All of Us Are Dead

This was posted on r/unpopularopinion but got removed bc mods thought it was a Spiderman review. So until that gets fixed, it's gonna be on here.

For those that don't know, All Of Us Are Dead is a Korean Netflix show about a zombie outbreak in a school, based off the webtoon by the same name. I heard it was much better than the show, so I recommend reading it.

So after re watching All Of Us Are Dead, I began to notice a lot more issues than when I first watched it. Tbf I actually found the show quite enjoyable and entertaining. The fight scenes were (although stupid) quite intense and had me on the edge of my seat a few times. I also thoroughly enjoyed the light-hearted, filler scenes.

Anywho, like the failed science experiment this show is, here are some of the issues I had with it, and improvements that could be made:

1. They didn't even try to make any of the characters likable at all. Especially On-Jo. Holy fuck she was so useless, the most useless character in the show imo. Besides Hyo-Ryung, but she's an exception because On-Jo is the main female lead. On-Jo did absolutely nothing except be Cheong-San's love interest, make them a bathroom and cry when her loved ones died. I know she's not very smart, but come on, no one is that stupid to STAND there and SULK because their dad (pointlessly) sacrificed himself, and consequently, risk the lives of themselves and their friends (who actually care about her and stayed by her side). Like excuse me? Please run first and mourn later thank you. Yeah, Cheong-San was probably my favourite character because he actually made half sense (that scene when I thought he was gonna abandon Dae-Su, but ended up dragging him with him, made me so happy).

2. So many pointless subplots, scenes and plot hooks. E.g. the pregnant girl. She was only there so the police duo would take in her baby. But it's not like the baby provided any problems for the policemen anyway. This was also the case with the little girl. The scene with the infected hamster that looked like it was going to bite On-Jo, or that scene where the firefighter dad gave his gun to the husband who crashed his car also provided nothing (unique or already mentioned) to the plot.

3. How many times do they have to throw Gwi-Nam off the roof? Or off one of the stories of the school? It was ok the first time, but it started getting tedious and mildly ridiculous when he repeatedly climbs up the school only for them to throw him off the roof, and so he climbs up again. As many have already stated, Gwi-Nam as a villain was heavily overused. It felt stupid that no matter how many times they tried to kill him, he just wouldn't die. I kind of wished Eun-Ji would've been the one to finish off Gwi-Nam, and maybe Nam-Ra would've joined as well. Maybe some girl-boss scenes, Idk.

4. While Gwi-Nam was overused, Na-Yeon was underused. I felt like they built Na-Yeon up to be the/a villain in the first few eps, but apparently not. This was incredibly disappointing because I actually found Na-Yeon to be quite scary and intimidating, a lot more than Gwi-Nam. Also, that whole montage of the english teacher telling Na-Yeon to stay alive after sacrificing herself for her, her hallucinating Gyeong-Su, her watching the videos of her friends, and making us feel sorry for her, only for Na-Yeon to pointlessly die before anything interesting happened. Like, what? They could've just had the teacher not run out and cut to black right before the zombies attacked Na-Yeon.

5. Also, we gotta talk about Eun-Ji and the other victim. Instead of the chopper picking him up and leaving before the students got on the roof, I think the scene could've been replaced with the one where the commander decided to not rescue the students because they might be zombies (and the victim guy would've been there as well). And so, instead of Eun-Ji biting the victim guy at the quarantine center, she could've bitten someone who accidentally bumped into her, or smelled nice, or started picking on her because she was from Hyosan High School, just to reduce the amount of pointless deaths in this show.

6. On the topic of pointless deaths, On-Jo's dad's death was seriously avoidable. Like he had all the time in the world to escape with them. One could say he was making sure the zombies wouldn't break through gate and follow after them, but that doesn't make sense because there were already zombies outside the tennis court that were chasing them. Other deaths like Wu-Jin's, Joon-Young's, Cheong-San's mum, Ji-Min's and the fat guy in the archery group, were so unnecessary.

7. The scene where Gwa-Nim bit Cheong-San made me so angry. Like his friends literally stood there and watched Gwa-Nim twist their friend's arm and bite it. They don't care about him at all! For fuck's sake, this whole show was full of something tragic happening, people watching it happen and only coming to help after it happened.

8. Now onto Nam-Ra. I wished they'd showcase her power's full potential. I felt her powers were wasted on pointless fight scenes (except for maybe that last fight scene where Wu-Jin died) and wished there was a scene where she took on a hoard of zombies alone, and her friends watched in awe. And then Su-Hyeok would've come to help her, and eventually the rest of her friends. Her heightened senses also didn't do much more than a regular human's eyes and ears, considering how long it took her to warn them.

