Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 1]
Puppies and Kittens
Shown 12/Sep/14
The Zombie Apocalypse (or ZomPocalypse, as one character coins the phrase) has happened.
Delta Force Lieutenant Harold Perrineau (
Lost
) is assigned to protect the CDC’s secret project: a potential cure.
Only one of the convicts survives the testing process.
Unfortunately, the only secure lab is in California, on the other side of the country.
A year later, our heroes have only gotten as far as upstate New York.
They encounter a group of survivors led by a National Guard sergeant
(Tom Everett Scott -
American Werewolf in Paris
).
This is a similar setup to
The Walking Dead
, so we should focus on the differences between the shows.
The characters in this tend to use guns instead of knives,
but they are up against Fast Zombies instead of slow Romero-style ones.
The virus is transmitted by bite, not airborne.
And the characters are not wandering aimlessly in search of sanctuary.
They have a mission, and they are co-ordinating by radio with Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
.
This is produced by The Asylum, the company responsible for the
Mega Shark versus
series (and so many other low-budget pieces of cinematic trash).
However, we should put things in perspective.
The SyFy Channel likewise produces some of the worst Z-Movies ever made,
but their episodic television products (
Dark Matter, Defiance, Stargate SG-1
) tend to be quite high quality.
Maybe this will be the start of the Asylum improving their products.
Or maybe it is just a cheap knock-off of
The Walking Dead
. It is certainly a lot faster-paced, with an emphasis on action (like a thriller)
instead of character development (as in a drama).
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 2]
Fracking Zombies
Shown 19/Sep/14
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) has lost contact with the sole survivor
at the CDC’s Mount Weather facility in California.
Is anyone going to be alive there if and when the immunised man gets there?
Do they have a backup for their research,
or was it all trashed when the power went down?
Is there any point in trying to save the world,
or is the trans-American journey pointless?
The survivors run out of fuel.
They go to a refinery, where they plan to get a tanker of gasoline.
The place is full of zombies, but these ones are slow-moving Romero ones
rather than the fast ones from the previous episode.
A couple of bikers ride past, eyeballing the oriental woman.
Do they plan on stealing her to help repopulate the world?
Or do they know about her mysterious past?
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 3]
Philly Feast
Shown 26/Sep/14
The survivors continue their road trip by visiting Philadelphia.
They think it will be easier to scavenge supplies there,
but it seems the real reason is that
they want to do some tourism and see the Liberty bell.
The Oriental girl’s history is revealed.
She was a sex slave pimped out by a cult of sadistic cannibals.
By incredible coincidence, the survivors now find themselves hunted by the cult.
And for a city that probably has a million zombies in it,
the humans do not mind making a bit of noise
and attracting attention to themselves.
For example, the cult is protected by a .50-cal belt-fed machine-gun
that can be heard a mile away!
The answer seems to be that our heroes should destroy the cult.
Not only will they kill the leader and his enforcers,
but they will also leave the sex-slaves and prisoners to be eaten alive by zombies.
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 4]
Full Metal Zombie
Shown 03/Oct/14
The survivors run into trouble - brigands with a good ambush plan.
They manage to get out of the tight spot without losses,
but further down the road they run into even worse trouble.
It ends up as a waste of ammo,
which ends badly for the ambushers when they run into zombies.
But the survivors learn a lesson - stay off the road, get airborne ASAP!
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) is bored to distraction,
and is beginning to obsess about the female Caucasian survivor.
He even conducts facebook chats with her when he has nothing else to do,
which is all the time.
Except when he gives helpful directions to the survivors,
such as sending them a hundred miles south in the hope of finding a helicopter.
It is spelled out that the zombie virus is apparently airborne, like in
The Walking Dead
. This was alluded to in the previous episode,
when the Cultists were threatened with a heart-shot not a head-shot
so they would turn into zombies rather than just die.
The nearest helicopter that might be functioning is at a military base.
The guard refuses to let anyone up to see the General, except the Doc.
Predictably, the General spends his time giving orders to non-existent units,
in the best tradition of insane military commanders.
Doc get trapped in an air vent with a zombie.
