Just like with the first one, there are plenty of things to love about the Zombieland sequel
- but there are also a few things that didn't work out as well as we might have hoped.
From obscene, thrilling action to obnoxious new characters, let's sink our teeth into
the five best and five worst things about Zombieland: Double Tap.
Best: Madison
While it's great to see the old crew again, especially after that weird Amazon series,
the MVP in Double Tap is quite possibly newcomer Zoey Deutch's Madison.
She tags along on the group's quest to find the missing Little Rock, and the fizzy energy
she brings to the group makes every scene she's in sparkle with light.
"Tiny, big, tiny!"
"She is adorable."
About halfway through the film, it appears that Madison tragically dies.
But in a delightful turn of events, she reappears out of nowhere in the final act - driving,
appropriately, a technicolor ice cream truck - giddy to report that what we all assumed
was a zombie virus infection was actually just a bad nut allergy.
It's a twist that could feel forced and unearned, but with Madison, somehow, it works.
"You're cute.
I like it."
Worst: Berkeley
After ten years stuck with her sister, her sister's boyfriend, and a rough-around-the-edges
wannabe cowboy, the grown-up Little Rock falls into a state of young rebellion.
She's yearning for contact with people her own age, preferably of the attractive male
variety.
She shows just how serious she is when she takes off with the guitar-playing, weed-smoking
Berkeley.
"Do I look like the person who would have weed?"
Although Tallahassee's reaction to the news is a bit much, we've got to agree with him
that the guy's pretty insufferable.
Not only does he shrug off Little Rock's interests, he also flat-out lies to her, claiming to
have composed Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" and Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Free Bird."
Plus, while his commitment to pacifism is arguably admirable, roping Little Rock into
a more defenseless lifestyle seems reckless at best, and deadly at worst.
"I have nothing against hippies, I just want to beat the s--- out of them."
Best: Rules vs. Commandments
The extended, unexplained doppelgänger sequence in Zombieland: Double Tap is a bit of a mixed
bag - and not just because they cast Thomas Middleditch as the double for Jesse Eisenberg
in a world where Michael Cera exists.
"They said, 'Didn't you know?
You're a poor man's Jesse Eisenberg.'
I said, 'what?'"
But it's all worth it for the scene in which Columbus and Flagstaff realize that they each
keep their own list of rules, or in Flagstaff's case, "commandments," for surviving in a zombie-filled
world.
With manic politeness, the two nerds compare notes, kicking themselves when the other has
a rule they should've included, such as Flagstaff's first commandment, "Teamwork."
Columbus' first rule, "cardio," is in fact on Flagstaff's list as well, but not until
the mid-20s.
While it has little to do with the plot of the movie, Eisenberg and Middleditch each
bring an earnest eagerness to the scene that makes the rapid-fire recitation of rules,
and the exceedingly cordial one-upmanship, a joy to watch.
"He's so cool."
Worst: Tallahassee's Blackfoot heritage
Early in the movie, Tallahassee decides to reveal a secret he's never shared before:
somewhere in his family line, he has ties to the Blackfoot tribe.
There's no real reason that Tallahassee brings this info up, and it only ever serves as kind
of a one-note punchline.
While Tallahassee functions as a constant fountain of crude one-liners, leaning on his
supposed ethnic background as joke fodder feels cheap and exploitative in a way his
other zingers don't.
What's more, Double Tap doesn't need those jokes - they're far from the funniest lines
in the film.
Best: Tallahassee's big leap
When the heroes find themselves up against a horde of zombies and have no firearms, they
have to get creative.
The pacifist Babylon settlement doesn't have any guns to speak of, but they do have a very
tall tower with a constant party raving on the rooftop.
In a desperate last stand during the final battle, the group races up the tower's stairs.
Tallahassee brings up the rear, slowing the pursuing zombies in any way he can, including
rolling barrels down the stairs, Donkey Kong style.