9. The zombies themselves were very inconsistent in their symptoms. For example, they're sensitive to loud noises, yet when On-Jo's dad lit a flare, the zombies were attracted to the light. Gwi-Nam, who had the mutated virus, passed on the mutated virus to Nam-Ra, yet when he bit the archery guy, he looked like he was turning into a regular zombie (?). And Eun-Ji, who also had the mutated virus, only passed on the regular virus.

10. And that scene where they were going down the rope. Cheong-San said they could only go down one at a time because it might/will break otherwise. I thought that would mean at some point, two people had to go down at the same time and the rope would break. But no, Su-Hyeok full on jumped and grabbed onto Cheong-San, and the rope didn't break. WHAT? Those two guys have to be at least 70kg each, considering how tall and athletic they are. Why even have Cheong-San say that in the first place? Just have him say they should go down one at a time because they don't know the strength of the rope.

Now, I know that the characters are students. They're stupid and immature, and so their decisions and deaths were very realistic. But this is a show goddammit. To make it good, you can't have pointless plot points and hooks with zero development and you gotta have the students make smart decisions. I know most of the students are supposed to be dumb. But they can't so be so dimwitted to the point that they're incapable of making realistic, profound and well thought-out decisions to aid in their survival. And character development. Please, we need it. I really thought they were doing something with Ji-Min there but as soon as she abandoned Hyo-Ryung, that idea died with her.

The show, for me, just didn't have any emotional, impactful or action-heavy scenes that make me think of that scene when I think of All Of Us Are Dead. Even though that's not a bad thing, it just didn't make the show memorable. I mean, I guess it was memorable for all the problems and issues it had. 5/10.

Disclaimer: spoilers for the entire show, also this post is long.

I just finished the show and honestly while I really liked it it feels a bit confused in some areas. Especially with the whole, "half-bie" thing which kinda took a front row seat for the second half of it. I really liked the first few episodes and some specific moments along the way but I can't scratch the feeling it could've been better. For one Na-Yeon's death felt kind of pointless and completely for shock value, why bring her back and have a bunch of scenes that I really liked involving her being isolated from everyone after directly and indirectly getting two people killed. The acting, directing, and cinematography worked really well for me there and it almost made me feel bad for her. Then she immediately gets killed before any interesting interaction can happen. This show is just a really big version of that. Something really cool and interesting followed by a dumb decision by the writers/directors. After Nam-ra gets bitten the show takes a pretty big hit for me, not necessarily because of the concept of a "half-bie" because I think it's interesting and unique in film for the virus to affect people differently, however, this show uses that a bit too much and it becomes stale pretty quick. Suddenly a character who's been in the back the entire time is now the most valuable person there and the main groups entire survival depends on her. That would be fine, if she was an interesting character to follow, but she isn't. I'm pretty sure she's meant to be made of cardboard and have few spurts of good dialogue but when she suddenly becomes an x-men it really doesn't fit for me. I don't like the idea that this group of kids wouldn't have had a chance if not for this demigod they have with them. That's no exaggeration either, she can basically use echolocation to see where everyone is at a given time, superhuman strength that can essentially do anything par what the writers want to be a roadblock, invincibility to zombies who don't wanna eat her, powerful killing machine in that she can take everyone out at the plots convenience and all with the outward appearance of a shy, physically weak, schoolgirl who doesn't like her mom very much. The show jumped the shark for me there. That's just magic, it's not sciencey zombie bs it's just magic at this point. None of the zombies in the show have anywhere near that ability (unless they need to be for the plot to happen) and seem to be completely incompetent in every way that isn't running which they are alright at. So if you are infected, but are "asymptomatic" you suddenly gain the ability to do anything. At least the zombies themselves can die from fall damage the one bully character comes back a bunch like it's nothing. That doesn't make anywhere near enough sense. I thought the science teacher himself said it basically just made people much more aggressive and have really high testosterone. Yeah I'd guess that would make you stronger by comparison but not pushing someone and they fly 10 feet. I'm sorry, but that's just absurd. I can handle that stuff but when it's cool or used in a clever way but it's just used to give the characters a major disadvantage until they get their own teenage mutant ninja fuck to make it even again. All of this only serves to make the majority of the characters feel powerless against them and sideline everyone. A few characters get their time to shine like characters using a bow or cheou-san (100% misspelled I'm sorry) sacrificing himself to kill the bully character which is probably the best scene in the show. All in all I think the show is at it's best when it's just a bunch of confused kids trying to make it and at it's worst when everything is explained yet also convoluted. I really didn't like having confirmation they were the only survivors. Anyway I'd love to hear everyone else's takes but that's mine and it sounds super critical but I really did enjoy this show a lot and it's easily some of the best zombie stuff I've seen in a while.