In Zombie Aftermath, astronauts return to earth to find that it has been ravaged by nuclear war. With no space program to guide them in safely, they crash land in the ocean off the coast of Los Angeles. The two surviving astronauts set-up a home in what used to be a lush mansion. They soon meet a young boy being raised by a dying museum curator and take him in. Then they meet an attractive young woman who’s sister and niece are being held captive by a brutal gang led by the vicious Cutter (Sid Haig). Their mission to rescue the woman’s family starts a bloody rivalry that can only end with the complete destruction of one of these tribes.

In my description above, I tried to make Zombie Aftermath sound really exciting, because it wasn’t. The whole thing moves at a snail’s pace. The “zombies” in the movie are more like nuclear mutants that kind of look like zombies, are logical enough to organize attacks and communicate with one another. The “zombies” are only in the movie twice, whenever there is a lull in the movie. The fact that this movie is called “Zombie Aftermath” is fairly offensive to me given the lack of any real zombies and the fact that the title given at the end of the movie is simply “The Aftermath”. The word “zombie” was obviously added to bolster doubtlessly crumby sales of such a sad excuse for a movie.

Sid Haig was great in the movie, nonetheless, as a diabolical gang leader. He could have used more screen time and a little more character development (as well as everybody else inthe film), but I’m sure he did what he could with what he was given. The rest of the cast seemingly just showed up and delivered the lines that they had memorized.

Zombie Aftermath was definitely designed as an action movie. They used every outdated action cliche possible to build this movie into what it is - bad guys that go down in one punch, people jumping off roofs, behind their victims and laying them out with the weight of the blows on their backs, bad guys being hurled through the air by tiny explosions, bad guys with the worst aim in the world, good guys that are crack shots even from the hip, the list goes on indefinitely. The fact that the hero, Newman, shows little to no emotion makes his feats of daring-do have absolutely no impact.

Newman has a partner, Getman, that is in the movie whenever it is necessary for the movie to have someone else in the scene. When Newman first arrives on shore, he washes up amidst the rockiest beach imaginable. He goes through all sorts of inner monologue about being alone and find skeletons on the beach and all this, then Getman just washes at a point inthe movie when it’s convenient. Later, Newman meets the young boy, Chris, and developes a father/son relationship with him, while Getman is inexplicably absent. Then, Newman meets Sarah and their relationship developes without the nuisance of Getman cock-blocking him. Once they finally seal the deal and get it on, here’s Getman helping them plan the rescue mission. Later in the film after Newman storms the gang’s compound solo, Getman shows up to help him out of a pickle and promptly gets shot while they talk about how he saved the day, further fueling Newman’s rage of vengeance.

The special effects were fairly pedestrian and unremarkable. The “zombies” wore little more than regular clothes and paper mache masks. There were a few gunshot wounds, but they were pretty much just blood packs exploding through clothing.

If you’re a fan of Sid Haig you might enjoy seeing him in this flick, but don’t be fooled by it’s bullshit title. Zombie Aftermath has almost nothing to do with zombies at all. It’s not a particularly good film either. This movie might go good with friends and beer for a laugh, but serious viewers should avoid it at all costs.

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