Well I finally finished the 40th anniversary of George A. Romero's "Night of the Living Dead" and the four sequels tribute peice I've been working on since Friday. I chose signature zombies from all four films that I could find decent pics of. I had to leave some popular zombies out basically because I couldn't find good pics of them or just because I didn't want to clutter it up too much. Zombies like Blade (Tom Savini) from "Land of the Dead", the hari krishna zombie from "Dawn of the Dead" or the jawless zombie from "Day of the Dead's" title sequence. Here's a breakdown of what is in the drawing:

"NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD" (1968)--The image I chose was the image of the cemetery zombie (the first Romero zombie ever seen) attacking Johnny at the cemetery. I love this image. It is very rare that you see such a perfect capture of action in a photo. The distress on Johnny's face is priceless.

"DAWN OF THE DEAD" (1978)--The plaid zombie, which became the main focus for the promotion of the film is in the top right in all it's gory glory. Tom Savini made his mark on this film as a make-up artist who would be given the nickname, The King of Splatter. This zombie, with half of his face mutilated and rotting is a staple in the Romero saga. The other "Dawn" zombie is Steven "Flyboy" who made such a wonderful zombie. It really shows you how a trained actor can always bring something special to any role. Flyboy's zombie was very memorable.

"DAY OF THE DEAD" (1985)--The most famous zombie in the Romero saga could possibly be Bub, seen here saluting after he has killed a soldier with his pistol. Bub was the pet project of Dr. Frankenstein who was teaching Bub to remember his past life. Bub was an intelligent zombie who was actually learning and regressing. The other zombie from "Day" in the peice is the famous table top zombie who Dr. Frankenstein was working on when interrupted by his colleagues. The zombie, who's torso had been opened up with surgical tools rises up and reaches for "food" which causes his guts to spill out all over the floor. Dr. Frankenstein simply walks over and drills a hole in the zombie's forehead.

"LAND OF THE DEAD" (2004)--After nearly 20 years, Romero returned with his fourth zombie film. The most famous zombie from this film was Big Daddy, the big black garage worker in his blue coveralls who seemed to become the general of a zombie army who charges on Fiddler's Green. In this peice I also included two other Land zombies together...one, the butcher zombie with meat cleaver and bloody apron and the softball player who had a really cool prostetic make-up on her face that showed her jaw and teeth through her torn away cheek.

"DIARY OF THE DEAD" (2008)---After watching the new Romero zombie film last week I realized that there really aren't that many zombies in the film, and not many that really stand out much. Also, finding decent pics of them was difficult. I ended up picking out the leading zombie which was Ridley who had been playing a mummy in Jason's monster movie. It was all sort of a coincidence that this guy dressed like a mummy would be walking around dead...like a real monster movie mummy at the end. Nicotero's idea to roll the zombie's eyes up into their heads and push the flesh around the mouth away to expose their teeth and gums was a nice touch in this film and the close-up of Ridley in the piece is one of the best.