Dead Set [DVD] [2008]
Starring Jaime Winstone (Donkey Punch, Kidulthood), Dead Set is E4’s new horror series in which the dead are returning to life and attacking the living. Curiously there are a few people left in Britain who aren’t worried about any of this – that’s because they’re the remaining contestants in Big Brother. Cocooned in the safety of the Big Brother house, they’re blissfully unaware of the horrific events unfolding in the outside world. Until an eviction night when all hell breaks loose.
Kelly (Winstone), a production runner working on a fictional series of Big Brother, finds herself trying to fend off the walking dead alongside her producer boss Patrick (Andy Nyman, Severance), boyfriend Riq (Riz Ahmed, Britz) and the remaining Big Brother housemates. Featuring cameos from Davina McCall and several former housemates, this is a cruel and twisted take on one of TV’s biggest game shows. Dead Set was created and written by Charlie Brooker (Nathan Barley co-creator and Guardian writer).
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Charlie Nails the Horror Genre,
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This is a review for “Dead Set” the episodes, NOT the DVD (and associated extra features) as it has not been released at the time of writing.
Dead Set is a very respectable zombie horror. It is a classic tale of a small group of isolated survivors in the face of a zombie apocalypse. Whilst this is horror/drama it does not suffer from the common affliction of taking itself too seriously. There’s plenty of black humour and lighter moments as a counterpoint to the scares and gore.
The scenario borrows from Dawn of the Dead, with the survivors holed up in a secure compound (once they’ve dealt with the immediate threats). The twist is that the compound is the Big Brother house and the contestants are initially unaware that anything is wrong with the world outside. By the time they find out it is too late to do anything but sit tight!
Another thing this has in common with the DotD remake is that the zombies in this are “new skool” running zombies (of the type first seen in 28 Days Later). This may upset some purists who insist that all zombies should be shamblers but fits perfectly with a modern day, fast paced scenario. The speed with which the infection spreads is frightening and the undead are like a pack of ravenous animals. With shuffling zombies it’s usually sheer weight of numbers that overwhelm the heroes but with the visceral, panting, lightning fast beasts they are unnerving and dangerous individually and terrifyingly deadly in a group.
Like all good zombie horrors, once the immediate danger of the undead is kept at bay, the danger then comes from internal conflict. With most of the survivors having already spent the best part of 2 months in each others’ company tempers fray pretty quickly, leading to fatal consequences. Because this is the BB house the characters are mostly obnoxious, obscenely thick, gratingly annoying, utterly weird or infuriatingly arrogant (or a combination of several of those!). There is the risk that with such potentially dislikeable people as our survivors that we don’t positively look forward to seeing them torn apart! However, the groups’ humanity is kept intact by a few “normal” people and enough redeeming characteristics in the group as a whole to make us care about them.
The acting is mostly convincing (although a couple of characters are deliberately OTT) and whilst there are a few moments that are unintentionally funny, most of it is believable (well… as much as a zombie apocalypse is believable anyway!).
All in, this is a reputable stab at the horror genre by Charlie Brooker. There are some genuinely scary moments, a lot of tension and welcome comic relief. The prosthetics and make-up are all very convincing and gives the impression of it being much higher budget than it really is. I was going to give this 4 stars but genuinely couldn’t find a reason not to give it that extra one. If you like zombies or horror then you shouldn’t be disappointed.
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|Accomplished, scary satire but the DVD leaves a little to be desired,
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Dead Set is a well-polished zombie production (particularly considering the limitations of it being an E4 TV series rather than a film) that rises above the zombie norm thanks to writer Charlie Brooker’s wickedly satirical swipe at reality TV culture. What makes this work so well is just how easily and neatly the concepts of zombie horror and reality TV are married together. There’s the stock characters, the pleasure/horror of voyeurism, the sly commentary on the idiocy of the general public…
However, whilst the series shows a great deal of knowledge of its obvious forebears, this sometimes means it comes across as highly derivative, particularly of Dawn of the Dead and 28 Days Later. Still, such is the cost of wanting to pay knowing homage to your predecessors, it seems.
As for DVD extras, the series includes about a dozen featurettes of varying quality. Some are semi-interesting interviews but a few are just compilations of behind-the-scenes footage that don’t really communicate much of any value.
I’d be tempted to give the overall package four out of five, but I’m docking an entire star for the annoying decision to not include the feature length edit of the series that was shown on TV on Halloween. It seems a bit of an oversight to not allow people watching the DVD the chance to view the series as a 2-hour film. A “play all” option is available, but this means you’re treated to the credits every half hour instead of a seamless product. This really is an irritating oversight.
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|Ticks all boxes,
This does to reality TV what Dawn of the Dead did to shopping malls.
Dead Set has everything you want in a zombie movie: gore, satire, a smattering of fabulous one-liners, a seige mentality and internal conflict between the survivors. The only difference is that it’s not a movie.
It’s a very decent offering to the zombie genre, although not without its flaws: The contrast is frustratingly dark (not just on my telly – I checked!), particularly during the outdoor action sequences, and at times it does feel a little bit zombie-by-numbers. These aren’t huge niggles though. The characters aren’t tremendously likeable, but nor should they be. The producer character’s a riot! And like the original Dawn of the Dead, Dead Set has its target squarely in its crosshairs.
I love the ‘zombies can’t run’ argument. One day someone’ll make a film with flying zombies and that’ll really upset people.
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