It turns out that fumes from a cannabis cigarette can actually affect the undead!
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 5]
Home Sweet Zombies
Shown 10/Oct/14
The survivors get to Illinois.
They are only a few miles from the Token Black Woman's home,
so they can explore her backstory.
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) has access to input from a weather satellite,
and warns them that a tornado is inbound.
Will it be filled with flying zombies, like the show's version of a
Sharknado
? Unfortunately the budget (this was made-for-TV by The Asylum!)
does not stretch that far.
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 6]
Resurrection Z
Shown 17/Oct/14
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) narrates the background of the Zom-Pocalypse,
indicating that its true origins are unknown.
As a result, desperate people turned to strange religions.
The survivors get to Missouri.
They find an armed compound led by a US Military officer that the Sergeant (Tom Everett Scott -
American Werewolf in Paris
) was friends with.
There is a nearby Cult of religious fanatics.
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 7]
Welcome to FU-Bar
Shown 24/Oct/14
The survivors get to Kansas.
The youngsters decide to scout ahead on the motorbike.
The rest of the gang end up at a marketplace called FU-Bar.
By incredible coincidence, one of the survivors has a friend there.
Yes, three backstories in a row?
The teenage sniper kid enters a contest to win a .50-cal sniper rifle.
When flirting with a female contestant, he mentions his kill-count is over two thousand.
In the first episode his count was about a thousand,
so he has done a thousand kills off-screen in between episodes.
Murphy's cure-infected bodily fluids get a mention.
Yes, we get proof that he might actually be able to save the human race.
But he does not share this proof with anyone!
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 8]
Zunami
Shown 31/Oct/14
The survivors are on foot, and have been three days without water.
They are still in the path of the Zunami.
The biker kids are still missing,
but there are a couple of hangers-on from the Fu-Bar to act as redshirts instead.
There is a backstory to the Zunami.
It started at a refugee camp in Alberta Province, Canada.
A million people were gathered in one spot, but food ran out.
Starvation and disease killed off vast numbers,
and since the virus is airborne then they turned and bit the others.
Now the zombies are migrating south for the winter,
because they do not function well in the cold.
The survivors lock themselves in a morgue,
and only Murphy is able to walk freely among the zombies.
In the previous episode he showed he was willing to mug a man and steal his car,
which is a major felony when you consider that his prison sentence
was originally only a three-year stretch for a non-violent offence.
But a car is a luxury item, not an essential, and the man was in a zombie-free area.
This episode Murphy does something far worse,
a monstrous act that the survivors would consider unforgiveable if they ever find out.
Why he would even bother to go back and save them is a mystery.
Up at the North Pole, Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) detects anomalous communications.
First someone tries to hack his system,
then a Cosmonaut from the International Space Station arrives.
But why is the dog sleeping through all of this?
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 9]
Die, Zombie, Die... Again
Shown 07/Nov/14
The tweenage biker duo kept riding after they got separated from the others.
They keep going until they run out of fuel.
It seems that scavenging in a post-apocalyptic wasteland is not an option.
Finally, since they have some alone time together, they get the chance to talk.
Unfortunately this means they have to talk to each other.
The girl starts to look the gift horse in the mouth,
pointing out that their relationship is based on
them not knowing much about each other.
If it was not a zom-pocalypse, would they be a couple?
Of course, this chatter is irrelevant – they ARE in a zom-pocalypse,
so they have to stay together for survival whether they like it or not.
The girl talks about a recurring vision she has been having.
Next thing we know, the male wakes up and starts to re-live the same event,
time after time.
He fights a massive zombie, but each time he loses.
The concept of the episode is unoriginal,
and the execution may be confusing to casual viewers.
However, the result is a thought-provoking episode that provides good character development.
Best episode yet.
But with Murphy’s bad turn in the previous episode,
there may be even better to come.
This show is really beginning to shape up!
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 10]
Going Nuclear
Shown 14/Nov/14
The survivors run out of fuel.
However, they are in South Dakota so they can do some sight-seeing at Mount Rushmore.
