The Weekly Planet - The Cancelled Zombieland Amazon Series - Caravan Of Garbage
Episode Date: October 18, 2019Zombieland 2009 is finally getting a sequel in 2019's Zombieland 2 Double Tap. The whole cast returns including Woody Harrleson, Emma Stone, Jesse Eisenberg and Abigail Breslin and whilst we wait on t...he review GET THIS RIGHT! There already was a sequel in 2013 with a Zombieland 2013 Amazon pilot that was immediately cancelled. Is it good? Well let's Caravan Of Garbage it and find out.Video Version â–º https://bit.ly/2pmp4rvJames' Twitter â–º http://twitter.com/mrsundaymoviesMaso's Twitter â–º http://twitter.com/wikipediabrownBuy Zombieland â–º https://amzn.to/33rtf3VTWP Itunes â–º https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-weekly-planet/id718158767?mt=2&ign-mpt=uo%3D4TWP Direct Download â–º https://play.acast.com/s/theweeklyplanetTWP YouTube Channel â–º https://goo.gl/1ZQFGHPatreon â–º https://patreon.com/mrsundaymoviesAmazon Affiliate Link â–º https://amzn.to/33rtf3VT-Shirts/Merch â–º https://www.teepublic.com/stores/mr-sunday-movies Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Welcome to Caravan of Garbage, everybody.
And I know that at least some people are excited because we're finally getting a Zombieland sequel.
And by finally, I mean again.
We're getting a Zombieland sequel?
That's what people are saying.
That's what people are saying.
I like the original Zombieland.
I think it's good.
I think it had a good cast.
Exactly.
Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone,
the little girl. Abigail something. Abigail
Breslin. There we go. They're all back.
But the funny thing is, Mason, Zombieland
the original movie was pitched as
a TV series by creators
Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. Oh yes.
Which is interesting in itself, I feel. Those names.
That's right. Wernick.
Wernick. I'm like, won't Nick. They didn't pick up the
pilot. Oh, okay. That's very good.
But when nobody bought their pitch, it was repurposed into a movie, which is why in the
movie we get zombie killer of the week, because that would have been a running gag in each
episode.
Oh, I see.
Right.
Uh-huh.
Which brings us to the Zombieland TV series pilot that aired in 2013, because one of the
running gags in this was going to be zombie killer of the week.
Wait, so this actually aired on TV?
Well, okay,
this is what happened.
You're already making excuses
for this show,
but all right.
Did it air or not?
It sort of did.
So basically what happened is,
I don't know if you stayed
to the very end,
but after the credits
it says something like,
tell us what you think
of the episode
because the idea was
that Amazon was pitching
13 pilots
and putting them out
into the world
and then people would
vote on them. I'll stop you there. I didn't go all the way to the end. So thank you for filling
me in on this little tidbit of information. So the winning pilot would have been picked up for
series. Do we know what the winning pilot was? I cannot remember off the top of my head. Was it an
office spinoff? Maybe. This is the winning one. If you're watching the video, this one.
Oh my God. I'm going to watch this video and learn a thing. Is that show cancelled or not?
Who's to say?
When did this come out?
2013.
Then it's definitely cancelled.
Yeah, you're probably right.
Zombieland though,
the TV series,
was greeted with immense hatred.
Really?
Despite it having a bunch
of good stuff going for it.
For one,
it was directed by Eli Craig
who did Tucker and Dale
versus Evil.
Oh yeah.
Which is quite a fun
horror spoof,
would you say?
It is, yes, absolutely.
You think those backwater hicks are out to kill you,
but they're actually out to save you.
Yeah.
Hilarity in juice.
Very gory.
Alan Tudyk's in it.
Very funny.
Alan Tudyk's in it, exactly, yeah.
It's not terrible, this pilot.
I didn't think so either.
But it was met with hatred, is what you're saying.
Yes.
Is that because...
Look, and again, I think Zombieland,
I don't know how well it did financially,
but it was certainly a cult favourite.
Yeah.
And it's got, you know.
It's got two sequels.
This TV series is an actual sequel.
Exactly.
It's got cult favorite actors in it kind of thing.
And I imagine if you attempt to replace a Woody Harrelson, people are going to get upset.
And I think that's the problem because the main cast being replaced, I think, is the
reason this fell down.
