robert Rodriguez' ex-girlfriend with the machine gun leg
by jaylenotookmyjob
Die zombies! DIE!!!!
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They may be bare, and they may be nipples, but they're on a fucking Bear. It's my way of saying HOLY SHIT this sounds like it'll be fun. That Zombie pilot that never became a series, I think last year? That was actually pretty fun. But Darabont tackling a Zombie show? Color me watching every week.
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That'll cover, what, the first two issues?
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But it wont be the same if it in color.
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Mar 29, 2010 6:59:15 PM CDT
This show is going to have to try really hard to suck
by dapper swindler
All the pieces are there for awesome.
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Last I heard Brad Pitts production company bought the rights. Hope they make it a feature. Can't get enough zombies.
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Mar 29, 2010 7:12:23 PM CDT
I would definitely prefer a black and white television show, but
by rbatty024
while a director might convince a studio to make a black and white film, there's no way a studio will agree to a black and white tv show. People just won't stand still for hundreds of hours of black and white. It's sad, but true.
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...was one of the better scripts I've read this year, zombies or no. I think AMC is really making a name for themselves and this one will do it again.
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^^^
Yup.
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...are the zombies in this "runners" or "shufflers", or a mix of zombie types?
Personally, I usually prefer runners. But maybe shufflers would be more appropriate for episodic television.
Discuss... -
I'm looking forward to that movie even a little bit more than World War Z.
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If they do it like the books.
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Everytime I hear that asinine word, I feel like I'm trying to discuss comics with my hick relatives from Portsmouth, Ohio.
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Has no business stating their opinions on anything. You prove that you are either 60+ years old or you are a backwoods hillbilly pig rapist. Either way, your opinion is irrelevant.
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The Monarch, I don't know why, but every time the Governor gets pissed I imagine The Monarch killing one of his henchmen. I always thought that the Governor was kind of silly, almost too evil.
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I thought that was a term of endearment for comics; I've read Erik Larsen using the term tons of times.
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wasn't thi story posted a month ago on this site?
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Jonny Lee Miller seems like terrible casting, but I'm sure Darabont knows what he's doing.
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Great books - great director....
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Peter Jackson's Dead Alive? [Zombie Ninja Priest x Zombie Nurse]
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Between this and Game of Thrones on HBO? WOW. Geek TV aint goin' away any time soon! I expect this to be BETTER than the comics. The dialogue tends to be way too corny, in my opinion.
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I believe you are correct buffy, I think... Dead Alive is the shit. And I know there's probably less than a one percent chance this will be a B&W series but I can still hold out a small hope!
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This is such good news. You know Darabont will treat it seriously too. Now just make WWZ and I will die happy.
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...Seriously curious... was writin a zombie script years ago and i had my "zombies" shittin themselves and eatin it
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I think I would rather see zombie masturbation before zombie defecation.
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Only six hours... with some character named 'Shane'?!?!? I WAS excited about this... until now !!!!
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how good can it be?
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He is not right for Grimes, not at all. Also, I remember reading an article that said the show would give some back story and tell us how Grimes ended up in the hospital. Well, the comic did exactly that so I am not sure what the hell they were talking about.
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and you should seriously check it out, Stepdaddy. If you are writing any Zombie stuff at all, it's the definition of "push the envelope". I just checked & they have a bunch of clips on youtube. But rent/buy it if you can. When I came across it as a unrated VHS rental way back when, I watched it 3 times in a row. The best.
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I loved a bunch of the early trades, but haven't gotten around to the rest. I hear it takes a sharp dip when they hole up in the prison. Great comic from what I've read, could be a very good series. Darabont gets my vote for the cruelest ending in any film I have ever seen.
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I was hoping they would have some casting by now. Too bad Thomas Jane is on Hung, he worked w Darabont on the Mist. I could see him as Rick. Aaron Eckarts got the look but he's making movies.
Looking forward to this. -
I bought it as Dead Alive, I'm from Canada but I can't imagine that making any difference.
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And I'm ONLY 39 years old! I have 14 long boxes of funnybooks in my crawlspace. What's more disturbing is people that call comic books "graphic novels" as if they're too embarassed to call them by their proper name.
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The comic will hook you man...Can't wait to see the transition to film!
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I also bought it as Dead Alive and I live in Massachusetts. Have yet to come across the title Braindead
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Really enjoyed the movie but found the ending to be a descent into bathos. No reason to shoot your son when you can at least keep trekking on foot and die like a man. Utter emotionally exploitative silliness...otherwise, a fine film. Looking forward to this.
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Not sure why they changed it for the States. Although I do remember getting really excited when I heard about a Dead Alive vid game & then it turned out to be chick fighting platform.
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I think.