Unfortunately it has been tagged,
probably by the same person who did the Liberty Bell back in Philly.
The nearby nuclear power plant is about to go critical.
Since there are no usable vehicles nearby,
any evacuation would have to be on foot.
Unfortunately the blast radius will be 300 miles,
and since humans walk at three miles per hour it will take four days to get clear.
They have less than three days.
The only logical option is to stay put and repair the reactor before it explodes!
The team pick up a satellite phone.
Perhaps they will be able to keep in touch with Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) on a regular basis now.
Also, they convert a prop-plane to run on vodka.
Murphy actually shows some humanity for a change,
and thinks about someone other than himself.
Ironically this person happens to be a zombie,
But since they seem to think he is their leader or something this should be expected.
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 11]
Sisters of Mercy
Shown 21/Nov/14
Thanks to Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
), the two groups of survivors meet up again in Utah.
Their journey is almost at an end.
But the Asian girl is wounded,
and the white girl is still messed up after recovering her memory in her previous episode.
Worse, they run into a women-only commune.
Addy the white girl is vulnerable to the manipulative woman running the commune.
No men are allowed in the compound,
and when the male children hit puberty they are sent off on foot into the wilderness.
At least one of the women is a healthy heterosexual.
She decides to have lots of sex with Murphy.
Will he spread his zombie-proof blood to the next generation?
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 12]
Murphy's Law
Shown 28/Nov/14
This seems to be a flashback episode,
to before the main unit met up with the bike kids again.
Murphy is being escorted through Colorado,
and his transformation is ongoing.
However, things really get interesting when they meet some other survivors.
Naturally for a post-apocalyptic story,
the greatest threat is other humans.
This lot have a plan to use Murphy to heist a pharmaceutical supply.
In the Zompocalypse, oxycotin (a high-grade painkiller) is like gold-dust!
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) is vital to the good guys’ survival.
However, it would be too easy for them
if they kept hold of the satellite phone the whole time.
Instead, he has to watch them on CCTV cameras
and communicate through billboards.
The real surprise of the episode is Murphy himself.
He is easily the best member of the cast, now the big names are gone,
but he can pretty much carry the show by himself.
And just as well, because his character is becoming more interesting
and vital to the plot.
Previously, when he bit a guy and infected him with saliva,
the victim’s only symptom was that he was not zombified
by the airborne virus when he died.
But now, Murphy shows that he can influence living people as well as zombies.
He exhibits a strange form of telekinetic mind-control
over anyone with his saliva in them.
Z Nation [Season 1, Episode 13]
Doctor of the Dead
Shown 05/Dec/14
There are flashbacks to before the zombie plague.
A creepy doctor travels round the world,
taking samples of brain fluid from victims of the nastiest diseases he can find.
Almost as if he were creating the ultimate bio-weapon!
Up at the North Pole, Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) tells our heroes there is a change of plan.
The mission to California has been changed,
because the scientist is at a nearby base in Colorado.
They infiltrate the lab, but it is not what they expected.
Murphy's powers mean that the zombies will not attack anyone group-hugging him.
This will not do the Asian girl much good, as she is dying of something.
Will his saliva cure her the way it did the guy at the marketplace?
The place has a self-destruct failsafe system.
Instead of having the bomb built into the complex,
the designers simply aimed a nuclear-tipped ICBM at it.
Unfortunately, a launch of a single missile could trigger the
automated Mutually Assured Destruction systems operated worldwide.
Matt Cedeno as Javier Vasquez [ 2 ]
Emilio Rivera as "Escorpion" [ 2 ]
Season 2
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 1]
The Murphy
Shown 11/Sep/15
Murphy has gone rogue.
He makes new friends easily – the Zombies are his servants.
The Asian Babe is also on his side, like a super-powered bodyguard.
How she survived a direct impact by a nuke on the underground complex is not explained,
but this show is made by The Asylum so it is best not to ask questions.
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails –
The Core
) is lucky that the military outpost he inhabits has a missile defence system.
Unfortunately, the resulting airburst
(while neutralising the nuclear payload before it detonates)
thaws out the frozen aircraft wreckage where the entire crew were wiped out.
