Black Summer -- a review

Like most people these days, I was suffering from zombie fatigue, and so when I heard about a new zombie series on Netflix called Black Summer, I was tempted to just ignore it, because, you know, zombies…ugh. However, with Stephen King giving the show a verbal thumbs up on Twitter, I decided to reconsider my embargo on all things zombies long enough to give Black Summer a chance.

I was only going to watch the first episode of Black Summer, just to gauge how good the series is, and I wound up watching the first four episodes back to back before I finally reluctantly gave into sleep--yes, it’s that good. Taking place in the early days of a zombie outbreak, with civilization teetering on the verge of catastrophe, Black Summer details how an orderly march of suburbanites into an evacuation by the military quickly becomes a horrific fight for survival once things start going sideways.

Jaime King plays Rose, who gets separated from her young daughter right at the start of the show. The rest of the series basically details her efforts to find her daughter, who’s supposed to be at a specific rally point with other evacuees in the city. But that’s easier said than done, as Rose’s quest to get to her daughter becomes a nightmarish struggle just to stay alive. And it’s not just the zombies that Rose and several other survivors have to deal with, they also have to contend with other humans, as well.

Black Summer is a tightly wound thriller that presents a stripped down version of the zombie apocalypse. It thankfully lacks the soap opera nonsense that a certain other zombie series has devolved into, instead remaining focused on a riveting story that’s essentially a bare bones battle to get from point ‘A’ to point ‘B’, and it’s all the more better for it. Black Summer is a lean, mean thrill ride that makes us care for its characters. The lightning quick pacing and interlocked stories also make it the perfect show to binge-watch on Netflix.

And despite the fact that it’s technically a prequel series to Z-Nation, Black Summer still can be enjoyed on its own merits. I haven’t seen Z-Nation, and I had no problem diving into Black Summer. The outstanding cast--which includes Christine Lee as Sun, Justin Chu Carey as Spears, and Kelsey Flower as Lance--make it very easy to get caught up in the story. And, yes, Black Summer was produced by The Asylum (the Sharknado people?! Gasp!), but don’t let that scare you off. The Asylum gang have outdone themselves with this deadly serious and completely enthralling take on the zombie genre that’s guaranteed to make anybody who watches it forget they were ever fatigued with this genre. --SF

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