I can understand why you wouldn't be able to get them back from the series because they're all A-list actors. If they weren't then, they've
gone on 2B. I think if they had have said it in this universe with new characters, this would
have been received very differently. But do you think they would have attempted to, what they
would have attempted to do is get, because you know, it's Tallahassee and it's et cetera, those
states. I think what they would have attempted to do was get four new states and just
replace the existing cat like a woody harrelson type yes and just give them a different state
name and etc but i think that would have worked a bit better i think just for audiences i'm not
saying it would have made the show better but i think it would have been received better yeah okay
sure yeah i think they would have hated it anyway yeah i think they would have just i think they
would have found a way to hate it i think they would have been like this guy's just a ripoff
of woody harrelson's character i hate it. I think they would have been like, this guy's just a rip-off of Woody Harrelson's character.
I hate it, even though he's got a different name.
But what if they did, say, like the Limitless TV series,
where they roll Bradley Cooper and go,
yeah, it's the direct sequel to the movie.
Oh, for sure.
Because there's a scene in the Limitless TV series
where Bradley Cooper comes in,
the window of his limo comes down,
and he goes, I fully support this venture,
and he gives a big thumbs up.
Exactly.
And he's never seen again, maybe? Yeah.
Yeah, who's to say?
So maybe, yeah, I guess they could have done that.
You could have gotten a Jesse Eisenberg or an Emma Stone.
Yeah.
Or an Abigail Breslin.
Or a Woody Harrelson.
He does TV, doesn't he?
They didn't have the money for this, but they could have gotten one of those people to endorse it.
Exactly.
Or a lookalike.
Or a lookalike.
So I think the Tallahassee character, which is the Woody Harrelson character, that's the one that stands out to me the most as being different,
not just in looks, but in the way he acts.
He seems dumber.
Are you saying that Jesse Eisenberg is very easily replaceable
by another actor?
Yeah, just get a guy who's like...
Just get somebody from your office and stub their toe.
Yeah, that's right.
Now we're rolling.
Here we go.
Yeah, but I think the intro to this, you know,
the two people sitting in the office and they're talking about their bloody first world problems and he's cracked his iPhone screen and he acts, he wanted a soy latte, but he got a bloody full milk latte.
Boo, all that, obviously.
Did you hate that?
No, I like the running gag of all the terror that's happening behind them.
That's a very flying high airplane.
Yes.
Police squad kind of gag.
Here's the thing
though i got kind of invested in there the storyline about the wrong coffee order and i
missed i had to wind it back because i missed the man on fire yeah and the zombie attacks and the
and the screaming car chase i'm like oh boy they should really work harder on getting that man's
order absolutely yeah does this fill in any of tallahassee's backstory from the movie did we
know that he was a sandwich delivery guy beforehand? I don't believe so. I think that's
fun that he's, you know, he's the ultimate badass in the zombie apocalypse world, but beforehand he
was the sandwich guy. Yeah. I think that's fun. Because I think some people who, you know, their
particular skills won't align with the way that society runs now. So that makes sense. Nobody wants
a sandwich delivered in the apocalypse. No.
Unless it's a brain sandwich.
Yeah.
Or an actual sandwich if you're hungry.
I would actually really like a nice sandwich delivered.
For sure.
Imagine if you could.
There's a few things that are introduced in this.
There's a few new rules that they drop in, the zombie rules.
One of them being Rule 19, Ziploc bags.
And Rule 33, keep hope alive, which is like, boo.
Don't like that one.
It should have been rock out, rock and roll.
Guitar solo.
Rule 33, guitar solo.
Oh, so they're not two separate rules?
No, they're the same rule.
Okay, fair enough, yeah.
And the other thing is they introduce characters like On Star, or is it One Star?
It's On Star.
On Star, yeah, which is the eye in the sky.
I'm sure that's going to be explained, would have been explained in subsequent episodes.
No, no, no, don't. eye in the sky. I'm sure that's going to be explained, would have been explained in subsequent episodes.
No, no, no, don't.
Keep hope alive.
Rule 33.
It's going to be explained when they finally finish this series.
Yeah, so I don't know who that is or where they're positioned or any of that.
But this is a more populated world than what we were led to believe from the movies, I guess.
Yeah.
Well, you say that, but there were like six people still alive in Los Angeles.
Well, that's true, actually.
Yeah, you're not wrong.
