4 out of 5

Creator: Dominic Mitchell

Prepare to be underwhelmed but intrigued, then prepare to be surprised.  Then maybe underwhelmed again.

You would think ‘In the Flesh’ is just jumping on the zombie bandwagon, and maybe you’re correct, but writer Dominic Mitchell has finally – god damn finally – latched on to the same promise that Romero showed in Night and Dawn for using the walking dead parable to explore many, many themes, and not just the inhumanity of humans a la a certain AMC show based on a comic (which I enjoy, but thematically isn’t too much of a stretch).  It’s almost too promising for its three episodes – that is, it touches on A LOT of themes, and approaches them all with emotion and realism (within the context of the show’s logic) – and it isn’t exactly uneven due to this, or too abbreviated with its handling of such things, but the underwhelming feeling stems from just getting glimpses of these moments, and sensing how fully thought out they are but then having to follow the character to the next scripted stage.  Realistic, yes, and I’d rather TV passionately portray several things as opposed to over-preach any given one, but perhaps one more episode to smooth out the tone would’ve been helpful.

So you died, and then there was the resurrection and it’s the zombie apocalypse, and then scientists figured out a drug that can restore control to the undead mind.  You don’t eat anymore, and you have to wear makeup and contacts to “look” human, but at least you’re no longer a monster.  And now, after the requisite testing and reintegration training, these once-fiends are ready to be returned to their families – under some supervision, and with instruction to regularly inject the magic science serum every day.

Episode 1 starts with our primary character – Kieren – played with a good blend of sadness and life (no pun intended for rizzle) by Luke Newberry in what amounts to a sort of psychiatric hospital for zombies – come get your meds, have therapy sessions about the memories you have of feeding off the living – a bit before he’s set to be released to his family.  Things start off rather dour and political, the first of our trio of eps exploring the practical aspects of how this works, and the little societal offshoots that came about due to the rising – the politics of it, the anti-zombie groups, Kieren’s family overjoyed for his returning but having to hide him as they drive into town.  Kieren’s lack of emotion at this point feels a little emo, but the world-building is already in place and shapes things up well so that all of the plotting sits on firm ground.

Episode 2 is the ‘fun’ episode, as Kieren meets an undead lass who likes to go out with little makeup and just have a good time being… uh… alive… right.  The local anti-zombie family’s son is returned to them, and the father copes with it all strangely, inviting his son along on zombie hunting expeditions and demanding that everything is as normal as ever.  The quiet and dull colors of episode one give way to much more expression, and dialogue, and joy, and a bit of light in the scenery as well – not so rainy, not so grim.  The exploration of the relationships we form and the different decisions we might’ve made with hindsight are given an interesting dimension from the perspective of the undead.

And episode 3 finds a collision between these two, swooping into some further acceptance of Kieren and his own awareness of his previous soft-spoken approach to life and then rollercoasting down, down into the devastating consequences of the world trying to mash in these concepts which are so unacceptable, and so, essentially, inhuman.

There’s consideration to every aspect here, though the hand behind the writing and directing doesn’t feel forced.  The indie / emo theme haunts it a bit, with the sappy music at the end of each ep and some of the social themes that dance about, but it’s all written so gracefully that it’s nowhere near being a problem.  I kept expecting ‘Flesh’ to drop into melodrama, or typical zombie bullshit, but it remains committed the whole way through.  I request that extra episode just so we could explore some more of these characters, since it’s so apparent that those back-stories and extra details are there, in-between the lines of script, but by the same token it’s very possible 60 extra minutes would’ve been just that step over the line I was worried about, leaning too heavily on one theme or another.

Really surprising in a sneaky way.  Absolutely curious how creator Mitchell will apply himself after this.