Review: 'Black Summer'

While I watched Syfy's "Z Nation" early on, I have to admit that I tapped out of the show somewhere towards the end of season two. For all of the things I liked about the premise and the actors, the often campy performances and borderline idiotic staging just wore me out. I don't mind a post-apocalyptic show having a goofier take on the end of the world as we know it. But as "Z Nation" continued, it never seemed to outgrow its made-for-Syfy movie roots.

So I didn't approach Netflix's "Black Summer" with any sense of anticipation. The series was described as a "prequel" to "Z Nation" and promised to show the early days of the zombie plague. It was an idea with some promise, but I didn't expect to like it much.

As it turns out, I had nothing to worry about. "Black Summer" is a taut, often overwhelming series that offers a stripped-down take on the first couple of days of the zombie apocalypse. It isn't perfect, but the flaws aren't serious or impossible to tweak in time for a second season.

Episode one introduces a series of characters in little vignettes that are all intertwined in the streets of a quiet suburb. It's the first days of the plague and residents are frantically running down the suburban streets, trying to get to a military checkpoint where they can be transported to a stadium for evacuation. The stories are interwoven in a way that heightens the tension. You'll see a woman lying injured in the road in one scene, then during another character's scene you'll see how she's injured. One long sequence follows a zombie as she slams her way around the neighborhood, looking for a target. 

What makes the first episode such a compelling introduction is that it's mostly filled with the small examples of cruel self-survival that can quickly overcome even the most restrained and civilized person when they are faced with a situation that is both deadly and impossible to understand. And then there are the brief snippets of "what the fu&%k was that about?" that pop up and are never explored.

Jaime King plays Rose, who is traveling with husband Patrick (Ty Olsson) and daughter Anna (Zoe Marlett) towards the closest checkpoint. The couple ends up being separated from their daughter and one of the main arcs of the season is Rose's effort to find her daughter. Justin Chu Cary plays "Spears," who has been arrested by soldiers for some unknown reason. The hearing-impaired Ryan (Mustafa Alabssi) find himself scrambling through the neighborhood with a woman who doesn't speak English.  

The entire eight-episode season one follows these characters and many others as they desperately fight to make their way to the stadium. The unfamiliar neighborhoods are filled with zombies and even worse, people whose survival instinct is to let everyone else die if it means that they have a chance at another minute of life. The scenes are often frenetic and particularly in the last episode, familiar characters are quickly killed off in scenes that are sometimes little more than a quick blink during a much larger battle.

As much as I really enjoyed "Black Summer," the show does have its flaws. The humans can't seem to figure out that a shot to the head will stop the zombies, so even in the later episodes they continue to pour an entire clip into the torso of a zombie before being eaten. And without giving away anything, let's just say that the season finale ends with a "Sopranos-like" abruptness.

But in the end, "Black Summer" was just the action-packed series I needed this week. At a time when "The Walking Dead" seems to carrying the weight of the entire series in every episode, this was a stripped-down story that was made for bingeing. Especially since none of the eight episodes are longer than 44 minutes and several are well under 30. So you could easily watch it all in one adrenaline-fueled session.

There's no word yet on whether another season of "Black Summer" is on the way and it's a bit worrisome that the show hasn't received any substantial pre-premiere buzz. But watch it anyway because it's a solid show and there will only be more episodes if Netflix sees the audience is interested.