Does Romero's Dead series depict the same zombie apocalypse? — Page 2

Good example, Duracell. Universal's The Bride of Frankenstein was a direct sequel to Frankenstein. I chose Planet of the Apes as a single example because the franchise was produced in the decade between Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead and spans several films that all tell one story and has fantastic continuity across the franchise.

Like I said in an earlier post, the concept of film franchises goes all the way back to the beginning of film. Basil Rathbone starred in 14 Sherlock Holmes films from 1939 to 1946. Johnny Wiessmuller played Tarzan across 12 films in the 30s and 40s. Film franchises were nothing new by 1978, neither were sequels or continuity. I'm arguing that there was nothing preventing Romero from making one big science fiction/horror narrative across multiple films on a tight budget. He didn't, so the question of whether the films depict the same event, or separate events happening in parallel dimensions is a valid one, and leads to an interesting debate.

CP3S said:

TV's Frink said:

TheBoost said:

no one cared

This.  And why care now?

Not to start anything, but here is another example of if it isn't relevant to you, it doesn't need to be talked about at all attitude. I just don't get where this attitude comes from.

There are a ton of threads with discussion I would be hard pressed to care any less about, as such, I just don't click on them. I think people would get more than a little annoyed with me if I jumped into every sports thread and asked "Who cares? Why does this matter?" etc. Asterisk obviously started the thread because it is an interesting topic to him.

To be clear, I wasn't saying it shouldn't be talked about.  I was simply pointing out that I've never had this issue with these movies.  It never bothered me.  So I probably should have worded it better...

TheBoost said:

no one cared

This.  And I agree with them.

doubleofive said:

Would you believe GIS "i care luke skywalker" brings up this image in an OT.com thread?

:-)

Film series aren't new (my hatred for the word 'franchise' being used in this context is on record).

Clearly any attempt to fuse the 20th Century Fox Rathbone/Bruce Holmes films to the Universal ones is going to be convoluted because dates are clearly given.

Time travel, cryonic hibernation etc would have to come into play and it's easier just to say the Fox films are not in the same continuity as the Universal ones.

There are no dates given for Romero's Dead films so the only incongruities are the surface details.

NOTLD as pure narrative could easily take place a day or a week before Dawn and only look decades apart because of when they were filmed and that's the way I read it.

CP3S said:

TV's Frink said:

TheBoost said:

no one cared

This.  And why care now?

Not to start anything, but here is another example of if it isn't relevant to you, it doesn't need to be talked about at all attitude. I just don't get where this attitude comes from.

There are a ton of threads with discussion I would be hard pressed to care any less about, as such, I just don't click on them. I think people would get more than a little annoyed with me if I jumped into every sports thread and asked "Who cares? Why does this matter?" etc. Asterisk obviously started the thread because it is an interesting topic to him.

 I think you've misunderstood my point (can't speak for Frink... if he has one)

I'm not saying I don't care. I'm saying that Romero and the audience of the day didn't care.

And I'm not arguing that the idea of sequals didn't exist in the 70s. They made almost 30 "Blondie" movies in the 40s!  Just that the modern notion of the hit franchise, where every filmmaker claims that they have a trilogy in mind, and almost all actors in genre pictures are tied to multi-picture contracts, wasn't the standard in the late 60s.

"Planet of the Apes" was a hit, and they quickly made a string of cheaper and cheaper sequals. If you want convoluted reasoning, look at the fuzzy continuity of those films, just made a year or so apart.

"NOTLD" was a hit, and Romero didn't revisit it for a decade. And it was set in the 70s because it wasn't "PART II" of a single story set in 1968... it was just the sequal being made in the 70s.

Bingowings said:

Film series aren't new (my hatred for the word 'franchise' being used in this context is on record).

I think "franchise" best applies to modern ganre-films that are plainly and statedly trying to launch a connected series of films.

Carl Lemme wasn't trying to start a "Dracula" film series.

Kenneth Branaugh is plainly trying to start the "Thor" series, happy meal toys, cartoon spin-off.

TheBoost said:

CP3S said:

TV's Frink said:

TheBoost said:

no one cared

This.  And why care now?

Not to start anything, but here is another example of if it isn't relevant to you, it doesn't need to be talked about at all attitude. I just don't get where this attitude comes from.

There are a ton of threads with discussion I would be hard pressed to care any less about, as such, I just don't click on them. I think people would get more than a little annoyed with me if I jumped into every sports thread and asked "Who cares? Why does this matter?" etc. Asterisk obviously started the thread because it is an interesting topic to him.

 I think you've misunderstood my point (can't speak for Frink... if he has one)

Did you read my previous post?  My point was that I don't care, I like to think of the movies as a continuation of the single outbreak, regardless of when the films were made. 

But that's not the same thing as saying the thread shouldn't have been made.

TheBoost said:

Bingowings said:

Film series aren't new (my hatred for the word 'franchise' being used in this context is on record).

I think "franchise" best applies to modern ganre-films that are plainly and statedly trying to launch a connected series of films.

Carl Lemme wasn't trying to start a "Dracula" film series.

Kenneth Branaugh is plainly trying to start the "Thor" series, happy meal toys, cartoon spin-off.

I dislike the term because it implies (correctly 99.99% of the time, I know but there's no need to vulgar about it) that the sole purpose of the franchised set of projects is to make money and telling a story is a side order with special sauce.