Now Zee barely has time to put out an APB with a million-dollar bounty on Murphy
before he has to defend his outpost from the zombies.
The female-only compound has its own set of problems.
Luckily, the suicidally obsessive biker boy somehow survived his last on-screen scene.
He teams up with the girl again, and they go looking for their buddies in Colorado.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 2]
White Light
Shown 18th September 2015
Murphy is hunted by bounty hunters.
Every redneck within hundreds of miles has turned up.
They want him alive,
and they are willing to cripple him so he does not run away again.
The good news is, the bounty hunters kill each other
as well as any zombies they meet.
The bad news is, they tend to use chest shots
so every dead bounty hunter becomes a fast zombie!
Yet another regular character gets a final scene.
However, a well-trained military-looking guy
looks like a new recruit for the good guys.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 3]
Zombie Road
Shown 25th September 2015
The survivors encounter a group of drivers heading east to Minnesota.
Seattle was nuked, and this created a group of super-zombies
known as Blasters (because they were killed in the blast).
The Blasters are immune to Murphy's powers,
possibly because their brain-tissue was destroyed by the radiation.
It is nice to meet some new characters for a change.
William Sadler (
Roswell
) leads the drivers,
while his sidekick is a dope-smoker who gets on well with Doc and Murphy.
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails –
The Core
) does not appear in this episode.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 4]
Batch 47
Shown 2nd October 2015
Following on from the previous episode, Murphy and the Asian not-a-zombie girl
head to the marijuana plantation where the Zee-Weed is grown.
The man in charge (a familiar face from
Drag Me To Hell
) has discovered records of an apparent cure for the zombie virus.
Unfortunately, Batch 47 is located at the very back of the main grow-room.
The plants are part-zombie,
or the zombies are part-plant depending on what way you look at it.
This means that bullets have minimal effect on them, and Murphy has limited effect on them as well.
The show actually has a story arc.
The mad scientist who created the virus is back,
having survived the nuke by hiding in a fridge like
Indiana Jones
. He avoided breaking any bones,
but he does have severe burns on half his face.
He is not the only one after Murphy.
His backers, the Zero Cartel, are Mexican drug-lords
who also run the Zee Weed plantation.
If they look familiar it is because they were among the bounty hunters
who were after Murphy in the free-for-all a couple of episodes ago.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 5]
Zombaby
Shown 9th October 2015
The survivors bumped into Murphy’s baby-momma, hitching a ride through the wilderness.
She is about to give birth, so they take her to a nearby Amish farmstead.
There is no room at the inn, so they put her in the barn.
Nobody stands guard, so a whole circus-full of zombies (including the animals) come to pay their respects.
The farm is also afflicted with anthrax, and the zombies spread it.
A couple of survivors get infected, so they go on a road trip to get some antibiotics.
Unfortunately they have to make a difficult decision.
Will they put the mission first and save their friends so the mission will succeed,
even if it means screwing over some innocent people who are probably going to die anyway?
The baby has Murphy's skin disorder, and it interferes with his ability to control Zombies.
This has disasterous results.
It may just be a plot device, considering how Murphy's super-power is a bit too useful.
Remember how the Blasters similarly were unaffected by him a few episodes ago?
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 6]
Zombie Baby Daddy
Shown 16th October 2015
The Latino guy heads off alone.
The Black lady tails him, intent on finding out what he is up to.
Is he working for the Zeros cartel?
After all, everyone else is.
Murphy is obsessed with his baby daughter,
although he does not have the skills or temperament to be a parent.
The others are worried about the baby’s tendency to attract Zombies,
so Doc wants to give it a check-up.
Murphy takes the child and does a runner.
This show tends to lose its regular characters quite often,
and this episode is no exception.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 7]
Down the Mississippi
Shown 23rd October 2015
The team try to get across the mighty Mississippi.
Luckily for them it is not a mile wide yet.
Since the show is filmed in Spokane, Washington State,
it looks more like one of the minor tributaries.