At the top, Tallahassee leads the zombies in a charge, seemingly sacrificing himself
in order to guide them all over the edge of the roof to their permanent ends.
But at the last second, he jumps and grabs onto a dangling hook, and is ultimately pulled
to safety.
It's a thrilling scene, and one of Tallahassee's most heroic moments.
Worst: Babylon
We can see the draw of the pacifist community of Babylon, and why characters like Berkeley,
Little Rock, Madison, and even Columbus would be tempted to stay.
But at the same time, there is a zombie apocalypse going on.
It's aggravating how much the people of Babylon seem to completely ignore the reality of the
world they live in.
That they actually melt down weapons they come across, instead of keeping them locked
up in a safe place, just in case, seems ludicrous.
When the zombies inevitably arrive, the people of Babylon still don't seem to realize there's
a threat, making us wonder how on earth this place has managed to stand for ten minutes,
much less ten years.
Best: The zombie battles
As with the first Zombieland, one of the most enjoyable elements of Double Tap is in its
brutal showdowns between humans and zombies.
The first smackdown, following the core foursome as they slash a path to the White House, is
a great way to reintroduce the film's main characters after ten years away.
Later, when Flagstaff and Albuquerque become infected in the Hound Dog Hotel, the frantic
fight through the hallways is a thing of beauty.
But probably the best battle comes at the end of the film, culminating in Nevada and
the gang crushing dozens of zombies in Albuquerque's monster truck, "Big Fat Death."
That Columbus is in the back seat getting carsick as the scene goes on is just icing
on the cake.
Worst: Inconsistent T-800 zombies
The first time we meet one of Double Tap's evolved super-zombies, Columbus dubs it the
T-800, a reference to the Terminator movies.
There's a good reason why: Tallahassee is forced to go far beyond the double tap in
order to put the first T-800 down, unloading nine bullets into its undead body and then
crushing its skull under his boot before it finally stops trying to eat him.
"Oh god, those are T-800s.
Or at the very least T-700s."
Later in the film, the T-800s have suddenly become much easier to kill, with characters
easily taking out T-800s with a single blow from a shovel.
If Double Tap was dead set on introducing a new strain of super-zombies, it would've
been nice for them to stay consistent, and maybe effect the story a little more than
they end up doing.
Best: Bill Murray
One of the best parts of the original Zombieland is Ghostbusters actor Bill Murray's extended
cameo as a version of himself, disguised as a zombie to survive the apocalypse with the
power of acting.
Unfortunately, Columbus doesn't realize that Murray is only pretending, and shoots the
actor dead in his Hollywood mansion.
In Double Tap, we find out that mistakenly killing a human that you thought was a zombie
has come to be known as "Murraying."
"I'm sorry, he just gets me.
But it still is sad."
Since Columbus killed Bill Murray in the first movie, we hadn't held out a lot of hope of
seeing him again in the sequel.
But the actor does pop up - twice! - during the end credits.
Both scenes take place during the 2009 press junket for the thankfully fictional Garfield
3, which it turns out coincided with the beginning of the zombie virus outbreak.
The first person to be affected is Today show host Al Roker, who begins vomiting and becoming
aggressive.
When more zombies emerge, Murray takes matters into his own hands, taking them out one after
another using nothing but a metal folding chair.
Worst: Logic
We're willing to suspend a lot of disbelief for the Zombieland movies, but in a film that's
supposed to be set a decade into the apocalypse, there are a few things that are a little hard
to swallow.
Like really?
The electricity's still on?
In the first film, most of our issues could be handwaved away because of the time period
- the zombie apocalypse had only been going on for a short time, so of course the characters
would have a relatively easy time finding food, clothing, fuel, clean water, and other
resources.
After ten years, though, some things should be a little harder to come by.
We're not asking for the gritty grimness of The Walking Dead - a series which is "totally
unrealistic," according to Columbus - but at least a little acknowledgement that the
world has actually collapsed by now would've been appreciated.
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