UPDATING OCCASIONALLY (FOR NOW)

9 thoughts on “558 – Cotton Clad Calamity”

  1. Yup, he’s a bastard XD

  2. Dr. Norman (not a real doctor)

    Are those pajamas available in XXXL in the gift shop?

  3. It’s been a while, so let me ask: Did we get a reason for him to WANT Susie dead? Not to backseat, but if we didn’t, I’m worried were about to move into “Stupid Evil” territory. Now, stupid happens, don’t get me wrong. It’s not bad storytelling for that to be the case here.

    You’ve just done a good job NOT having that be a driving factor, so the “Kill off the stars of my successful reality TV show.” seems shortsighted, otherwise. Oh, I guess I could be mistaken about the in-story reality TV show’s success. Like, if the company behind them is losing money, or they think a change in management at the ranch would make the whole thing more popular/profitable, then I can see the above scenario happening as well.

    I REALLY think I’m just forgetting something important, but that I don’t have time to deep dive to remind me of, hence the comment. >_<

    1. It certainly has been stretched out over quite a while, but there have definitely been hints from quite near the beginning that whoever is running the reality TV show definitely wants her dead.

      But I certainly don’t recall any reason why.

      1. Yeah it’s fair to not remember since it’s been a hot minute (many, many minutes) but if you feel like a refresher the most relevant bits would be the beginning of Episode 8 and the end of Episode 15. We haven’t explicitly spelled out exactly what The Exec means by his “side hustle” or who was on the other end of that phone call, though.

        I’m hoping that when the whole thing is eventually available it will make sense, or at least enough sense to have hung this narrative on.

        1. Thanks for the replies, Deoxy and Clint. Yeah, I’d totally forgotten about those things. Good to know!

  4. Seems about time for the two people who aren’t there to make a surprise entrance as the ace Susie didn’t even know she had.

  5. There’s still 3-5 people on her side that might be planning something. This guy is a megalomaniac with a god complex, so letting him think he’s the sharpest tool in the shed sets him up for a fall. Everything depends on those cameras, and I suspect their little stop over by the charging coffins had something to do with her actual plan, not the one the a-hole thinks it is.

  6. Really enjoyed the opening of Zombie Ranch. I like the combination of the western setting with the zombie concept, it gives the story a really distinctive atmosphere. I’m a freelance illustrator and animator, and I’d be interested in seeing how some of these scenes could translate into motion, especially as a short animated teaser or character scene.

    If you’re ever interested in something like that, you can reach me here:

    IG: eve_verse_
    Email: [contact.lilaclines@gmail.com](mailto:contact.lilaclines@gmail.com)
    Discord: Lyralilac_

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558 – Cotton Clad Calamity

What would you call this? Armchair assassination? Merk-from-home?

Well, Suzie ain't dead (or undead) quite yet, so we'll just have to see if his gloating is justifiable.

Z Nation

I admittedly haven’t been keeping up with my zombie fiction lately. I haven’t watched The Walking Dead in many years, for example, and while stuff like Train to Busan is on my list I keep forgetting to fire it up at an opportune moment. It’s not a situation like Stephenie Meyer where she didn’t want to read or watch about horror, it’s just circumstance.

But anyhow, with that backlog weighing on my mind, I got around to checking out the pilot episode of a zombie series one of my friends had been talking up — Z Nation, a SyFy show whose first season is now on Netflix.

So far I’ll say this: if the pace of TWD is too slow for you, Z Nation will probably be right up your alley. The pilot barely stops to breathe as it keeps piling on the zombie attacks (and zombie tropes). By the end of it, I hadn’t really gotten much of a sense of the main characters or why I ought to care about them — in fact I joked to Dawn something along the lines of “Oh hey, all the PCs are together now.” And no I’m not really kidding about that, one character in particular pretty much joins up by shrugging and climbing into the back of the truck after they say “Hey you’re a good sniper, come with us.” The rest of the story is one you’ve probably seen before… zombie outbreak, America As We Know It has fallen, last outposts are trying to find a cure, and eventually a ragtag band is set up to make their way across the wasted nation.

So the show so far is not what I’d call particularly innovative or insightful, but if you want to see a lot of people get eaten and zombies get bashed/shot you’ve come to the right place. It’s fun to watch for that, even if we weren’t particularly compelled at the time to see what happens next. If any of you out there have watched more episodes I’d be interested to hear your take, does it stay with my first impressions more or less or go somewhere a little less traveled?