The Movie Waffler First Look Review - <i>Dead Kansas</i> | The Movie Waffler

First Look Review - Dead Kansas

A father and daughter attempt to survive the zombie apocalypse.


Review by Andy Comer

Directed by: Aaron K Carter

Starring: Erin Miracle, Alexandria Lightford, Kevin C Beardsley, Ben Woolf, Michael Camp


Dead Kansas is a post-apocalyptic tale in which “rottens” and tornadoes are terrorizing the people of Kansas, or mainly just Emma and Glenn, a father and daughter chased by a gang like group of hillbilly types, led by Jebediah. They're after Emma because she is the last girl that they know of in the area, and Jebediah believes Emma to be humanity's savior. While on the run, Emma runs into quite the strange assortment of characters with an array of agendas of their own. Sadly, none of the efforts displayed by anyone here seem worth it as – just like the majority of zombie stories already out there – everyone starts dropping like flies despite having a somewhat functioning brain.
Now, while Dead Kansas does seem to have a lot of heart put into its small budget, it doesn’t quite hit the mark. The acting is awful and is only amplified by the absolutely cheesy and terrible lines that the actors are given. The story is pretty bland as it is exactly like most zombie flicks; one stupid, power-hungry character starts to abuse their power and thus puts the remaining survivors in peril.
Having said all of that I’ll go back to what I said before about having a lot of heart. Despite the low budget causing the filmmakers to forego great effects and great actors, I feel the need to give credit to people who are passionate about film-making and zombies. It is abundantly apparent that this is a love letter of sorts, so I don’t think the unoriginality at work here is complete laziness. It is more of a combination between a sort of homage to the zombie films we love, and the bloodthirsty lust of B level horror films that mostly try to cater to their limited built in audience.
Ultimately, the biggest thing I took away from this one is the realization of how unfortunate the zombie genre is to have so many filmmakers that are unable to see the unoriginality they keep feeding to the genre. It's almost like a bunch of people all met up one day and decided together that the only originality that a zombie movie needs is some different name that the characters use to refer to the zombies. That isn’t originality to me. It is laziness disguised as creativity and is one major thing that really annoys me when watching all of these movies and television shows about zombies. They are zombies; just call them what they are and focus on making a worthwhile story. This one may have the heart that others don’t but it only caters to the filmmakers themselves and the very selective few who are just like them.

Dead Kansas is available for rent through Amazon Instant Video