I do like the running joke of every time they go and try to bring a new person into their group,
they inadvertently get them killed.
I hated that.
Really?
I thought that if anything was going to drag this series down, I think,
was that is it just going to be a series of Warner Brothers gags
where they attempt to recruit a new person and that new person's hit in the head with an anvil and then they disappear
like I kind of like this I liked the very slight expansion of this world yeah in a lower budget
but I hated the idea that it was just going to be a series of one note I by the end of this I'm like
if they kind of would they attempt 22 episodes of this just trying to recruit a new guy and then he
falls into a pit or whatever oh my god i think
that's maybe just the first episode kind of but also what what i think let this series down and
i don't know ultimately what killed it in the minds of producers beyond i think i think it was
just the fan okay but what i think killed it for me was that there didn't appear to be any ultimate
goal of this series other than... Get across.
Just go across America a bit and maybe you'll find something.
Yeah.
Like there should have been...
I think it would have sold it easier if there was like a zombie cure
or there was a bunker on the other side of America that they could get to.
Is that really...
I think that's more The Walking Dead than a show like this though.
Right, uh-huh.
And I think...
You know what?
That's why Bloody The Walking Dead went for 98 seasons or whatever. Yeah. But I think if you wanted a good example of a show like this though. Right, uh-huh. And I think... You know what? That's why Bloody The Walking Dead went for 98 seasons or whatever.
Yeah.
But I think if you wanted
a good example of a show like this,
you'd go Last Man Standing.
Right, uh-huh.
Which I think is,
you know,
it's a guy searching across America.
He's to the Channel 10 Australian TV series.
Yes.
What am I...
Is that...
What's the one I'm talking about?
Some kind of rom-com.
No, I know that one.
The last man on earth.
Last man on earth, so yeah.
That's the Roger Costner one
I was talking about.
Don't worry about that.
That was also cancelled.
Okay, good.
In 2003 or whenever it came out.
But yeah, I think that show is a better example of,
well, not even a better example,
just an example of how this comedy apocalypse world
could have played out.
Yeah, right.
The old people with the zombie, with the false teeth.
Yes.
That's quite a good gag.
You think he's bit, You think it's over.
It's false teeth because they're old people, Mason.
Oh, my God.
Can they do this every episode?
Not important.
It's cancelled.
It's cancelled, yeah.
I don't think it's terrible.
I don't fully understand the hate for it outside of that it's a recast.
It's not as funny as the movie, I don't feel.
No.
And the zombies seem very few and far between.
They meet probably as many zombies as they do regular people.
Pretty much.
It's always, yeah, they're rescuing one person from one zombie.
I mean, there's obviously limitations with budget.
Probably get two zombies in there.
But it is Amazon also.
Yeah, again, one of the biggest companies in the world, if not the biggest.
Yeah.
I guess their TV division wasn't as big as it is now.
That's probably true.
I guess their TV division wasn't as big as it is now.
That's probably true.
But I think if this was given a chance,
I think most TV pilots are good at best.
Yeah, they need time to expand and again,
and to fill out that world. That's why we watch a TV series as opposed to a movie,
because the world gets a chance to breathe
and we can see all the more interesting aspects of the world
that we don't get to see in two hours.
Exactly.
And especially for comedy, you need to establish the characters. And then also,
they're all funny in their own particular way. That's hard to get across in 28 minutes or
whatever. If you watch the first season of, say, The American Office or Parks and Rec,
it's not great. And then it's only when the characters develop.
Yeah. I mean, that's a great example because the first season of The American Office
is essentially a replica of the British office.
Especially the first episode, which is just word for word.
Which, again, like people were not, you know,
I'm sure people were like, well, this is,
Michael Scott's no David Brent, is he?
You know?
Yeah.
But I think, but it got a chance to breathe
and this is the same thing.
Well, this Tallahassee's no movie Tallahassee.
Maybe he would have been.
Maybe he would have been. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know know i can't say i'm shattered that it's gone because we are
getting a sequel we haven't seen it yet at the time of recording this but i'd rather see a sequel
in this universe with the same actors than i guess this tv series another or or as you might say
another zombie tv series i mean just at this point in in 2019 I think we're all sick of zombie TV.
You're not wrong.
So it was dropped by Amazon due to the fan backlash.
