iZombie

By: Robert Murphy

Changing up the traditional ideas of classic movie monsters has been something that the 20^th century has been full of, whether it is with movies like Twilight or TV shows like Teen Wolf. And while looking at the title for this show you would know exactly what dynamic would be changed up this time around and that is with the time old blockbuster bad guy, zombies. This would prove to be a good thing though since shows like The Walking Dead have started to drain out what little is left of the whole zombie angle. The story is not unlike the one presented in Warm Bodies (another zombie film with a twist on how we perceive zombies) where seemingly perfect Liv Moore (Rose McIver and yes you heard me) goes to a casual boat party that goes very wrong when a new drug transformers people into brain craving undead, our protagonist included. In order to maintain her secret and keep those around her safe she pulls a complete 180 personality wise, giving up her promising internship as a medical surgeon, breaking things off with her future fiancé and getting a job as a medical examiner to supply herself with plenty of brains to munch on. However, eating the brains of murder victims has come at a price as Liv gets visions of the person’s life before they passed away and together with a surprisingly willing detective she helps solve their murders.

Right away the premise for the show made my eyebrows raise up and I thought that this could not be something I would enjoy watching. The show is loosely based off of a comic book series called iZombie where the twenty something hero solves crime by eating the brains of dead victims. The show however takes its own liberties from there so you won’t be spoiled much if you just so happened to have read the book and surprisingly I was hooked. The aptly named Liv Moore would prove to have a far richer afterlife than the life she was living before her skin turned pale and her hair turned white. When you see flashbacks to her life before she turned zombie she appeared to lead a dull sort of life where she did everything that was expected of her in life and never did anything outside of the ordinary. It stinks that the one time she does she winds up getting a cravings for cerebellum. Now though her character is a rich and interesting one to get invested in as she gains more than just memories from those she eats but also gains part of their personality traits and picks up little bits of interesting ways to go about life. The personality traits are usually fun little gimmicks for the particular episode, one being a pot head and another being an adrenaline junkie but each usually shapes Liv into a further interesting character.

The dialogue is just as fun and open as our main character as well. Zombies have plenty of stereotypes to exploit and gawk at especially when you now have a living breathing zombie taking brains and making salads out of them or putting them on pizza just to seem normal. Liv does lead a cushy life though as far as zombies go because most are probably not fortunate enough to have a medical background and get to settle in at a morgue job, this is in fact one of the big points for the stories villain. As Liv meets other zombies out there she sees just how good she has it as she hears about how hard it is to dig up a freshly dug grave in order to get the food you need to survive and not lose your mind. It's presented in a fun way somehow despite all of it's bleakness and that good hearted nature is one of the things I love about the show. 

As it was with the leading lady, most of the cast members supporting her throughout the story were virtually unknowns to me but if I’ve learned anything from watching so many shows that isn’t a bad thing. The first person to learn Liv’s secret was her boss Ravi Chakrabarti (Rahul Kohli) who discovers that she’s been looting the corpses of the bodies they work on. Rather than freak out though he becomes an unlikely ally and also starts to hopefully work towards a cure to change her back and give her a normal life again. It’s all just genetics after all so why can’t she be changed back. This is a nice touch to the story in which most things are insanely supernatural they still remain somewhat grounded. I say this knowing how crazy it is that the show is about Liv solving crimes by eating brains. Speaking of crime solving, the other top notch character to strike me is the insanely understanding Detective Clive Babinaux (Malcolm Goodwin) who goes along well when it comes to Liv claiming she knows about these murders because she is a psychic. What makes thing work more exceptionally for the story is that Babinaux doesn’t try and discover what secrets Liv is hiding and just accepts her abilities. Sure, he raises an eyebrow and asks how this petite and sickly looking girl can fight off guys half her size or survive being thrown thirty feet from a car but Liv gives him an excuse and he shrugs and accepts it. His character is hard not to love along with the cheeky British medical examiner Ravi.

Where I start to pull away from the story is with our grieving fiancé Major (Robert Buckley). Liv feels terrible about having to call things off with the hunkie dreamboat that she was soon to marry but I wouldn’t want to turn the person I care about into a zombie either, that might be more awkward than the break up. Things go progressively bad for his character though as he grieves for Liv but then finds a new axe to grind when he starts looking for missing kids at his trouble youth group. Our resident bad guy zombie and fortune seeking money man Blaine (David Anders) is taking kids off the street and killing them to feed his growing zombie army. He’s not aiming for world domination or anything, he just wants to live large and gain the respect he wasn’t getting as a small time drug dealer. 

Major has a big problem with this though and spends most of the show going vigilante and trying to take down these zombies which doesn’t get too interesting until his big finale "Blaine's World." His character just seems too bland and acts much like you would expect Liv’s character to act before she went zombie and it is hard to be invested with someone like that. Blaine makes a great adversary as the bad guy that you just hate to love and worms his way in and out of situation like a true sleazeball while he makes his new found fortune in the much needed brain market for zombies.

iZombie really is an unexpected win for the CW. There is plenty of quick witted banter between the characters and jokes at the expense of what you would expect a zombie to act like such as what is it like for them to eat when they have no nerves to taste, Liv’s new love for insanely hot foods being the answer. It’s a show that has fun with its admittedly dark concept and that’s what makes it run smoothly. Liv Moore and most of the other cast are also spot on throughout the series as well and I expect interesting things to come if another season is around the corner.

Good:

- Quick witted banter and dialogue

- Rose McIver as Liv is fantastic

- Other great supporting character such as Detective Babinaux

Bad:

- Not all the side characters spring to life such as Major

Scully Rating: 8.5 out of 10