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Marvel certainly didn’t disappoint at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con. Fans lucky enough to catch the Marvel panel in Hall H were inundated with upcoming features on TV and film, with titles expanding the MCU to Phase 5 and beyond (let’s just say your children’s children may only possibly see the end of it). One of the more intriguing announcements was a Marvel Zombies TV series, one that continues the story started in the fifth episode of What If…?, titled “What If… Zombies?!” One of the more popular episodes of the series, it picks up in a universe where Iron Man, Dr. Strange, Captain America (Josh Keaton), and a number of other Avengers are infected by a virus that turns them into murderous zombies. A handful of heroes, including Spider-Man (Hudson Thames), T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman), and the head of Scott Lang (Paul Rudd), head to Wakanda with the Mind Stone in hand, hoping to find a cure. In the final scene, the Watcher (Jeffrey Wright) reveals that Wakanda is compromised and that a zombie Thanos awaits them. Before we get into the few details we know of the upcoming series, though, a brief history of Marvel’s undead.
The 2005 Ultimate Fantastic Four story arc “Crossover” introduced readers to Earth-2149, a parallel universe overtaken by a zombie virus that attacks super-powered individuals, resulting in the termination of 99.9% of all human life. The zombies are capable of thinking and planning, and plan on using the dimensional teleporter that brought the Ultimate Fantastic Four to their Earth to go to the Ultimate Universe and feed on humans there. Their efforts are thwarted by the Four and the uninfected Magneto, who destroys the teleporter and prevents the zombies from escaping. The popularity of the storyline led to the first Marvel Zombies miniseries in 2006.
Written by The Walking Dead‘s Robert Kirkman, the series picks up from where the “Crossover” arc ends. Magneto searches for other uninfected heroes, but falls prey to a zombie horde. Meanwhile, the Silver Surfer arrives and lets the zombies know Galactus is coming, but is attacked and devoured as well, which gives the attacking zombies a portion of the Power Cosmic. Then Galactus arrives, and easily fights off the zombies. Undeterred, the zombies make a device to amplify their power, defeating him and feeding on his body. The miniseries ends with a different world being attacked by Galactus, only it’s the Galacti, an unholy horde of zombies now infused with Galactus’ power.
A prequel series would follow: Marvel Zombies vs the Army of Darkness. Yep, that Army of Darkness. Ash Williams appears on Earth-2149, chainsaw and all, and is warned by the spirit of the Necronomicon that “an army of the dead will rise”. He warns the Marvel heroes of the incoming threat, but is not taken seriously until it’s too late. The virus spreads quickly, with one of the victims being the Earth-2149 version of Ash, whose brains become a snack for a zombiefied Howard the Duck (yep, that Howard the Duck), who is in turn killed by prime-Ash. Ash finds the Necronomicon, convincing it to raise an army of Deadites to fight the Marvel Zombies. As the battle begins, Doctor Doom helps Ash escape to another dimension. One that is filled with Marvel heroes that transform into werewolves. Some days you just can’t catch a break. The next series in 2008, Marvel Zombies 2, picks up 40 years after the events in the first miniseries, followed by no less than eleven more miniseries, a number of one-shots and tie-ins (including one that is a crossover – seriously – with the Marvel Apes), with the last appearance in Marvel Comics’ Zombies Assemble Vol. 2 in 2018.
So far, Marvel Zombies have had little representation in the MCU, with only the What If…? episode and a possible association with Dr. Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) dreamwalking into the body of the dead Earth-616 Dr. Strange variant in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness and an unlikely but potentially awesome association between director Sam Raimi, his Ash, Bruce Campbell, and the Marvel Zombies storyline from the source material. The little we have seen, though, is enough to know that Marvel is taking liberties with the source material, the absence of The Fantastic Four as an example, which isn’t uncommon by any stretch. There is also little word on if any of the events in the Marvel Zombies comics will play into the upcoming series.
Here’s what we do know about the Marvel Zombies TV series. It will pick up from where the What If…? episode left off, where Peter Parker, T’Challa and Scott Lang are heading towards Wakanda, where a zombie Thanos awaits them. Zombies presumably killed during the initial appearance are still alive… er, undead alive… with appearances from an upper torso Captain America and an increasingly deteriorating Hawkeye. New living heroes making an appearance include Yelena Belova and Red Guardian from Black Widow, Katie and Shang-Chi (Simu Liu, the only MCU actor confirmed for voice work) from Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Kate Bishop from Hawkeye, and Jimmy Woo from Ant-Man and the Wasp.
In the zombie corner, the newly zombiefied include Ghost from Ant-Man and the Wasp, Carol Danvers of Captain Marvel fame, Okoye from Black Panther, zombie Widows, zombie Skrulls, and the powerful Ikaris from Eternals. Perhaps most surprising is the confirmation that the show will be rated TV-MA, a rarity for the MCU and most definitely a rarity for Disney+. Producer Bryan Andrews provided that piece of information, saying, “We are not shying away from the things that made the comic book so great. Not just the storytelling, but also the gore, the splattery-ness, and the grossness.” The release date is rather vague, with “sometime in 2024” the only real timeline given, but it’s pretty safe to say that whenever it does premiere, the buzz surrounding it will be epic. And if a certain groovy, chainsaw-wielding hero happens to show up, even better,
