Like you have to change up the humor because I think this movie is so smart and how it deals with humor. You were talking about this a second ago. You know, it's not making fun of the zombies. You know, it's not a joke about the zombies. It's not a parody film, even though it definitely sounded like a parody film here because timing wise, it comes out two weeks, I think, after the Zack Snyder remake of Dawn of the Dead. So do you have Dawn of the Dead coming out of Fast Zombie movie by Zack Snyder? And then Shaun of the Dead coming out two weeks later. Obviously people are gonna think you're making fun of it, even though that really wasn't the intention. You're not doing like the scary movie version of this. And I mean part of why I think that was so strong on Edgar Wright's mind, like how not to do the Zaz version of this is because that's kind of how he got his start of his own career, was doing the Zaz versions of things. Like, Shaun of the Dead, I think you can kind of consider it his first movie. It's his first real movie that like gets out there. But 10 years before this, he made a movie when he was incredibly young, like 20 years old, called Fistful of Fingers. And that movie was a Zaz movie. It was like completely inspired by Zaz. it was like his version of a Zaz Western. You know

these men? Oh yeah. Some of the meanest outlaws since Billy Mean and the Meanies. Okay, we got to tell the kid quick. Charlie McGraw, Matt, Dr. Cooper, Donald McDonald, Calimeliki, grow Daddy Fisher, laughing Bob to compete and no compete. So

I liked that he had worked in that genre really specifically so that he was definitely trying not to work in that genre. I mean, and maybe it would have felt less like a parody if they had gone with the original name they had of this, T-Time of the Dead, but maybe that would also sound kind of dopey. But I think in either way, like you can't have Shaun of the Dead without thinking of it as a film that is working in opposition. You know, like it's working in opposition to 28 Days Later, it's working in opposition to USA, American-based Hollywood zombie films, where people just grab their guns and start shooting everything. This is a movie where nobody has guns, where nobody knows how to use guns. They're having a huge debate about it. And then when somebody finally steps up and takes the gun, they're awful at it.

Okay. Has anyone fired a gun before? Oh

yeah. Apart from Ed. I'm a pacifist. Apart from David and Ed. Sorry,

what was Ed's experience?

Uh, he shot his sister in the leg with an air rifle.

I think you should do it.

I think we should all do it. Where can five

people operate one gun? None of us have any real experience, okay? Now we've only got 29. 29 bullets. Call on shells. We've only got 29 shells. We really need to work together on this. I need someone to help me reload. Everyone else to look out. I will fire. As Bertram Russell once said, the only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation. I think we can all appreciate the relevance of that now. I

love that he dismisses everybody. Like, nope, that doesn't count. That does count. It's such a funny sequence there.

Yeah, but then he's awful too. He's probably worse than they would have been.

I also think one of the key reasons why this movie is so good, um, is because of the relationship between Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright. This is a movie where I think they can both amp up each other, right? The trust that Simon's going to have in his director is going to be off the charts, because they've already worked together. They've, they have seen this movie together. They can support each other, right? So, Eggerreich can go in and feel fearless. Like you played in that opening scene, like this idea that he's committing to these choices and he can feel like he supported in those choices. He's not alone in it, right? He has control over it. And conversely, as a co-writer, I think that Edgar Wright can play into these things that he knows about Simon Pegg. Simon Pegg recently came out, maybe a handful of years ago, talking about his battle with alcoholism. And that was something, you know, I think this movie even started to get Simon Pegg off of a bender to write this together with him. Because he was hanging out in a real pub all the time, right? And He, he was somebody who had been dealing with depression. And I think that whether it was intentional or not, he knew that Simon Pegg could. Do more than the affable funny guy. If this movie is in somebody else's hands and you cast Simon Pegg, he may not have had these moments to stretch, to play a little bit more of the darkness. The, the, this is an interesting character that I feel like Simon Pegg let himself show and it becomes this three dimensional character, which is incredibly fulfilling for an audience. I think at the end of the movie, it's not about, is he a different person? He's not fully a different person, but he also was able to, I don't know, maybe prove to himself that he can do more. Like, you know, like the ending of the movie isn't like now he's in the military. Now he runs for president. Like he's just back on the couch watching TV. He's in a better relationship, um, we hope, but he still has his friends, you know, like, but he's also learned to compartmentalize his friend. Right. It's like, it is this idea of like growing up, like you battle through all these. Demons, you know, whether it's your own demons or not. And you, and you get through this other side. So he has time for his friend. He has the proper respect for his relationship. He is moved out of this flat with his apartment. Like it's, you know, the way that Buffy the Vampire Slayer was this analogy or metaphor for the high school experience. I think that the zombie attack is really a metaphor for your late 20s.

