All of Us Are Dead (2022)

A Thrilling Modern-Day Apocalyptic Drama with Emotional Compelling Scenes

This is a drama centering not simply around humans vs. zombies, but themes of team work, love and friendship as well in the face of a modern-day zombie-like virus outbreak that spreads across a high school in the city of Hyosan. It follows a group of high school students as they attempt to communicate with outside rescue authorities and fight for survival. What would you do if you wound up trapped inside your high school rife with flesh-eating monsters roaming the halls, classrooms, gym, cafeteria and field left and right? Among them are your homeroom teacher, that kid who sat next to you in math, and even your best friend of ten years, looking bloody and repulsive, driven by a primal desire to eat you and your human friends up for dinner, making the person you once knew no longer recognizable. A team of courageous and smart teens joined forces. Together they stave off and combat these zombies, along with a number of emotional challenges tied to loss, betrayal, sacrifice and longing. And in the midst of it all, they must put up a fight because the only way out is through.

The gameplan? First, find a temporary base safe and isolated from the hordes of zombies. Next, plan and strategize by considering all accessible and useful tools in the vicinity. Employ logic to skillfully weigh the risks of every move. Finally, at the right moment, execute, and pray for the best, doing all their bodies could withstand to adapt to the unforeseen obstacles standing in the way that could rock the boat.

I thoroughly enjoyed the thoughtful communication style and interactions of the characters. I fully immersed myself in both their playful banter as well as vulnerable heart-to-hearts. Showed that it’s in times of crises such as these that a solid support system and boosts of morale serve as providers of hope. A meaningful reminder that bad moments are plenty but life must go on, so never lose hope. My favorite character absolutely has to be Nam-ra, the class president. Beneath her quiet and standoffish demeanor is a warm and affectionate girl with a level-headedness and quick thinking skills that truly came in clutch and saved the team multiple times in critical, sticky situations.

If you’re one to catch plot holes like a hawk, it’s been made known to me, judging by other reviews I’ve read, that you might as well not start watching since all you’re going to feel is frustration as you attempt to wrap your head around certain scenarios. I, for one, felt like none of the characters had acted out-of-character or anything at any point during the series. I found myself easily able to empathize and shed tears of joy and sorrow with every character. They’re so young, yet strong. If you are like me and are just looking for good, exciting entertainment to get your cardiovascular game on on a calm evening, this is the show for you! Have a snack in hand to indulge in because this drama will keep your eyes glued to the screen for a while. Although a lot of the show does picture grotesque, gorey zombies digging into human insides and (surprisingly well-shot) action scenes, it was certainly not without its share of heart-fluttering sweet romantic moments between the leads, comedic reliefs, and genuine, raw emotions.

I encourage all to give this a shot. It is captivating and binge-worthy.

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A sombre apocalypse

Calling this an enjoyable watch feels wrong given I was holding in my stomach for most of it, either at the nail-biting tension or the exploding moments of gore and blood. But it was an excellent show. It built up the sense of crisis, the hopelessness and through it, the characters. The relationships that were formed were organically done and realistic, and thus made you root for characters sometimes simply because of what they meant to everyone else. This show did really well in highlighting the importance of family and social rootedness because people are stronger when compassion is plentiful. I've always found Korean shows to be thoughtful in the social analysis of these things and this show hinted well at that.

The other thing they did well with was the issue of survivors' guilt. Living on felt very difficult for characters but giving up was a betrayal of the memory and sacrifice of those who died for them to live. I thought the show was beautifully written in that way. The casting was good and there was an innocent charm to a lot of these characters, who ultimately, were just teenagers having a very rotten school week.

The standout character was Nam-ra and her ending was beautiful and deserved. Her struggle for clinging onto her humanity manifesting in that feral shriek of despair at the end really underlined the sheer goodness of her character, her overwhelming desire to hold onto the essence of who she is and not give in. I give the show 5 stars for how it wrote her, she quickly grew into the most interesting character.

The show had some excellent sections. Moments when they were trapped in one place for too long only to escape and get trapped elsewhere within the school and then during the second half of the show when their movement was more fluid and constant simply because staying in one place, they realised, was just delaying the impending doom. The final two episodes of the show blew me away because many things I did not expect to happen took place. Even though the ending was a little foreshadowed, it was a deserved one but everything else during those final episodes left me stunned. In a zombie apocalypse, there are no main characters with plot armour.