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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103873/
Says it's marketed as Dead Alive USA too. Now I'm just confused. -
Damn that's a shame...we need more!
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"Braindead" is the actual and original title of the film and the title that is used everywhere except for in the United States. Due to conflicts with another film of the same name, the title "Dead Alive" was used instead. [Iz wuz baxwerds].
This is also interesting: "Even though this version is not rated, the DVD is cut. Most of the missing scenes are plot scenes but nevertheless some cuts were made for censorship. Till today no Uncut version has been released in the US."
http://movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=3888 -
Good news then, good news now.
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Is giving me a hankering for some delicious custard pudding.
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It's 2010, and you've had a color saturation control on your television for fucking decades.
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Has no B&W, you can't control the color however you can make it old style sepia toned. So... YEAH, Ninja, just STFU! RARR!!!
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Mar 29, 2010 11:25:45 PM CDT
For all the people who so desperately want this to be a B&W seri
by bombshelter
Fyi you can mae your tv turn to black and white by turning down the color in the settings. This way everybody wins!
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So would you also say that Schindler's List would have been appropriate in color and that if we wanted to see it in black and wite (how draconian!) we could just down down the colors on our tv settings? It's the principle of it! Walking Dead is supposed be in black and white, that is how it's drawn and that is the world it exists in. Know what you're talking about before you flap your mouth.
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Yeah.
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its not just because itll look cool in black and white, but because it will allow them to show SOOOO much more blood and gore.
why do you think the majority of the house of blue leaves fight in kill bill 1 is in black and white?(in america) -
I like Bernthal. Darabont is smart. There will be zombies. Huh.
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I used to hear that from clueless old geezers who thought all comic books were about Archie and Jughead. That was a long time ago though. Now only douchebags say it.
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Just wondering if they're replacing LOTS with this. If so, it might be premature to celebrate. AMC's treatment of expensive genre programming isn't exactly the best.
I do think B&W would be an awesome way to film this, and allow for a lot of gore without a lot of scarlet on the screen. Wasn't that what was done with Kill Bill at one point? It was very effective, even if it wasn't filmed that way. (The full colour battle could be seen on Japanese imports.)
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for hundreds of hours of black and white" are they correct? Because sometimes execs really underestimate the audience, and kind of hold them in contempt.
Sometimes that's warranted, I'll grant you. But do you think this would be one of those times? Are the audiences really so rife with ADD that they couldn't watch a black and white style show? -
...Shame HUNG got to him first.
I dunno if an endless WALKING DEAD comic series is a great idea - I mean, it's the same story over and over, but to keep it "unpredictable" and "unsafe", they just kill a major character every so often to keep the readership on its toes. It's fun for a while, but I got bored around Vol 6 or 7. Same old, same old.
And Charlie Adlard's art is virtually unreadable. I'd love to see a version by someone like Brett Ewins.... -
The comic is up to issue #71 this month. The zombies are the classic slow moving flesh eating dead people, exactly like the ones in George Romero's Dawn of the Dead. It's a grim and realistic tale of survivors after the zombie apocalypse. I can't wait to see what Frank Darabont does with it, as I loved his take on 'The Mist'. Forget any ideas of making it black & white though, that works well for the comic, but on TV is would totally suck.
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I actually have a lot of sympathy for Frank Darabont. He's a true movie geek turned director, the real deal, unlike some pretenders who bullshit to gain some creed (Brett Ratner, McG, Abrams and Orci, Mickey Bay). And i love to hear him in DVD docs when he talks about other people's movies and how much they have influenced them. His passion and enthusaism for the movies are evident. And his opinions about Blade Runner should be dealt as gospel. Damn right Deckard is not a replicant, you said it, Frank Darabont!
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I know he's a very well respected actor, but the guy should be more popular among the mainstream audiences then he is.
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It's the only way the story makes any damn sense at all.
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The man gave solid performances from Stander to The Mist.With that said,his portrayal as The Punisher was the most disapointing of the three versions.Otherwise, he is deserving of major stardom.And on that note, will somebody kill That HBO show Hung? What a waste of Network programming.
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It's called Braindead here in the UK. You should also check out Bad Taste by Peter Jackson if you haven't already.
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George Takei will be angry!
They just came out with yellow!
No, that wasn't racist! -
Stop sounding like a pretentious fanboys. "People just can't handle black and white, bring more tea and crumpets Bucky." I love the graphic novels but we're talking about two different mediums. We don't need a exact recreation of graphic novel. Things done on the panels of a comic don't always transfer properly to film and vice versa. The graphic novel is b&w and should stay that way. Please give a good reason as to why the tv show should be in b&w besides "it's that way in the graphic novel". I wish nerds would stop complaining before they actually see the finished product. I remember times when great stuff like this wouldn't have even been considered and we would have just gotten another ER clone.
