Marvel Zombies Review

Shastine Matsunaga 26 / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

In 2021, Marvel Studios debuted What If…?, their experimental new animated series. Each episode takes place in a different universe where something skews slightly different from the original MCU timeline, resulting in a completely new course of events. These scenarios include Peggy Carter taking the super soldier serum in place of Steve Rogers, Thor being raised as an only child in a world where Odin never took in Loki, or T’Challa becoming Star-Lord. 

One of the most notable episodes is the fifth episode of season one, “What If…Zombies?!”, in which Janet Van Dyne brings a zombie virus back from the Quantum Realm after  Hank Pym rescues her during the events of Ant-Man and the Wasp. The virus spreads rapidly, taking out all of the Avengers as Thanos’ army arrives on earth, marking what would otherwise be the beginning of Avengers: Infinity War. The remaining Avengers band together to save the world, ultimately bringing Vision’s (Paul Bettany) mind stone to Wakanda in an attempt to save the world. They find it overrun by zombies, including zombified Thanos, and the episode ends on this cliffhanger.

A few months after this episode’s release, Marvel announced their Marvel Zombies series, which would continue the story. Four years later, we finally get to see this continuation in the form of a four-episode mini-series. However, while it is an incredibly fun and high-octane zombie adventure, Marvel Zombies  falls short in several of the ways that could have otherwise made this show special.

One of the biggest problems is that the series feels disconnected from the What If…? episode. Rather than picking up right where the episode left off, the series moves forward five years and follows an entirely new ensemble—including Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani), Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) and Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld). They are accompanied by F.R.I.D.A.Y. (Kerry Condon), Tony Stark’s AI, repaired by Riri and controlling the Iron Man suit on Tony’s zombified body. 

By the end of the first episode all but Kamala are presumably dead. This is a common theme throughout the show: many characters from the MCU are introduced, but by the end of the season, practically every one of them is deceased.

The main appeal of Marvel Zombies is being able to see your favorite Marvel characters engage in chaotic, gory fights with the hordes of zombies, but it is hard to maintain that appeal when  the aforementioned heroes  are dropping like flies. In addition to Khan, Bishop, and Willams, we also get to see a whole host of other characters, including Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh), Red Guardian (David Harbour), Shang-Chi (Simu Liu), Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), Thor (Greg Furman) and Spider-Man (Hudson Thames). Some don’t last very long, and all the others are introduced so late that they only get a small amount of screen time before they, too, are killed off. 

There are only two characters that survive from the first episode to at least the beginning of the last: Kamala Khan, and the brand new character Blade Knight (Todd Williams). However, Khan is the only survivor, and even her fate is left unclear by the end. It does make sense that Kamala survives, as the show would feel pointless if its main character was killed off, but that doesn’t mean that every other character should be treated as expendable. Many of these characters have deaths that feel meaningless; even when characters get emotional deaths, the show will immediately move on after killing them. Neither the characters nor the audience get a chance to mourn. 

Another problem is that most, if not all, of the most iconic Marvel characters are either dead or zombified by the beginning of the show, leading to anticlimactic viewing.In the zombie episode of What If…?,  Avengers such as Iron Man, Captain America, Falcon, Hawkeye, and Doctor Strange are all zombified. While several appear in their zombie forms in Marvel Zombies, they get very little screen time and are all killed in extremely anticlimactic ways. It feels like a wasted opportunity to showcase  big, flashy fights against zombies boasting the unique powers of their superhero alter egos.

There are a few times where the show displays its potential in this regard, but it never ends up going anywhere. In the first episode, Khan, Bishop, and Williams are venturing out and crossing an area where zombie Hawkeye is on the prowl, shooting arrows at the trio from the windows of a tall building. From the banter between the three, it is clear that this is an issue they’ve encountered before. It would have been excellent world building and made for thrilling fights if this became an established part of the world that characters revisited when traversing the area.

Later, the trio end up in the Valley of the Broken Gods, where zombie Captain Marvel is locked in a stalemate with the Eternal Ikaris who, being a mechanical being, is unable to be turned into a zombie. They are described by Blade Knight as “Two beings of immense power, each unable to beat the other, pausing only to destroy those dumb enough to get their attention.” It is fantastic world building that injects some flashy Marvel superpowers into the old zombie apocalypse formula. It is only a shame that it isn’t in the episode for more than ten minutes and is never mentioned again.

This points to another issue: the show’s four-episode length. Season one is so short that it hinders the storytelling significantly, preventing meaningful worldbuilding and the ability to spend time with the characters. The series feels incredibly impersonal, relying a bit too heavily on audiences already having an emotional connection to the characters. This is made worse by one of the only characters who survives long-term, Blade Knight, being entirely new, requires audiences to become accustomed to an unfamiliar character without giving them enough time to do so. 

Instead the show shoves as many impressive Blade Knight fight sequences as possible into its four episodes to overcompensate for his overall lack of character depth or personality.

Marvel Zombies could have been amazing, a thrilling twist on the typical zombie apocalypse formula featuring the combat styles and powers of iconic Marvel characters. Instead, we got an underwhelming adventure that doesn’t give any character or event enough time to stand out. The show’s cliffhanger ending promises another season which might, in any other circumstance, be a relief. However, having killed off every character, it feels like there’s nothing left to build off. 

We can only hope that Marvel doesn’t drop the ball too badly. Marvel Zombies is fun for what it is, but there is not enough  substance to elevate it beyond just another zombie adventure.