There were things I didn't like. Far too many characters had heroic deaths to the point where it sort of lost value. It was more gripping when people are trying to escape but the zombies take them. I think the hero complex was a real problem with Cheong-San. I liked him a lot but I was tired by his need to always elect himself as the sacrificial lamb for the group. I also thought how his death came about was foolish. They were all just standing there while he was slowly getting attacked. it didn't make sense especially given Nam-ra's superhuman feats that she just stood there.

Then there is Nayeon's character. I cannot accept that she purposefully infected someone just to be proven right. Her death was sad in that the group didn't realise she had only died due to her desire for redemption. I was a little annoyed at first before I realised it worked out better like this. It would have been too neat for her to reconnect with them.

My main issue perhaps, is the idea that this virus began because someone's dad got fed up with school bullying and decided humanity was irredeemable and evil. You're telling me that's how everyone got infected? I lost all sympathy with him when he was talking about how the system failed his son because of what he then transpired to do. There were also some payoffs I was waiting for, such as the girl who got videotaped getting her revenge during the apocalypse but the show didn't even hint towards that.

Those were my only real complaints, because otherwise it was an entirely excellent show.

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Seperti kuduga, drama korea genre apapun eksekusinya ya tetep ala drakor. lol

Sayangnya kecintaan gw sama hal terkait zombie, membuat gw tahan sampai habis akan drama-drama tak penting yang dihadirkan dengan adegan2 dramatisir ala drama korea pada umumnya.

Gw gak mau spoiler, tapi pembunuhan beberapa karakter yang terkesan sia-sia menjadi satu kelamahan serial ini. Padahal pembangunan (eh pengembangan) karakter sedari pilot episode yang begitu kental terasa hampa gitu aja demi menampilkan sosok sosok diadegan terakhir sebagai “karakter terkuat”. *fyuh*

Tapi gw harap banget netflix gak cancel serial ini, biar bagaimanapun series ini layak buat ada sequelnya.

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Zombies are zombies but are they zombies?

So, I'm writing this review in my not-so-usual manner, it's a bit disorganized but I hope you enjoy reading this!
There might be minor spoilers ahead, I hope you could proceed with caution!

To sum up this drama in a statement, it's all about "Here zombie, there zombie, everywhere zombie-zombie" and also, an even perfect explanation, let's have our own Hermoine-Ron story or basically, let's kiss with the basilisk around (dead!) (more like zombies here).
Anyways,
to put it simply:
This drama was pretty much alright for me. Though I still believe it wasn't the best zombie drama out there, this still was pretty nice and kept me hooked even though there were a lot of plotholes.
Then, there's something I would like to ask the screenwriter, "HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF ANTIBODIES TRANSFER?"
I hope they would have consulted some kind of a scientist of somebody of that sort before making up this ridiculous plot-hole of Gwi Nam biting Nam-Ra who doesn't fully turn while others do.
Well, I hated the female lead (On Jo) but anyways, I gave the story and cast and all a pretty okay rating because Soo Hyeok and Nam Ra exist!
It would keep you on your toes if you don't try to invest yourself in it and ask every now and then, was this decision right? Don't use your biology knowledge here if you ever want to enjoy this!
That's all I've got to say for this one! I hope you enjoy it if you decide on watching this and don't regret it if you don't cuz it's not a must-watch.
DO YOU LOVE ZOMBIE DRAMAS so much?
Go watch, THE TRAIN TO BUSAN, it's way better but anyways, this was pretty nice as well! (No hate)
(￣o￣) . z Z

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To save the majority, just how heartless do you think you need to be?

Out of all the zombie movies/series I have watched, this has the most substance. It is way more than just the thrill. The messages conveyed in this movie can touch you in ways, you never expected. That's exactly the case for me. And I really love this series.

I have mentioned on most of my reviews on titles related to zombie that I am not really a fan of zombie stuff because most of the time, you know what's the most possible ending, everyone will die. So I am always looking for something that will catch my interest and sustain my attention until the end. All Of Us Are Dead did just that. Having the Ground Zero set at a school is something I haven't seen before. The reason/motivation on how it started is also unique than most vague movies wherein it just started somehow without definite explanation. Every deaths on this movie made me feel various emotions from being melancholic to feeling 'he/she deserve it.' It was more than just becoming zombies. I love how the story focuses on the characters who wanted to survive, how they lost their love ones, how they lost each other, how they rely on each other, how the situation made them grow. The pain, the sadness, the happiness. It delivers a spectrum of emotions I never imagined on a zombie show. There were also parts that are actually light and fun that somehow lightens the mood of the whole series.