Of course, that is on the other side of the US Continental Divide,
but the Canadian version of Huckleberry Finn
used the Fraser River as a stand-in, so we cannot complain.
On the subject of Huckleberry Finn.
10K (the teenage sniper) gets stuck with a pair of con-men.
They bluff their way into a redneck settlement
which uses zombies instead of slaves.
As with all other evil plans this Season,
the bad guys are financed and run by the Zero Cartel.
Will they recognise 10K?
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 8]
The Collector
Shown 30th October 2015
Murphy gets captured by a zombie enthusiast.
The guy is building a museum of zombies, and has one of each kind.
He also has a celebrity section, with
George RR Martin
as Guest of Honour. Apparently a dirty guy with a crossbow (Darryl from
The Walking Dead
) tried to save him, but got eaten.
George RR Martin was in Spokane, where this show is filmed,
for the World Science Fiction Convention of 2015.
As a result he was able to make a personal appearance as himself.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 9]
Rozwell
Shown 6th November 2015
The survivors arrive at Roswell, New Mexico.
They encounter a group of UFO enthusiasts led by Bernadette (
Missi Pyle
). She claims that the Aliens will come to save everyone,
and that Murphy is the Chosen One.
The survivors go investigating the disused Roswell Air Force Base.
They encounter some strange creatures in armoured body-suits.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 10]
We Were Nowhere Near the Grand Canyon
Shown 13th November 2015
Up at the North Pole, Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) is back in business. He takes a break from fighting off the last of the zombies,
and replies to Abbie's radio call.
There is another Z-unami on the way!
The vehicles broke down near the Grand Canyon.
10k and Doc stay behind,
and get caught by some Native Americans who have decided to rediscover their culture.
Doc enjoys the peyote,
but the down side is that as outsiders they are the obvious sacrifice.
The others go on to the Reservation, and find a ten-storey Casino.
As a fortified structure it should be the perfect place to sit out the zombie invasion.
And whatever happened to Murphy's superpower of controlling zombies?
Well, it turns out that these ones are Blasters.
But he still has an emotional link to them.
The climax involves a solution that Rick and the crew in
The Walking Dead (Season 6)
should have used when they were in a similar position.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 11]
Corporate Retreat
Shown 20th November 2015
The team get to a hotel where some office workers
have barricaded themselves inside for the last few years.
The place is ruled by Anthony Michael Hall (
Dead Zone
), who uses the touchy-feely talking stick method
to convince everyone that it is a democracy.
Murphy gets shot by person or persons unknown.
This becomes a whodunnit.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 12]
Party With the Zombies/Zeros
Shown 27th November 2015
The team get captured by the Zeros cartel, and taken to their base in northern Mexico.
The Zeros Queen (
Gina Gershon
) has the mad scientist in her basement, working on a cure.
Yes, the man who created the zombie virus has STILL not got a cure for it!
However, now he has Murphy so he might have a chance of making it work.
The Latino gunman discovers which one of the Zeros killed his family.
A pity that the Zero does not find the Latino equally memorable.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 13]
Adios, Muchachos
Shown 4th December 2015
The previous episode featured a series of confrontations:
Murphy in the hands of the mad doctor
the Latino at the mercy of the Zero who killed his family
Warren trying to appease the Zeros Queen (
Gina Gershon
)
Will they be able to tie up some plot lines?
Or will there be double-crosses and a zombie outbreak?
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 14]
Day One
Shown 11th December 2015
The team get to Anaheim, in Orange County.
Their destination, in Los Angeles, is very close.
As they pass the remains of what was once apparently Disneyland,
we get flashbacks to their former lives.
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) was facing criminal charges for hacking the Pentagon.
However, the NSA conscripted him to work at their North Pole station.
They already knew there was a zombie outbreak!
Addy was attending an Ice Hockey game,
where Mac was one of the players.
They teamed up when the Fast Zombies ended the game.
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 15]
All Good Things
Shown 18th December 2015
Murphy gets handed over to the appropriate authorities.
10K (the teenage sniper) is wounded, so they take him too.
Although the US Government has fallen,
the Military-Industrial complex is still around.