very much. I mean, we are now through our late twenties and I look back at that period and like who I was hanging out with. And you can really get a sense of like who laid the tracks to have a good future and who did not, right? It's pivotal. That's a really pivotal moment. Well, because it's easy to get

by, but then the getting by stops. And that's where this movie kind of picks up and it's hard to get out of the getting by because you actually have to make decisions. You

have to commit to like a future, which is really scary, like to get on a path where I think you grow up thinking like, I'll grow up and I'll be an astronaut veterinarian zoologist. And then you're like, oh, I have to pick one. And then you're like, oh, I have to pursue one.

And now we have this moment where, you know, this is a guy who is in crisis in every part of his life, but he makes decisions. Are they great decisions? No. And I want to kind of come back to that because yes, he got all of his friends killed. He's not a zombie hunter. He's not a killer. He's just a guy. We will all make mistakes in trying to achieve who we want to be and how we are. Now, obviously the stakes of this are raised to zombie attack. Like he said, he had to kill his roommate, his mom and his stepdad all in the same day. Like, but I think that this movie is telling that story. Like you're not going to always make the right, being, making all the right choices doesn't mean that you're on the right path. Actually just making a choice means that you're on the right path. And I feel like that, maybe it's too lofty or maybe I'm reading into it too much, but I think that that's the underlying message or thematic thing that's going on here is just make a choice. It might not be perfect, but it's a choice and his choice does eventually save him. And there's growth in that. And even though he goes out and yes, he's saved by his ex, um, he's made choices. And I think it can at least in the movie die with the knowledge of he did everything possible. And if it's in life, it's like, well, I've at least tried that. I didn't think like, well, one day I'll try it or, or give up on my dream. And I think that that's an important message. I think that's why the movie resonates beyond a typical comedy and mashup, whatever. Like the romance, I don't know if it's a Zom-Rom Sure, maybe, but I think it really is more of a Zom coming of age story. I

think it could have worked more as a Zom-Rom if I felt more chemistry between the leads or if I felt like I was at all rooting for them to ever get together, which I'm, I'm not. Kind of to your point, what I think I really grow to dislike about like David, who acts like he's the more adult of the gang, is that when the chips kind of come down, when they're stuck in the pub, he's the guy who just is negative about everything. Like he doesn't have any ideas, he just has ways of criticizing ideas, and that in a crisis moment is to me like the great unforgivable. Oh,

absolutely.

Yeah. Like if you're not gonna help, then you're just hurting.

That to me is your 20s in a nutshell. Well, why do that? You are gonna fail. Why do like it's it's the inner voices of these characters. You look at somebody. Oh, I want that. I want that car. I want that thing. But that guy's not even really happy. I mean, you know, it's Peter Sarafinowitz seems like he's playing the right hand, but he's lost himself. He's

playing the safe hand, but the safe hand isn't actually working. And part of me, I think is maybe being a little bit harsh too, because, you know, when they're like running all the way from, um, when they're running all of the way from like their house to the apartment and they have that fantasy, even of like how it's going to be so easy and the women are going to be happy and smiling and grinning, and it's very much not that at all. But you know when the zombies show up I was like man only Sean is actually trying to like whack zombies and get them away. And I just I think I attributed a lot of that to like emotional reasons but then I found out it was awesome because only Simon Pegg had a weapon that was actually fake. He was the only one with like a cricket bat that was foam. And so he was the only one who could be hitting people. They didn't have like money, I guess, to have, uh, nerf weapons for everybody else.

