What do you want to do before you get turned into a zombie? If you have yet to consider this question, Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead may bring it up for you. This zombie movie (based on the manga of the same name) seems to have a tone like no other, starting with the moment Akira Tendo (Eiji Akaso) cheers with delight when zombies appear. No more going to work!
Also? ZOMBIE SHARK.
Here’s the lengthy synopsis:
Akira Tendo (Eiji Akaso) works at an exploitative company where he suffers endless hours and harassment from his boss. Spending more days feeling dead than alive, he awakes to discover his town has been devastated and overtaken by zombies and suddenly feels excited at the prospect of not needing to go to the office anymore. After witnessing an older co-worker he looked up to become a zombie, he comes to the realization that he’d rather be eaten by zombies if he can’t do what he wants. Akira comes up with a bucket list of 100 things he wants to do before becoming a zombie. He crosses these items off the list as he experiences stay-at-home camping, paragliding, SUP yoga and other long-held dreams. What will become of him as he joyfully lives his life amid a zombie apocalypse?! And, as he holds on to his dream to become a superhero who saves everyone, what will happen when he battles a massive and deadly zombie shark!?
Is this movie subtle about the conflict between a metaphorically zombified life driven only by work and hierarchy and the potential freedom in total, literal zombie chaos? No! Why would it be! We are becoming superheroes and doing paddleboard yoga and living our one precious life to the utmost. Just, you know, with zombies around.
Zom 100 comes from producer Akira Morii (Alice in Borderland), director Yusuke Ishida (Re:Mind), and screenwriter Tatsuro Mishima. It creeps onto Netflix on August 3rd.
