You wouldn’t think money heists and zombies would necessarily go together, but the trailer for Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead makes a solid case for them successfully co-existing.
The action-horror film will land on Netflix on May 21 and stars Dave Bautista as mercenary Scott Ward who leads the $200 million heist in a post-apocalyptic Las Vegas.
Ana de la Reguera, Omari Hardwick, Hiroyuki Sanada, Garret Dillahunt, Raúl Castillo, Nora Arnezeder, Matthias Schweighöfer, Samantha Win and Rich Cetrone join Bautista in the movie which features a Zombie Elvis because Vegas, baby.
Comedian Tig Notaro also stars as a helicopter pilot, having replaced fellow comic Chris D’Elia, who was accused in June 2020 of sexually harassing multiple underage women. Notaro’s scenes, which were shot during peak COVID restrictions, were filmed using a combination of green-screen and CGI technology to seamless integrate her into the project.
Snyder, who previously directed the Zombie movie Dawn of the Dead, released his directors-cut version of Justice League in March 2021. The director left the film mid-production in 2017 due to a family tragedy causing Warner Bros. to hire Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon to step in and help finish the project.
Speaking to Deadline in March, Snyder said, “We had an amazing experience with [Netflix]. I’m trying to write them another movie, and I have two animated series I’m doing with them, and I also have a German-language prequel to ‘Army’ that we did. So, we’re really like trying to stay on that franchise, the ‘Army’ franchise.”
That “Army” franchise will also include a prequel anime series at the streamer titled Army of the Dead: Lost Vegas which will “chronicle the origin story of Scott Ward and his rescue crew during the initial fall of Vegas as they confront the mysterious source of the zombie outbreak.”
Dave Bautista, Ana De La Reguera, Tig Notaro, Omari Hardwick and Ella Purnell will reprise their live-action roles in the animated series and will be joined by Joe Manganiello, Christian Slater, Vanessa Hudgens, and Yetide Badaki. The prequel is also expected to drop in 2021 although there has been no official release date as yet.
As for whether or not Snyder is making some sly commentary on the nature of Las Vegas and how its endless plethora of mindless entertainment and slot machines turns people into Zombies — we can’t say. But the trailer promises some good old fashioned fun either way.
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