I will say that they, you know, when they all had, uh, fake weapons was in that queen scene where they play the, uh, you know, don't stop me now, which is, uh, which was a song I came to love after this movie. It's such a great pick and it kind of also coincided with the re, uh, evaluation of Queen and Freddie Mercury. Like I felt like Queen blew up after this movie or it was like time. I think they were, they were on similar paths and Edgar Wright is a huge Queen fan. When they all had those pool cues and they're beating that man. Those were all fake sticks, which were foam, but they still hurt. And I was watching Simon peg talk about that scene saying, but we were like beating up a 70 year old man and the swacking the shit out of them. And it's like, it is really funny that like their big battle sequences against. A really old man, even though he's a zombie, he's a really old man. And apparently he was a, an extra in Brannigan, uh, like, a John Wayne movie that I think was shot in the UK. And so they loved having him around. He was a stuntman on that movie. But man, it is funny that their biggest fight scene is with a very old man. I

mean, yeah, Fag actually talked a little bit about how they got the timing of that, right?

I don't know why it's loud. But

also, I think it's funny that this movie, just like Wayne's World, takes so much credit for resurrecting Queen. Like they're both like, nobody listened to Queen. Nobody liked Queen that much. Nobody liked Don't Stunt Something Now. That was my song. I'm the one who made them popular again. Well,

I mean, look, you know, sometimes culture gets re, like there's a reappraisal. I felt like when Wayne's World came out, that song was popular, But I feel like after this movie came out, I think that Queen's catalog got popular. I don't think it was because of, I think it actually, it was one of the reasons that it was one of the many reasons. It was, it added onto the mountain of Queen. I think there was a great like reevaluation of Queen in this time, or at least in my opinion. I mean, I feel like everyone was talking about Queen, but I don't think it was exactly about this movie.

No, but I do want to say though, speaking of just like Sean growing up, Sean maturing, learning that he can live in an apartment with a little bit of pink. That's a little bit cleaner. Honestly, on the scale of human growth, he's about equal with humanity itself. Right? Cause what we see about like the-zombie world for everyone, is nobody actually is using this to reflect and grow that much, right? We get that little clip of what's happening on TV, where it's just like, yeah, we use them now to push grocery carts and amuse us on reality TV. The fact

that the mobile deceased retained their primal instincts makes them ideal recruitment for the service industry, as well as proving themselves useful in other roles such as. And I

thought that was like perfect and dark, you know, and true because I think that is, I don't know, I've been thinking a lot about that lately for ourselves. You know what? We're like four years out of COVID. What have we really learned from our own personal crisis? And you have to draw the parallel because I think it was a week into COVID that Simon Pegg and Nick Frost did like a Zoom video thing where they reenacted bits of Shaun of the Dead as like a COVID service announcement.

Do not go to the Winchester. The pub is out. Even if it's shut? Especially if it's closed. Remember what happened the last time? If you can, stay at home, have a cup of tea, and wait for all this to blow over. Above all, we're all in this together. Don't be selfish. Look after each other. Give someone a call if you think they might be lonely. Okay? How are you doing? I'm running out of toilet paper. Have you got any?

I mean, that's like March 20th. That was the first week of lockdown. So you have to draw the parallel. I mean, I know that we just finished our disaster series, and we're into comedy, but this movie does to me kind of thread that needle of letting us talk about both, right? What do we learn in a disaster?