The Zeros Queen (
Gina Gershon
) wants The Murphy.
She has her army besiege the survivors in the diner they are hiding out in.
The team get a new, completely unexpected member.
It is probably the most unlikely thing ever to have happened
- in a show about the zompocalypse!
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 1]
No Mercy, Part 1
Shown 9th Sept 2016
The pre-credits intro announces that this is a Flashback movie.
It is certainly a flashback, because the story takes place before the events in
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 6] Zombie Baby Daddy
. Also, it is fair to call it a movie.
Not only is this a double-length episode,
it also has very impressive production values.
In fact, this is probably the best thing The Asylum has ever made.
A small settlement (ironically named Mercy)
is threatened by The Man (Joseph Gatt -
Lucky Man
) and his band of well-armed men who want their doctor.
The settlers, including a feral boy like the one in
Mad Max 2: Road Warrior
, get help from Murphy and his friends.
10k's kill-count has reached 3225 and a half.
He starts to bond with a local girl who calls herself Red,
and her adopted brother (the feral boy - he was raised by crows).
Unfortunately the story starts with a sequence that implies a tragic ending.
The doctor that the villains are after is a scientist.
He was working on a super-antibiotic derived from a fungus.
It turns out that some people were infected with the fungus,
and they are stuck in a strange zombie-like state of living death.
Murphy can hear them telepathically,
even though they are technically alive and not actual zombies.
Perhaps the fungus will provide an actual cure to the zombie virus.
Perhaps the so-called villain merely wants the doctor to make a cure.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 1.5]
No Mercy (Part 2)
Shown 16 Sep 16
The first part of the story ended on a cliffhanger.
However, this is quickly tied up and we move on to the main story.
The survivors finish fortifying the compound.
Yes, it is a zombie apocalypse
but only now do they bother to properly fortify the place.
However, in reference to the classic western film High Plains Drifter
they go to the trouble of painting the entire town red.
The Man (Joseph Gatt -
Lucky Man
) has a suprise - some Mercy-proof zombies.
This is quite reminiscent of
Resident Evil
. Luckily our heroes have some special zombies of their own - the fungus people.
Yes, because the place was originally a chemical factory
there are enough spare hazmat suits around for everyone.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 2]
A New Mission
Shown 23 Sep 16
Warren and her team go after Murphy and his crew.
Unfortunately they get caught by a team of Chinese Special Forces.
The good news is, the Chinese have brought Warren's gang
souped-up versions of their old weapons.
For example, Addy's new version of the bat has a built-in cattle-prod.
Unfortunately, the Chinese have not been trained in countermeasures
to their own high-tech weapons,
leading to one of the most incredible blue-on-blue SNAFUs ever seen.
Worse, the biggest problem is no longer zombies - it is human cannibals!
Up in the Arctic circle, Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) and his canine sidekick have been rescued
by a First Nations girl and her elderly relatives.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 3]
Murphy's Miracle
Shown 30 Sep 16
Murphy takes his tiny band to the city of Spokane, Washington State,
which is where the show is actually filmed.
Yes, the show's locations will not have to pass for completely different parts of the country.
Murphy outlines his new plan.
The humans have evidently failed, and civilisation has collapsed.
Murphy plans to create a new civilisation of zombie-human hybrids.
Of course, he will control them as an Emperor.
However, in a world without hope it seems most people are happy to go along with this.
The alternative is certain death, then full zombification.
This episode indicates how much Murphy has developed as a character.
He is no longer the selfish scum-bag he was in Season One.
Likewise, 10K has also changed.
As Murphy points out, he has ceased counting the zombies that he mercies.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 4]
Escorpion and the Red Hand
Shown 07 Oct 16
Warren and the team stumble into a war between two groups of survivors.
One group claim to be victims, and Warren gets stuck with them.
The other group, who call themselves the Red Hand,
are led by a man who has stolen Escorpion's name and reputation.
Addy has a bad toothache.
Doc and the Chinese scientist must extract the rotten tooth.
10K is under Murphy's control.
However, Doctor Murch has perfected a vaccine that allows humans to negate this.
