The trailer for the long-awaited Zombieland: Double Tap has landed, bringing with it the same wicked humor and inventive gore of the original. The sequel to 2009’s Zombieland finds the dysfunctional gang of survivors continuing to do what they do best: kill zombies and crack wise. But a lot has changed in ten years: Emma Stone (Wichita) has won an Oscar for La La Land, Jesse Eisenberg (Columbus) has been nominated for an Oscar for The Social Network, and Abigail Breslin has grown up.
The trailer even pokes fun at the cast’s pedigree, introducing them all as Oscar nominees/winners. But despite the decade that has past, little seems changed in the world of Zombieland. Woody Harrelson’s Tallahassee remains as goofy and irreverent as ever, whether he’s hanging out in the Oval Office or cosplaying as Elvis. And Eisenberg continues to play the straight man to Harrelson’s shenanigans.
But there are some updates and new players joining the gang. Rosario Dawson joins the cast as “bad-ass zombie killer” Nevada, and Zoey Deutsch plays Madison, a ditzy survivor who has been hiding out in an abandoned Pinkberry freezer. In addition, the zombies themselves have changed. “In the 10 years since the first movie, zombies have evolved into different types of zombies,” says returning director Ruben Fleischer. “The one that’s causing the big threat are the T-800 zombies, that are stronger, faster, harder to kill.”
Fleischer, who most recently directed Venom, is back, as are screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick (Deadpool). Fleischer describes the film as, “We find our heroes from the last movie ten years later, as they’re just moving into the White House … Tallahassee has a saying, ‘Go big, or go home.’ They kind of took it to heart and went for kind of the biggest and best home they could find.”
But when Breslin’s Little Rock makes a break for it and hitches a ride with Berkeley (Avan Jogia), the gang must rush to find her. Along the way, they encounter a duo of doppelgangers played by Luke Wilson and Thomas Middleditch, as a bizarro version of Harrelson and Eisenberg.
The trailer is a fun, stylish return to form for the gang, and a welcome one. Zombieland was an unexpected delight, carving out a place as the second-best zombie comedy (zombedy?) of all time (Sorry but nothing beats Shaun of the Dead). Ten years is a long gap between movies, but Double Tap looks like it’s worth the wait.
Zombieland: Double Tap hits theaters October 18, 2019.
(via Entertainment Weekly, image: Jessica Miglio/Sony Pictures Entertainment)
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