I do wish it were on HBO because it is one if not the most brutal and honest post apocalyptic fiction currently running today. The great thing about Kirkman is that he is brutally honest in his portrayal human nature. We are the greatest danger in this dead world. I believe that Darabont will maintain that tone. -
www.tinyurl.com/editbttn
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Danny Trejo WILL PLAY the Mayor of the other town. Can't recall his name right now. But its gotta be him. He's done work on Breaking Bad so he's already in with AMC. Make this happen.
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not surprising. It's what the goatfucker excels at. Which is even more surprising since the barnyard rapist has never seen a vagina on a human women.
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THE GOVERNOR!!
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Yes that is true.
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...a "must watch" cable channel. It's appalling that network TV can't get the kind of quality that's on basic cable now.
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Eh I was close. Still what do you say? Don't you feel Danny Trejo is pretty perfect for that role?
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Ummm maybe if AMC didn't cut the shit out of their movies, or showed more interesting movies maybe I'd check it out more then one hour a week.
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The plural form of "medium" is "media," not "mediums." How's THAT for being a pretentious nerd? :)
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Well, it's been mentioned already in the talkback. But here's a few reasons.
1) Style. There's nothing like that on TV.
2) It would allow them to get away with possibly unprecedented levels of gore.
3) Homage to the original "Night of the Living Dead"
4) Brainless fucking idiots who get turned off by black and white film wouldn't watch the show, so they wouldn't be demanding lowest-common-denominator rubbish, or bitch about inanities on a talkback.
4 reasons right there. I'm sure there's more. -
He gets my vote.
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Right on. Specially the 4th reason.
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I think "Hung" is finally making more of a name for Thomas Jane, who is indeed a reliably solid actor. Lots of people like it. Honest to God, the only people I know who don't like it are biased because his nudity in the opening credits freaks out their straight-guy sensibilities.
I am very curious about how this project will turn out. AMC has a large female following, and Darabont has a sentimental sensitivity, so I suspect it will focus even more on the human drama, which isn't bad as long as Darabont resists the urge to cheese it up.
But he really likes to lay it on thick. The Mist, IMO, is one of the worst movies ever. Terrible on every level, it is entertaining in the way The Happening is entertaining. Not in a good way. -
As gory as Dead Set?
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It must be great to be as stoned as you are.
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I pity those who can't like it. Damn honest movie that is not affraid to kick the nuts of the audiences and deliver a killer bleak ending. No movie for pussies.
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Are absolutely the best zombie fiction in existence. This is amazingly cool news. I couldn't put the graphic novel down, all 11 volumes and counting. SO EXCITED.
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Lazy bastard mentality spearheaded by HBO. I wish I had a job doing nothing for a shit-ton of money, and then got to work even less.
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"the only people I know who don't like it are biased because his nudity in the opening credits freaks out their straight-guy sensibilities."That's a unfounded deduction if i ever heard one, but I found the pacing and stories a bit too flat.The premise sounds good on paper,however the execution is lacking substance.It's almost a throwaway show HBO needed to fill a time slot.I'll stick to True Blood instead.Never saw Weeds therefore I can't compare it to Hung...I just might look into it since it's available on my Netflix instant viewing.
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My sample size is very small...its just all my friends...but my reasoinining isn't unfounded, they don't like him stripping down in the credits, they won't even watch until I fast forward past it. I can see how the pacing can be slow, but overall I like it a lot.
The Mist is "damn honest." Well, I must be damn honest and say that I am very lucky that the people I know aren't total lunatics like everyone in The Mist. That movie is unintentionally funny to me, including the "bleak" ending. -
Call me crazy, and you will but I can totally see James Van Der Beek in the role. Dude isn't a terrible actor, he can pull off the look no problem and he was damn good in Rules of Attraction. If he could bring that level of Sean Bateman intensity to it then I think he would be great.
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Fixing typos is not worth giving undesirables the chance to weasel out of arguments by retconning their initial outbursts. We know what you meant to type anyway. And you can always re-post it if the typo/formatting bugs you that much.
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How soon can we expect a teaser trailer for this? Looking forward to it!
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You cant take a fucking joke? What an idiot.
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Woo... hoo, like we don't have enough zombie stories to last for the next 12 generations. Someone said that the comic gets repitious, how could it not? Romero told the first zombie story and it's just been retold a million times over. Zombie movies, zombie comics, zombie tv shows, it's all the same.
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whoever wants to have an artistic experience, can turn the picture of his tv into B/W.
there everyone is happy.what do i win? -
I can see this-James Van Der Beek-- he did an episode of Criminal Minds a few seasons back, he was really good. yeah I can definitly see this.
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is not the same as actually filming in black and white.So no, it wouldn't make everyone happy.
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