Army of the Dead Review: Entertains to an Extent!

Zack Snyder’s 2021 zombie-heist film, Army of the Dead, stars the former WWE star and now renowned actor Dave Bautista in the primary role while Ella Purnell, Omari Hardwick, and others fill in the supporting cast roles. A Netflix Original, the 148-minute film narrates a basic plot and begins with a zombie outbreak that ravages the entire city of Las Vegas.

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Shortly after, the whole town gets walled off from the rest of the nation so that the vile creatures can stay within the parameters. Subsequently, when the higher powers decide to nuke the exposed area, a group headed by their leader, Scott, attempts a covert operation to obtain a large amount of money left inside a locker in the zombie-infested region.

Comparable to every other heist film from Oceans to The Town and Now You See Me, Army of the Dead follows a conventional template of setting up characters with decent subplots. Cause Zack Snyder spent most of the movie following the lead characters’ journey from point A to B. As a result, apart from the usual narrative, the film had a few things to offer as far as emotions go. The subplot involving Dave Bautista and his daughter had a real nice throughline and is concluded well in the climax. The other storylines did not hold much weight to the overall film as a few are either suddenly ended or poorly narrated.

Now, we’ve already seen a ton of different versions of zombie films in the past, a sub-genre that has been tried and tested in every imaginable way. From Shaun of the Dead, which went took a more comedic route, to World War Z, which maintained a big-star feel, and Zombieland, which got a bit creative with its concept and humor, the term “Zombie Flick” became more redundant in Hollywood as the wave, in my opinion, passed it’s prime.

So, what else could be done when it comes to zombie films? Zack Snyder gets artistic with the setting of Army of the Dead. The undead (as they’re referred to in the movie) had a bit of a character, especially the two main ones, and are just not mindless howling and screeching creatures who are thirsty for blood. They carried a dash of style, and of course, as we saw in the trailers, a zombie horse and a tiger was a nice touch.

On to the action sequences, which are surprisingly not too many for a two-and-a-half-hour Zack Snyder film, but the available ones during the last hour were a ton of fun to watch and managed to level up the tension, even though the ending felt a bit too obvious. However, up until the one-hour-thirty-minute mark, the pacing felt a tad slow, and even though it is entertaining to watch, I just don’t find myself sitting through a two-hour Netflix film without taking a break.

From a technical standpoint, the VFX is pretty neat, good enough if you’re watching on a TV or a phone screen, and very much impressive when you identify that they digitally replaced Chris D’Elia with Tig Notaro. As far as performances go, Dave Bautista, unlike his other mainstream appearances, had a significant and a central character to play, and he knocked it out-of-the-park as usual. Ella Purnell, who plays his daughter, Kate, also made her character stand out from the rest.

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Overall, Army of the Dead falls in the same category as Netflix’s previous action films like The Old Guard and Extraction. It is an entertaining movie with a plot that is not too serious and action sequences that are engaging enough to keep you interested. What else do you expect from a Netflix zombie film? Popcorn recommended. Watch ‘Army of the Dead’ on Netflix here.

Rating – 3/5 | Grade – B

Images via Netflix India