DEAD SET
Charlie Brooker is best known as the ranting, raving TV critic rallying against stupidity on the small screen. How then did he end up creating Dead Set, a satirical TV series about zombies and Big Brother? David Pollock found out
n George A Romero‘s seminal 1980 horror Dawn of the Dear]. a group of mismatched survivors of the zombie apocalypse take shelter in a deserted mall. Famously. the film is Romero’s thinly veiled up-yours to consumerist Western society. to the ‘zombies’ who loll around suburban shopping malls in real life. pressing their noses against store windows in awe at the spectacle of desire. Now consider the 21st century. in which
anyone who wishes to make do with the cycle of
covet and consume fed to them via digital television and the internet can indulge in it without ever leaving their armchair. And let‘s also spare a thought for the inestimable (‘harlie Brooker — television critic. commentator. writer and producer. and the man behind such essential viewing as Nathan Barley. Charlie Brooker's Sereenwipe and the late. lamented web-rant 'lVGoHome. The man. indeed. who said of last winter’s vomiting bug in his feverishly essential Guardian column: ‘If I was running things. it would be dealt with like a zombie outbreak: shoot all victims in the head . . . then barricade the windows till the end credits roll.’
With a CV and an attitude like that. who better to loosely update the concepts of Romero’s paranoid epic for the credit crunching. future fearing. fame hungry present day? And what better folly for survivors to barricade themselves in this time than the Big Brother house? This stuff might have written itself if Brooker hadn’t come up with Dead Set. a five—part zombie horror meets reality TV epic airing on Channel 4
18 THE LIST 16-30 Oct 2008
on consecutive evenings this fortnight. But it wouldn‘t have been half as good.
‘1)earl Set‘s a fairly standard nightmare scenario. in which Britain is overwhelmed by a zombie apocalypse which wipes out pretty much everyone in the country. from hot dog sellers through to the people who pay the wages of hot dog sellers.‘ says Brooker. the show‘s writer and producer. ‘Just about the only people who aren‘t
‘THERE’S SOMETHING VISCERAL ABOUT HAVING A BUNCH
OF ZOMBIES RUNNING AT YOU'
aware of it. initially at least. are a bunch of contestants in a fictional series of Big Brother.
‘In the original Dawn of the Dead. which was sort of a model for this. the setting has obviously got satirical undertones. I would say the same about this. but while you could spend your time watching it thinking “Mmmm. yes. a satirical point“. most of the time you're going to be thinking. “Help! Here come the zombies!" It’s a scary romp. first and foremost.‘
Much like Brooker and (‘hris Morris' Nathan Barley. the story of a trust-funded. air—headed lloxton new media dilettante. which had its start as a recurring gag on 'IVGoHome with the non listings-friendly title Cunt. Dead Set‘s first episode reveals unanticipated depths of drama and characterisation which go well beyond the attention—grabbing log—line — which is. in this case. a simple ‘Big Brother with zombies‘.
‘()n one level. the fact that it’s set in the Big Brother house is kind of irrelevant. although it also sort of isn‘t.‘ says Brooker. ‘lt's inspired by shows like 24. so hopefully people will be too involved to sit there and stroke their chins.’
It‘s in the horror-thriller department that Brooker has moved furthest away from his regular style. Perhaps surprisingly for a show on