Michelle Ryan | Through the Shattered Lens

MICHELLE RYAN

In 2007 there was an attempt to reboot the Bionic Woman TV series and leading up to the series’ debut the buzz was great. When the show finally aired the series was unable to deliver on the hype that was built around it. The series didn’t last the year, but it did introduce a young British actress to the US audience by the name of Michelle Ryan who has since made a career in British tv.

Michelle Ryan has starred in such popular shows across the pond such as the soap opera EastEnders and such geek fan-favorites as Doctor Who and Merlin. After the disappointment that was Bionic Woman she now returns Stateside by having a recurring role in the popular USA Network spy drama Covert Affairs. In 2011 she even starred in a kick-ass role as a zombie-slayer in the zombie-comedy Cockneys vs. Zombies which actually turned out to be better than what the title would suggest.

With social media and the entertainment news cycle being they way it is now compared to 2007 I wouldn’t be surprised if Ms. Ryan finally ends up breaking through in the US and I wouldn’t doubt that the date and location of such a break out will probably by at next year’s mecca to all things genre, Comic-Con 2014. Until then better check Michelle Ryan out while she’s playing Stateside.

PAST HOTTIES

What better way to kick-off Through the Shattered Lens’ tradition of the horror-themed month of October than a trailer that brings my favorite horror monster of all-time: the zombie horde.

Most zombie films try to be of the horrific and social-conscious variety. Let’s call this the Romero-effect. The grandfather of this horror subgenre was and is known to inject a dose (both subtle and heavy-handed) of social commentary to the scenes of apocalyptic gore and horror that others have tried to copy, mimic and emulate his style of varying degrees of success or failure. Then there are the zombie films that goes for the funny bone in addition to the usual gore and flesh-eating. This first started with the initial Return of the Living Dead film during the 80’s which spoofed the zombie genre without sacrificing the horror and gore. This type of zombie film is even more rare until the arrival of Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead during themid-2000’s. Since then the success of this zombie-comedy there’s been more and more of this type of zombie film and most of them, to be honest, stinks to high heaven. It does make the adage that doing comedy is ultimately much harder to do than drama.

One such zombie-comedy that looks to be cashing in on the success of Wright’s film even now is another release from our cousins across the Pond with Cockneys vs. Zombies. It had made an appearance at this year’s Fantastic Fest and the reaction to the film has been quite positive and with this crowd of genre superfans with discerning taste this means just very good news for fans of the zombie genre looking for something new sink our teeth into.

While this is the type of film that never truly gets a wide release in the US I think it’ll be good for people to check it out once it comes out on video and On-Demand. I mean it has the geriatric and young bank robbers fighting zombies.