I’ve
been hitting so many TV jackpots lately:
Nikita, Agent Carter, The Bletchley Circle, 12 Monkeys (I’ve not
written about that one on the blog yet, but expect a few remarks when its debut
season ends,) and now In the Flesh. Since I’m well-acquainted with my aversion to
zombie narratives, I’m glad a friend recommended it so strongly, because there’s
no way I would’ve sought it out on my own and I totally should have. I just finished this short-lived British
drama, and I’m in love (admittedly, it helps that there’s no infection angle –
people don’t turn after being bitten.)
Something
of an outlier in its genre, In the Flesh
is a post-post-apocalyptic story, taking place in a small English village four
years after a zombie rising. In that
time, scientists have discovered a treatment that doesn’t reverse the
zombie-ism, but it gives the undead their minds back, stops their hankering for
cerebellum, and, as long as they take their medication faithfully, keeps them
from turning “rabid.” Armed with their
daily shots and flesh-toned makeup/colored contacts to help them look more like
the living, the newly-dubbed “Partially Deceased Syndrome (PDS) sufferers” are
being gradually reintegrated into a society that’s wary at best about rubbing
elbows with undead “rotters.” Our hero
is Kieren Walker, an 18-year-old lad with PDS just discharged from the
treatment center. Sensitive Kieren is
unprepared for the harsh backlash he meets when he returns home. The zombie-fighting Human Volunteer Force (the
HVF, which includes his sister) is calling for his blood, social segregation is
de rigueur, and his parents are completely at a loss for how to treat him. Meanwhile, flashbacks to the horrors he
unknowingly committed in his “untreated state” are a side effect of his medication,
the innocents and neighbors he killed.
It’s an
immensely rich series that uses zombies as a parallel to examine social stigma
in many forms, everything from ableism to homophobia, but it also avoids
heavy-handed “Get it?? It’s a metaphor!!!” anvil-dropping. Instead, the commentary is woven into a smart
narrative that examines a lot of thoughtful zombie-specific details. As one example, take the HVF. These are people who protected lives during
the Rising by killing the undead. They
know what PDS folk can do in their untreated state and can’t simply forget the
atrocities they saw. In that sense, it’s
understandable and maybe even natural for them to hate the rehabilitated zombies. At the same time, the revelation that PDS can
be managed with medication means that every “rotter” they killed during the
Rising is someone who could have been treated and recovered their minds. Suddenly, they’ve killed just as many
neighbors as the untreated PDS – some HVF members, upon realizing this, are
horrified or at least deeply conflicted, while others double down on their insistence
that those with PDS aren’t human and should be put down before they turn rabid
again. Meanwhile, HVF members are
commemorated for their valor while PDS folk are barely-tolerated sub-members of
society who deserve, at minimum, to face up to what they did when they couldn’t
control themselves. It’s just such a
fantastic series; in just nine episodes (will it rise again? your move, Netflix/Amazon,) it provides a
phenomenal well of creative, emotional storytelling and insightful themes of
otherness, discrimination, and what it means to be alive.
Warnings
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