I really love horror movies. So when I heard Netflix was coming out with a Korean Zombie TV show, I knew I had to watch. 

Netflix’s “All Of Us Are Dead” follows Hyosan High School, where a deadly virus causes infected people to attack anyone and anything. If you’re bitten, you’re dead. We see different groups of high schoolers, government officials, and many others throughout the show. Death is prevalent, and sorrow is ubiquitous. 

One of the main groups we see is high schoolers Lee Su-hyeok, Choi Nam-ra, Lee Cheong-san, Nam On-jo, amongst other students. These characters go through much heartache, from losing friends and family to dealing with teenager drama. The character development throughout the show was outstanding, especially how the actors portray their respectable characters. Normally, you see zombie apocalypse where the main characters are adults, but what you gain with teenagers is the emotion and hurt they feel. Teenagers equate everything as the same amount of difficulty, life or death, failing a class. Being in a zombie apocalypse also takes a certain amount of emotional maturity, being able to kill someone to save your own life, even if it’s one of your classmates. 

I also really enjoyed how the story was almost always unpredictable. You never knew who was going to turn into a zombie, sacrifice themselves, or turn against the rest. The villains of the story are fueled by anger and revenge, yet you still feel bad for them. The show allows each character to have their own path of bravery or vengeance, yet grants them redeeming qualities. Even the most troubled character has a past which is highlighted by the difficulty of living through an apocalypse.

I thought the plot of the story was extremely interesting and well thought out. It jumps from different groups of people, adding to their own perilous journey, and keeping the show interesting by leaving the watcher compelled to see what happens next. They focus on highlighting the gritty fights and bloodthirsty zombies, and it works out in their favor. Almost every episode ends in a cliffhanger, and makes you want to keep watching.

The tv show overall wasn’t completely scary. There are few jump scares and low hums of suspenseful music throughout the episodes, but really the only part that made me nervous was the amount of realistic special-effects makeup there was. 

When it comes to zombie movies, it’s impossible to avoid the crazy amount of gore and guts you’ll see. In this instance, the fake blood and zombie makeup was exceptional. I often found myself covering the screen with my hand, and yet still trying to look because of how realistic the prosthetics looked. It was also quite interesting how the color red was the most prevalent out of all of the colors in the show. With a tv show with as much blood as it had, the contrast between the grayish-blueish sky and muted colors of a decaying school, versus the scarlet color of death was truly fascinating. 

Recently, Netflix’s Squid Game gained the most popular title, reaching 1.65 billion hours of viewing in 28 days following its Sept. 17 premiere, according to Netflix. It’s no doubt that a second futuristic, psychological horror tv show is going to gain popularity. Just because there is a language barrier doesn’t mean people won’t enjoy it, especially when the plot and characters are as outstanding as this one.

The best part about this show was by far the easily identifiable contrast between Korean and American media. Oftentimes in American shows and movies, they are portrayed as a comedy, with witty dialogue and goofy fighting scenes between human and zombie. There are plenty of non-comedic movies out there, but the most popular ones do not portray it as well as “All Of Us Are Dead.”

This show was spectacular and I would recommend it to anyone who has a similar love of horror movies and/or high schooler drama. It may not be for the faint of heart, especially if you don’t like hyper-realistic gore. However, with 12 episodes, each being about an hour long, this show was absolutely worth the watch.