She plans to undermine Murphy's new regime by making off with the vaccine.
This seems most unfair, for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, she created the vaccine and used Murphy as an unwilling guinea pig.
Secondly, she was only interested in saving the rich and powerful few.
At least Murphy will treat everyone equally.
Nobody actually has a better plan than him.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 5]
Little Red and the Wolfz
Shown 14 Oct 16
10K is on the run with the vaccine.
Murphy's right-hand man is after him, with orders to bring him back alive.
As a result of this non-lethal conflict,
Murphy's minion manages to get his views across - to the audience, if not to 10K.
In a zombie apocalypse, just like in civilized society,
it is reasonable to reduce infinite free will in exchange for safety and security.
Unfortunately the kid is suffering from trauma-induced hallucinations
of the girl and her adopted brother from the first episode of the Season.
Murphy is back in his throne room, likewise communing with the dead.
In his case it is the dismembered remains of Doctor Murch,
who has left him with her notes but no way of interpreting them.
After all, only a top-level biochemist would be able to decipher them.
Worse, Murphy seems to be turning human again without his booster shots.
Even worse, despite turning human he has a zombie-like yearning to eat her brains.
Will the Smart Zombie trope turn true in this case,
and allow eating her brains to ingest her knowledge as well?
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 6]
Doc Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Shown 21 Oct 16
Doc ends up getting separated from the rest of the team.
He ends up getting rescued - well, half rescued and half abducted -
by the residents of a local mental health care facility.
There are only half a dozen patients left.
The good news is that one of them is called Winona, a reference to
Winona Rider
in Life, Interrupted.
The bad news is that the person in charge calls herself Nurse Ratched, like in
One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.
Doc charms the locals and allows them to convince themselves he is a doctor.
After all, he is an expert in pharmaceuticals and mental health.
The nurse merely uses placebos and lobotomies.
There is another recent arrival in the hospital.
He is a young man who seems to be suffering withdrawal symptoms
such as hallucinations about a blue man and a red girl.
Does this sound like anyone we know?
The hospital seems to be in great condition, considering the zombie apocalypse.
For example, the electric doors work fine
and the mains electricity does not go down
even when Doc plugs a zombie into a light socket.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 7]
Welcome to Murphytown
Shown 28 Oct 16
Doc and 10K meet up with the other survivors.
Now they know where Murphy is, so they head after him.
Unfortunately they still have the fake Escorpion and his Red Hand Gang to worry about.
The Man (Joseph Gatt -
Lucky Man
), villain of
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 1-2] No Mercy
, arrives at Murphy's town.
He passes himself off as a recent convert, and offers his services to the cause.
However, he has his own agenda.
Up in the Arctic circle, Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) and his crew (the canine sidekick, the First Nations girl and her elderly relatives)
arrive back at the monitoring outpost.
They might actually have a chance of repairing it.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 8]
The Election
Shown 04 Nov 16
Doc and Addy get a lift with the new US President and his Chief of Staff
- AKA the pair of friendly con-men last seen in
Z Nation [Season 2, Episode 7] Down the Mississippi
. Their new mission is to travel the American Mid-West,
giving hope to the hopeless ... in exchange for donations, of course.
The town they stop at has been hit by a mysterious plague.
Doc investigates and tries to find a cure.
Meanwhile, Addy keeps an eye on the con-men.
A rival con-man turns up,
also with a claim to the US Presidency.
The local Mayor, a very cynical person, demands an election.
After all, the con-men's claims derive from the chain of succession
instead of from an actual electoral mandate.
The resultant political campaigns mock everything in the then-current Trump/Clinton campaign,
and makes reference to other previous political debates.
Please note, this episode aired only a dozen days before the final vote was counted,
and at that stage everyone assumed that Clinton would win.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 9]
Heart of Darkness
Shown 11 Nov 16
The previous episode was a light-hearted story.
This one is much more serious in tone.
Even the subplot with Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) is short on laughs,
as he discovers that Murphy has taken over the broadcast frequency
and replaced Operation Bite-mark with his own plan for world domination.
Warren and her team have scouted out Murphy's base in Spokane.