And maybe disaster is about growth because out of every, you know, failure, there is a rebirth. You know, it's the Christ story all over again. You know, there is this idea that he gets to reset his life because of this moment. And he gets to settle accounts. And even though the people around him died, I would argue he probably ended his relationship with his mom and his stepdad and multiple people, probably not his roommate, better than he could have possibly ever done it if there wasn't a zombie apocalypse.

Not that it's worth it. I

really love this movie. And I think because it came out first, it may not have the lustre, or maybe it feels like everyone else loves it, so you can't love it as much. That's why people went to hot fuzz and picked that. I remember even seeing At the World's End at a very early screening in London. And what I remember about that first screening was, one of these movies is trying to do something very, very different. And I think that Edgar Wright as a filmmaker is somebody who is always trying to do different things. It feels like an Edgar Wright movie. Like I mentioned earlier, like the idea that music plays a big part in this film. And you can see that playing a big part in Baby Driver. I think that you see, you know, um, elements of different ideas and sort of like certain things get spotlighted on Eggerite's vision board. And one movie maybe employs more of this or more of that. Like Scott Pilgrim, I think definitely embraces more of the, uh, the fighting and the quick cuts and the idea of like comics. I feel like we are very lucky to get him exploring these different avenues and growing, you know, cause there, cause there's a world in which we could have seen three zombie movies, but you know, we get a zombie movie, we get a cop movie, and then we get this movie that's very much like the big chill in a way. I really, I applaud that choice of like not just going to the well and giving you what you expect or want from these characters. I would argue that at the world's end is probably the most grown-up film of this trilogy. And it just shows that he's constantly trying to not reinvent, but do something that's as interesting to him as it might be for the audience. And whether or not that works all the time. I know people didn't like the Soho film. I know that people like certain other films more than others. But I think that that's the sign of a good director is like, not just giving you what you expect. Yeah.

I mean, I like a lot of the show of film. I think, I think so. It was great. Honestly, I think I like all of his films. I do too. I really genuinely think I do. And I think like what I find so interesting about Edgar, right? Is they all feel like an Edgar Wright film and they all feel like their own film at the same time.

And that's why I'm thrilled that he didn't get caught up in the Marvel universe. Like give me a baby driver over Ant-Man any day because I'd rather him, and I think that his Ant-Man before Marvel became a thing because I remember that's what he was working on back in the way early day when I think it was supposed to be Simon Pegg as Ant-Man, I would have loved to have seen that, but it would have been a heist movie. It wouldn't have been a Marvel movie. And I think it was the smartest decision he made and it probably was tumultuous and upsetting and really awful, but man oh man made the right choice. And I think his career only benefited from it. I

agree. And I think it's interesting to look back at the people that I'm kind of listing in my head is like, the modern or outdoors, because I would consider him one. And like the people that we've known who we've known to like the rise and fall of their career. I was talking about this recently with my, with one of my friends. How there's a lot of people who have recently fallen in love with M. Night Shyamalan who are fairly young. So they've been just watching the movies that are good from his whole catalog. They don't understand the emotional pain of loving him, hating him, loving him, hating him, going on the ride that is following a filmmaker through their entire career. There's very few people that we have been alive for the entire range of their entire career who are still making movies, who are still doing important stuff. And I think like Edgar Wright is definitely one of them. We've been here for like Tarantino. That's been great. We've been here for Shyamalan. The one that I want to explore though, next with you is somebody that I was so hot on and now I'm very cold on. And I want to remind myself of the moment of what it felt like to love them again. And I think that we should do Tim Burton's Beetlejuice to prepare for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.

I cannot wait. Uh, I'm so excited about this because very similar to, you know, Shaun of the dead, Beetlejuice is also like this kind of odd throwback, like a, a, a world in which like Tim Burton, I think takes a lot of elements of films that we are familiar with and up ends them in a completely unique film, a comedy, uh, that is, I think probably decidedly one of the most Tim Burton-y movies. It kind of, it kind of is that perfect early Burton. So I'm excited to, to dive in. I haven't watched it in years.

Oh, really?