Great selection of casts really. The way they deliver their individual characters made the story much more believable and colorful. Most of the times shows that has a lot of characters ended up just blending in together however on this one, all the characters was able to make themselves shine in their own ways. It really felt like a group of students who are friends that has common and also individual identity that separates them from the others.

Honestly, although it left me with a lot of questions and imaginations, I love that the ending was open-ended. It kind of makes me hope that Season 2 is possible. If another season is given for this show, I'll definitely re-watch it. I have enjoyed every single scene of the show and would definitely love to re-live the moments with the casts again.

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Simply Brilliant!

This is a phenomenal series. Sure, it is graphic, raw, and are not afraid to show lead actors/actresses dying. It is a brilliant zombie series that is creative, contemporary, and full of human emotions. The action is fast-paced and full of surprises. I know there are only so many directions you can take a zombie series but this one took new paths. How? By actually making us care both for the humans and zombies. It also gave them a human soul despite them being more dead than alive. I also love the twist between humans and zombies. I thought that was so creative and even scarier than a pure zombie apocalypse. There is a lot of superb acting in this series and some awesome physical prowess by many of the actors and actresses.

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Slightly disappointing

As a zombie series fan I was really excited for All Of Us are Dead's premiere, but I ended up being slightly disappointed. I loved the very first episode, it was a very well paced first episode; even though the CG rubbed me off the wrong way but I'm not going to elaborate on that.
I found the show slightly underwhelming because as the episodes went on, the plot wasn't really advancing in any way; every time the students tried to change the spots within the school, the outcome was predictable.
There's a lot of unnecessary subplots and also quite a lot of plot holes that I can't really wrap my head around, but I've figured they did that as a tool for a second season. I did enjoy the friends' dynamic. Though I wished they actually showed more of that. Like the way they were acting before the virus broke out or some characteristics that would make them more three dimensional and not so flat.
Overall, it wasn't a bad show but I had higher expectations from it.

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i couldn’t stop crying in the last ep, so it’s obv a 10

it literally became one of my favorite dramas it is so good! normally i am not a big fan of hyped dramas because i have the fear that is actually bad BUT I LOVED IT! the plot it’s so good and never gets tiring and the characters are so amazing. To be honest, I cried a lot, I COUDN’T STOP CRYING IN THE LAST EP. I hated that the writers killed cheongsan, but I still have some hope for him to come back in s2. I really loved the characters specially namra, cheongsan, mijin and suhyeok AND OBVIOUSLY MY FAVORITE COUPLE WAS ONJO AND CHEONGSAN, I CRIED SO MUCH FOR THEM ??? but yeah i loved all of us are dead sm and it’s so worth watching it?

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Run

Run is the word you will hear from the mini series

As usual started calm then all breaks loose, ground zero is hyosan high school and a good thing about this mini series is the director stick within ground zero, story is incomplete and for sure, since it was well received there should be a prequel and a sequel.

Actors and Actress gave their natural environment performance, looks like we will be seeing more of the students in the future, kind of a way introducing the young actress and actors in a mini series, this was done in GTO where the young talent started and mentored by senior actors/actress. hoping to see more of Park Ji Hoo, Jo Yi Hyun and Park Solomon in the future korean series.

Music was just ok, but nothing outstanding bgm, hopefully music will be payed attention in the sequel and prequel

Would i rewatch, yes,
Zombie marathon series during the holiday seasons

Overall it is just good, this cannot top kingdom story wise, potential wise, sequel can take where the classroom leader can jump from the a 8 story building, and prequel can take where the virus was found and why?

If you like mystery and zombie series, add this to your list, the actresses are good and park solomon has a potential to take a lead action role in the future.

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The most emotional zombie drama I've ever watched

This one’s a toughie! On one hand, I absolutely fell head over heels for all of the characters in this drama and absolutely loved the fresh new take on the zombie genre. On the other, there were simply too many instances where logic was completely thrown out the window and the characters were frustrating as hell to watch. My main gripes probably were due to the amount of self-sacrifice and very cliche survival tropes which sometimes repeated themselves in the drama. The drama also created a seemingly impossible survival situation for our main characters. The zombies were simply too fast and there were too many of them for their survival to make sense half the time. I mean, hell, the characters are almost always facing them head on and we’re just supposed to believe that most of them can get out of it alive time and time again? I feel like humanity would die in a heartbeat if such a situation occured in real life, but I suppose the seemingly impossible stakes were there mostly to build tension so I’ll forgive it. Something that I absolutely loved about this drama in particular was the amount of side stories that went on all around even outside of the school. There was only one of them that I didn’t care for, but the rest were extremely entertaining and, although not too impactful, rounded out the story to show how everyone was impacted by the virus. I have a ton of other small complaints but I didn’t want to list them since they weren’t too bothersome and would make me look like a bit of a jerk haha. I would definitely recommend this drama to my zombie lovers, but I would warn them not to take the drama too seriously and be prepared with some tissues, because the best part of the kdrama is definitely the emotions it made me feel, especially at the end!

