Thinks of it: the wildly successful zombie drama The Walking Dead having an episode directed by the godfather of zombies, George Romero. Sounds perfect, right? The gig might even help Romero fund another Diary of the Dead spin-off after the ho-hum response to Survival of the Dead (which I thought was decent).
Speaking with io9, however, Romero disagreed with me and said he wasn't interested in directing an episode. Why? Well, you can read his comment, but it still doesn't really explain why he'd turn it down.
I love the books, I haven't seen any of the episodes. Listen I love Frank [Darabont], I know he's done a good job. I love the books, I never watched any of the episodes because… my zombies are sort of my own. I didn't want to be part of it. Producers called and said, "do you want to direct some of these," and I said no. Because I just didn't think it was me. I've been waiting to see the whole first season, which I missed because I've been traveling. I've been waiting to look at it, but I haven't seen any of it.
Again, I think the buzz around him directing an episode of The Walking Dead would be enormous and enough to convince backers to make his other Diary spin-off, and for that reason, he should do it. He should also do it to fund his other project, which sounds like it really needs a wave of publicity to get funding, as awesome as it sounds.
A friend of mine recently wrote a novel called The Zombie Autopsies, and it's about an isolated group of people doing autopsies on zombies during the zombie apocalypse and trying to figure out what the hell caused this. They come upon this discovery.
[Edit Note: SPOILERS Ahead]
The scientists discover that this is not a naturally occurring virus, they deduce that it must have been created by somebody. And they later discover that it was created by people who were trying to topple the economy. So that's a unique way in to talk about the economy, but it's not my story. Steven C. Schlozman is the guys name, he's a Harvard Psychologist who has somehow been swept into the zombie craze and is writing zombie novels.
As for that Diary spin-off I keep mentioning, it looks like it's a pipe dream.
I would love to do the next one, I had planned I don't know if it's ever going to get made, I was planning to do something Noir. It's just me, it's me in addition to wanting to say something about what's going on today. It's fun for me to try and do a little something different stylistically as well. I hesitate to call it an homage, it's just envy. I wish that I was John Ford. [laughs]
The Noir part might be OK — zombies all hunkered around not being able to find any food anywhere. But see their food is not our food… I don't know how to do it. The closest I could come is the Zombie Autopsies — just the way Wall Street engineered mortgages someone has engineered a great big collapse of society. Someone said, "The world is way too populated. We're going to kill off half the population of the world and as a result we're going to get richer!" It's the only way I can see doing it.
Romero says he has optioned Schlozman's book and is currently writing a screenplay for Zombie Autopsies. For more about Schlozman, head here.
