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SYFY WIRE Z Nation

This 2014 Zombie Series Ran for 5 Seasons & Might Be the Best Horror Show You’ve Never Watched

This is the post-apocalypse like you've never seen it before.

By Trent Moore
Murphy (Keith Allen) walks through a doorway in an orange Hazmat suit in Z Nation Episode 411.

Mention the concept of “zombie show,” and most everyone will jump to The Walking Dead as a reference point. For good reason! The show was a massive hit for a decade, and continues to lumber on through its myriad spinoffs and TV movie installments that are still going strong all these years later.

But it wasn’t the only zombie show over the past decade or so to dabble in the undead horror genre, and one under-the-radar zombie series carved out its own niche with a delightfully weird execution, plenty of comedy mixed in with the scares, and an expansive cast that evolved just like the show’s mythology.

Z Nation aired for five seasons from 2014-2018 on SYFY (and is now streaming in-full on Peacock), carving out one of the most entertaining horror stories of the past couple of decades with a surprisingly robust amount of world-building to tie it all together. Unlike The Walking Dead, which kicked off not long into the aftermath of a zombie outbreak, Z Nation jumps the story ahead a full three years to find a world already fully ended and just clinging to whatever weird existence those left behind can carve out.

Things take a turn, though, when they realize there’s one survivor who is somehow immune to being bitten and can still retain (at least some) of his faculties after the fact. It’s the type of breakthrough that could potentially turn the tide on a world overrun with the undead, which is where the action of Z Nation kicks off, as a rag-tag group assembles to try and transport this Patient Zero of sorts to one of the last remaining medical labs left in existence.

Much like The Walking Dead, Z Nation also cycled through survivors from season to season (hey, the apocalypse is a dangerous place!), but with a few stalwarts making it through to keep the core together throughout the run.

Z Nation had a huge cast of survivors

The pilot started off with a bang, with Lost fan favorite Harold Perrineau getting top billing only to throw fans a surprising twist by episode’s end that worked to set the stakes quickly. But past Perrineau, the cast was massive: Kellita Smith, DJ Qualls, Keith Allan, Anastasia Baranova, Russell Hodgkinson, Pisay Pao, and Nat Zang stuck around through most of the show’s run. But along the way, they were flanked by dozens of recurring and short-term players, including genre fan favorites like Gina Gershon, Mario Van Peebles, Joseph Gatt, Zack Ward and plenty more.

One interesting twist on the format was Qualls’ role as Simon "Citizen Z" Cruller, a hacker who is spending the apocalypse in the Arctic Circle at a former NSA base. He basically runs a pirate radio station for survivors, using the remaining functional technology to try and keep an eye on how the post-apocalypse is progressing and helping to provide a bird’s eye perspective on it all.

The show was also not afraid to play around with celebrity cameos — but don’t worry — Ed Sheeran isn’t popping up at a campfire. Instead, Z Nation took full advantage of its place in genre lore, with one of the show’s most memorable surprises being Game of Thrones author George R.R. Martin himself popping up as a zombie in Season 2, Episode 8 for an undead book signing (even reanimated, he’s still got to finish that Song of Ice and Fire saga). Turns out a post-apocalyptic collector scooped him up after the zombie outbreak interrupted a comics convention.

Z Nation even got a spinoff: Black Summer

Interestingly, and right in line with that Walking Dead-esque zombie legacy, Z Nation even got a spinoff along the way. The short-lived Black Summer, which ran from 2019-2021 for two seasons, carved out an earlier place in the timeline to tell a new story. Unlike Z Nation, Black Summer leaned harder into the horror aspects of the premise than the humor, telling a story set in the first few weeks after the zombie outbreak began when the world was in maximum chaos.

So if you’re looking for something to fill the zombie-shaped void in your streaming slate, Z Nation is a worthy addition to the watch list. It’s funny, scary, zany, and smart — and most likely a show you might’ve missed the first time around.

Stream Seasons 1-5 of Z Nation right now on Peacock.

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