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You need to step into the shoes of the antagonist to watch this drama and its too unnecessarily stretched. The original niche for the drama includes target audience that expect rom-com in any drama they watch and its delivered in a very deliberate manner. It was unnecessary. I mean they are in a virus aka zombie apocalypse which they call it as. The plot is very poor and its quite clear whats going to happen. To continue the story, they are forcibly moving to other places and doing stuff thats not needed or demanding. I just cant write more coz the entire drama is a mess. Sorry to say, but thats the truth. The origin or the concept of patient zero is not at all touched apart from harnessing concepts like teen pregnancy, abuse, social barriers, etc superficially. Instead of focussing on key issues, they just targeted so many random issues all at once with no depth in acting by the novices. The villian is like undefeatable and wasnt promising at all. The other characters didnt have any development. If I had to watch it through my perspective, there should have been much investment on development of story, how the virus originated, at least should have made it understandable. These observations accounts to only 1 or 2% of the experienced mess. The movie goes nowhere expect for the niche expecting a second season.

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So much wasted potential...

I've never written a review before, but this is the most frustrating kdramas I've ever watched. If it wasn't for sunk cost fallacy, I would've stopped watching it at ep 6, but I pushed on only to be rewarded with disappointment after disappointment.

My main issue is with the writing. So before I jump into that, I'll say that the drama LOOKED really good. It definitely had that Netflix budget. Some of the acting was top tier. The zombies themselves were convincingly terrifying. Love a surprise Lee Kyu Hyung appearance. A lot of their survival instincts and plans had believable merit.

Unfortunately, these details could not save the show's biggest flaw: the writing.

I think the reason I ended this show feeling so pissed off was because it had so much wasted potential. All the plot threads for a smart, compelling, satisfying drama were there, but they were mostly left hanging. At points, I felt like the writers were actually trolling us by purposely setting up an interesting character arc only to let it fizzle without a purpose. I'll detail the most egregious ones below:

‧ So Ju (On Jo's father) - Set up from the beginning as one of the main story lines, we saw So Ju fight against all odds to prove that a father's love could overcome anything. He was trapped, attacked multiple times, put under lockdown, shot (don't even get me started on how multiple trained soldiers couldn't shoot one man running without cover), gut-punched by a tree and yet he still made his way to the school. Just in time, he manages to randomly (the guy has been through so much, i'll overlook this incredibly unlikely luck) discover On Jo and her friends in a gym detached from the main school building. He somehow breaks a thick metal chain to free them and unites with his daughter. It's touching, it's a relief, it's satisfying. But not 10 minutes later, despite flares working to distract the zombies, he's sacrificing himself for no apparent reason and sending his daughter and crew off to face more unknown dangers on their own again. And that was that. A fleeting payoff followed by a nonsensical self-sacrifice that probably resulted in more characters dying than would've if he'd been there to guide them further.

‧ Gwi Nam (and the bullying storyline) - Yoo In Soo's acting as a villain was really well done. He was appropriately terrifying and fully psychotic. At some point it turned and became comical how many times he popped back up to be a threat, but I still think he was a good villain in theory. However, his hyper-fixation on Chung San and the forced conflict between them was frustrating when the obvious and much better story arc of Eun Ji getting her revenge was RIGHT THERE. Instead, the sympathy that was built up for the bullied duo was dashed by showing them both to be awful people at their core which sent a really weird message. Also, what was the point of Eun Ji going back to light the school on fire? My expectation was that our main group would find themselves trapped on the roof as the fire spread and needing to make an escape, but instead we got a few lit up pieces of paper and then... nothing. Let's also not forget that there's implication that Soo Hyeok used to run with Gwi Nam's crowd meaning he was probably a pretty awful bully himself up until recently and yet we're supposed to see him as one of the most likable and righteous members of the main group.