However, Murphy's forces are too strong for a full frontal assault.
To get reinforcements, Warren and her people go to Seattle,
on the other side of Washington State.
It is the base of the Red Hand,
the bloodthirsty vigilantes led by a mysterious man who calls himself Escorpion.
This leads to a brutal face-off between him and Hector, the original Escorpion.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 10]
They Grow Up So Quickly
Shown 18 Nov 16
Addy and Doc arrive at the remote farmhouse where Murphy stashed his daughter Lucy.
Her hydrid nature has given her growth spurts,
and she now looks like she has aged ten years instead of ten months.
She controls her guardians,
and she has a bunch of zombies as playmates (or playthings, really).
However, she has yet to learn that she cannot control feral cannibalistic humans.
Doc and Addy try to convince Lucy they are her father's friends.
This leads on to the high point of the episode,
a surreal version of the story of how her parents met.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 11]
Doc's Angels
Shown 25 Nov 16
Doc wanders the midwest USA in search of a radio transmitter,
so he can contact Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
). He finds himself in an oasis of peace
inhabited by a tattooed dominatrix, a goth chick and
Nadine Velazquez
. However, it all seems too good to be true.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 12]
The Siege of Murphytown
Shown 02 Dec 16
Kaya in the Sky-a is in charge of the North Pole radio station.
Citizen Zee (DJ Quails -
The Core
) has caught a lift in Uncle's single-engine prop plane,
and is en route to meet the others at Spokane.
We must ignore the fact that the plane's range
is nowhere near the thousands of miles distance it would have to cover.
Murphy has established a peaceful community in Spokane.
People can live without fear of the zombies,
and they have electricity again.
This is the greatest success that Operation Bitemark could ever have hoped for.
After all, the world government is now controlled by Zona,
the same corrupt sons of bitches that The Man (Joseph Gatt -
Lucky Man
) is working for.
Warren and her band of killers are out to destroy humanity's last hope.
She is convinced that the Chinese doctor can create a better vaccine.
However, this would require a serious amount of medical resources.
Since Red China has abandoned her,
and may in fact have fallen to the zombies
the same way the US Government did,
the only remaining powerbase is the villainous conspiracy at Zona.
After all, they were the ones who were behind Operation Bitemark from the start.
Yes, Warren is willing to kill Murphy's people,
and sacrifice her own people in doing so,
in order to hand the power over to an evil conspiracy.
10K finds out what happened to Red,
his girl from the first episode of the Season.
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 13]
Duel
Shown 09 Dec 16
Addy is still on the trail of The Man (Joseph Gatt -
Lucky Man
). She tries to defeat him repeatedly, but he is practically indestructible.
Just as The Man in
Alias
was a codename used for a woman,
so it might be used here to disguise the fact he is a robot or similar inhuman.
In contrast, Addy actually shows her bruises.
Yes, this show displays some medical realism
and has a major female character with a black eye from a fight with a man!
Doc is on their tail, following the trail that Addy has left for him.
He is still puffing on his marijuana cigarette,
and has a surreal halucination inspired by
Back To The Future
). A DeLorean appears, and the driver is Doc Brown (Doc himself).
His sidekick, Marty McFly, is 10k!
Z Nation [Season 3, Episode 14]
Everybody Dies in the End
Shown 16 Dec 16
Doc and Addy are on the tail of The Man (Joseph Gatt -
Lucky Man
). Lucy has left them a guide - a zombie that she turned into a blend.
How this works is not explained,
but this is not the kind of show for explanations.
The Man gets to his pick-up point, built into a remote mountain.
Even the NSA's files do not have any data on the base,
so the Zona group that built it must be very well-connected.
However, the guards' immunity is wearing off.
Their reinforcements are on the way, but things are falling apart for them.
Warren and Murphy have left their entourages behind in Spokane.
They are alone except for the Chinese Doctor and 10K,
who is dying of an infection.
Can they save 10K?
The final face-off is quite cinematic.
Z Nation [Season 5, Episode 1
]
Z Nation [Season 4, Episode 1]
Warren's Dream