But Rhett Reese, like I said, one of the creators on Zombieland, he took to Twitter soon after
and he blamed the fans for the series are not continuing as he had hoped.
He was quoted as saying,
The fans suck.
No, go ahead.
Pretty much.
You guys have successfully hated it out of existence, which is pretty much what
occurred.
Yeah.
And he's still working in Hollywood to this day.
Yeah.
I guess back yourself.
Like if he'd been like, oh, I'm so sorry, guys.
I'll do better next time.
Nobody likes a weakling.
And that's right.
That's someone who's going to die during the zombie apocalypse.
Let me tell you.
What rule number is that?
One.
Yeah.
Nobody likes a weakling.
That's right.
Tell the fans they suck.
Rule number one.
Yeah. Never likes a weekly. That's right. Tell the fans they suck. Rule number one. Yeah.
Never back down.
But I can see him thinking that also if he had this big plan for how the arc of the season
would play out.
Yeah.
He probably had some great ideas, which may be folded into the sequel that we're getting
and never being given the chance to do that.
That would be incredibly frustrating.
A real headshot.
Yeah.
That's the world we live in.
The world that's not Zombieland, but the world where we have two sequels to the movie Zombieland.
One's a TV show, one's a movie.
And that's Caravan of Garbage.
Can you believe it?
I can believe it.
Yeah.
Anyway, thanks everybody for watching this on your phone
or your tablet or your computer like a zombie.
Oh my God, maybe this world isn't so different
from the world of Zombieland after all.
That's really good.
Just thought of that metaphor. That's really good. Just thought of that metaphor.
That's really good.
It really makes you think.
In a way, it's like anti-social media.
In what sense?
There's zombies in it.
Right, yeah, yeah.
Okay, yeah.
They'll eat your brains.
Here's a good...
You're not very social after you've had your brains eaten.
That's true.
Here's a good one.
Watch Charlie Brooker's Dead Set.
He did Black Mirror about 10 years ago.
He did What If There Was a Zombie Apocalypse and then there were idiots in the Big Brother house.
You didn't know.
That's a good one.
That's a very good one.
Also, it's terrifying.
Yeah.
That's well worth a look.
Anyway, this has been Caravan of Garbage.
We do this every Tuesday.
If you've got something you want us to look at,
we'll take a look at it.
Suggest it below and we'll look at it.
More zombie stuff.
Maybe there's a better zombie pilot.
Dead Set.
Charlie Brooker.
No, we've done that one.
A different one.
Maybe a worse one. Okay. Yeah. I was going to say The Walking Dead pilot, but The Walking Dead pilot's Dead Set. Charlie Brooker. No, we've done that one. A different one. Maybe a worse one.
Okay.
Yeah.
I was going to say The Walking Dead pilot, but The Walking Dead pilot's very good.
All right then.
Yeah.
Maybe like a middle season episode of The Walking Dead.
Yeah.
Where they're just farming or whatever.
Yeah, or whatever.
Also, we have a podcast called The Weekly Planet where we talk movies and comics and TV shows.
We, of course, do have an episode coming up on Zombieland 2.
Of course we do.
That happens every Monday morning.
It's a great little commute to work situation if you want. Every week we do an episode on Zombieland
2. We can't help ourselves. The show has been exclusively built around Zombieland 2. What do
we do after Zombieland 2? Zombieland 3. Of course. And then they'll revive the series. Exactly. Yes.
Yeah. But it is just about movies and comics and TV shows. It's about whatever's going on, isn't it?
That's right.
In the world of entertainment and such.
I'm at MrSundayMovies on Twitter.
I'm at WikipediaBrown on Twitter.
Thanks for stopping on by, you bloody.
Put your phone down and go and stand in the sun, all right?
Put some sunscreen on, though, and a big brimmed hat.
More like anti-social media.
I'm with you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
See you next week.
Grab that jam, you guys.
We'll see you next week.
This podcast is part of the Planet Broadcasting Network.
Visit planetbroadcasting.com for more podcasts from our great mates.
I mean, if you want.
It's up to you.
FX's The Veil explores the surprising and fraught relationship
between two women who play a deadly game of truth and lies on the road from Istanbul to Paris and London.
One woman has a secret.
The other, a mission to reveal it before thousands of lives are lost.
FX's The Veil, starring Elizabeth Moss, is now streaming on Disney+.