‧ The wasted potential of so many fleeting characters and pointless introductions - What was the point of the pregnant high school student? What did that story beat add to the drama? What was the significance? Just to eventually give the cops something to do? Same with the youtuber. He could've been used as a plot vehicle to show the outside world what was really going on but instead he existed just to take up screen time. Now, don't get me wrong. One of my favorite parts of the show was the cop duo. They had great chemistry and Lee Kyu Hyung just brings his A game to every supporting character he plays. Unfortunately, as soon as they left the police station, their purpose in the story disappeared. Better drama?: Following the two cops as they went around saving people. Better plot thread?: Letting them be the ones who retrieved the laptop. The writing robbed them of their one useful job in the story halfway through the drama. What about the assemblywoman? What was her purpose aside from delaying So Ju from saving his daughter? It was mentioned that she had kids so the least they could've done was reveal that one of the main students was her child. It would've made her a hundred times more compelling and it would've given her a deeper connection with So Ju. Wouldn't have been awesome if her child was Nam Ra? Or Na Yeon?! It was all right there and just never capitalized on. I'll just briefly mention the wasted potential of the caring teacher, the brother/sister connection (Woo Jin was given so little development/to do as a character that I didn't even realize he existed until the group was thinned out by zombies), the military commander...

‧ Na Yeon. Sigh. We were absolutely baited by the potential of a well rounded character arc. Like many of the characters, she was just a bad, cruel person for no real discernible reason. Lots of high school students are catty or dramatic or brats, but they don't have it in them to just murder fellow classmates in a survival situation because they feel left out and ignored. But in directly and purposely sending Gyeong Soo to his death isn't the worst thing about her character - it's what happens after that. We see her hiding in the closet, stocked up with food and drinks (let me say here that the lack of attention to the fact that the students haven't had food/real water in days is odd), and she seems truly and emotionally remorseful. Surely, she's going to provide them with sustenance and win a little of their forgiveness, right? No. She hears them talking bad about her and stays put. Fine. Surely they're just upping the drama to make her revealing herself more impactful, right? No. We finally see her snapping out of her pathetic pity party and packing things up to meet them. We get an odd flashback to the teacher (another person who dies unnecessarily because of Na Yeon's selfishness and stupidity) begging her to make amends and do something helpful for the group to redeem herself. If you squint, there's even a potentially possibility that maybe she WASN'T the one who infected Gyeong Soo after all. The set up is there. She'll save them by providing food and water and apologize. She'll explain her motivations further. Wrong. She dies. Maybe. We don't really see her turn for sure so maybe she's alive or turned into one of those hybrids. Okay, writers. Surely, SURELY this means we're going to see her pop up in the future, somehow saving the group or sacrificing herself to give her story some kind of satisfying closure? Wrong again. We get a pan shot of the zombies in a future episode and there she is. So. That's that then.

‧ The On Ju/Cheong San relationship - We know from the very beginning that he's into her. We assume that she's also hiding the fact that she's into him. But that doesn't ever really happen. She seems fully focused on her crush on Soo Hyeok up until Cheong San confesses to her. She responds with anger saying she's now lost him as a friend (which isn't necessarily unjustified) and doesn't reciprocate his feelings. After Cheong San gets bit we see a tiny spark of what maybe could've been, but does she actually have romantic feelings for him or is it just guilt? We never really see any indication that she loves him in any way other than just a best friend. She never learns what 'left' meant. It's all just kind of awkward and underdeveloped when a few small changes could've made it a much more interesting and emotional relationship dynamic.

This drama would've benefited from dropping about 10 characters, developing the ones left over better and pulling in the plot tighter. The potential was all there (which is what made the viewing experience so frustrating). The side plots were so much more interesting and compelling than the main group's most of the time (I've already praised the cop duo but I also thought the group headed by Ha Ri and Mi Jin was so much more interesting and defined and I wish we'd followed them instead). The pacing was off (how could things drag but also feel so glossed over? how much time exactly had even passed since the outbreak started?) and so much time was wasted on things that served no purpose to the story. And then, just when I'm finally on the last ten minutes of this struggle of a show, they introduce a new plot that is actually interesting and fresh (a congregation of a new breed of zombie hybrids with superhuman abilities! lead by the most likable character with the most significant growth and development!) and that's where it ends.

And this is where my review will also end. Because I could go on, but I've covered more than enough. I've never felt compelled to write a review like this and there's definitely been some terrible shows I've watched. But the thing that sets this one apart is that it had so many ingredients to be a GREAT show. It could've really been an amazing, fresh twist on the zombie genre but it just dropped the ball over and over again. One or two pointless plots or underdeveloped characters would've been forgivable, but we were given the bones of a zombie drama without any meat.

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