The Dragging Dead
Episode 8 of All of Us Are Dead picks up with Eun-Ji walking through the school grounds. She notices all the people who used to give her a hard time are now walking zombies. There’s a faint whiff of satisfaction that comes from her walk, and she eventually starts a fire inside the offices. A big smile spreads across her face. The fire hungrily laps across papers and desks, burning everything in its wake. That is, until the sprinklers turn on. Up on the roof, Cheol-Su decides to keep his mouth shut and saves himself rather than the other kids. He doesn’t tell the soldiers about Cheong-San and the others, leaving them to their fate instead. Just as the soldiers all fly off, the kids manage to unlock the door but it’s too late. Now, in the middle of this big skirmish, Nam-Ra’s strange powers manifest, saving Cheong-San from the wrath of Gwi-Nam and knocking him back down the stairs. Up on the roof, the kids decide to make a big, bold SOS signal just incase the helicopter comes back. While they set to work, the other group of kids including Min-Jae and the others decide to follow suit and head up to the rooftop too, working out a plan to do this while avoiding the zombies. On the roof, the gang try to make a fire… until they realize that Nam-Ra actually has a lighter. There seems to be a theme of rooftops this episode, as Jae-Ik and Orangibberish also try to lure the zombies away so they make it to safety off the roof they find themselves stuck on. Ho-Cheol shows up on a minibus though and encourages them both to jump to safety. The episode then screeches to a halt. Most of the drama we see take place after this revolves around the kids sitting around for the night and waiting for daybreak. Even Jae-Ik, who has had an action packed series of sequences, ends up on a road trip. While that would ordinarily be okay, it’s awkwardly placed right at the tail-end of this series when a mid-point breather would have been more fitting. Anyway, I digress. Downstairs, Na-Yeon has been stuck in the storage room for much of the season since leaving the group. She does venture out to grab the video camera, watching the whole group as they leave their messages. Unfortunately, Gwi-Nam soon finds her and after evilly telling her he’s hungry, bites her neck. Now, it’ll be interesting to see if she turns into another of these super-powered zombies, like Nam-Ra or just like the infected. We shall see. Up on the roof, the group who all start talking abut how they feel and their lives. Among them is Cheong-San, who opens up and reveals that he’s liked On-Jo ever since he was 6. When On-Jo leaves the group to get some space, Su-Hyeok gives an approving nod for him to go and talk to her. On-Jo though, simply tells him to leave. Well that’s probably just as well because Gwi-Nam manages to climb up the outside of the roof and makes it to the rooftop. He immediately grabs On-Jo, bringing Cheong-San over to try and stop him. That’s just what he wanted, as he slams Cheong-San down to the ground and begins pushing his thumbs into Cheong-San’s eye.
The Episode Review
Well that episode dragged. Out of all the drama we’ve seen across the season, this one grinds to a halt as all our characters sit around and we get to know more about their backstories. While that in itself is nice, it comes at an absolutely bizarre moment in this 12 episode series. Why did we need to wait 8 episodes to get some of this development? Shouldn’t it have come much earlier so we can actually care about these kids making it out alive? It’s almost as if these kids should have been saved by the helicopter, moved to the quarantine camp so they can tell their stories…and then let another infection out ala. 28 Weeks Later style. Instead, it almost feels like this series is dragging its heels. I’ve enjoyed the show so far – especially those early bombastic episodes – and there’s been a good deal of action and drama to keep things ticking over. The ending here with Gwi-Nam certainly hints that bigger episodes are on the horizon.
