Max Brooks is a genius.  Not only has he written two classic zombie best sellers, but he re-defined the genre.  I credit him with a great deal of the revitalization of zombies in popular culture.  Every day we see a new zombie novel, video game or movie.  The Fukerton got the opportunity to discuss all of these things with Max.  We also got an update on his new graphic novel and the World War Z movie. It was a thrill.

Click HERE to download the interview and click HERE to get Max’s new book. I’ve read it. It’s pretty fricken sweet.

The Kurt Warner Rodkast.  Drab T Shirt and Brad Fukes get ol’ Smooth Daddy B on the phone.  Bracken did not only tells us of his wife’s new afternoon radio show on the Fan, but he reviews Pandorum and Zombieland.  We learned what he has been doing, lo these many months.  He also gives us new movie skinny, some of which is distressing.

 It’s also the first time that any of you will get to hear Bracken curse his filthy ass off.  I know it was the first that we here at the Fukerton have and it was quite something.  

Click HERE to download the latest.  Keep in mind it is dirty and sexist and racist so if your offended by that sort of thing, tell yer story walking.

I want to make a disclaimer before you read the rest of this post.  If I were offered the choice between saving a kittens life or never watching 28 Weeks Later, that kitten would be Bantha fodder.  Don’t get me wrong, I loved “Days” as well, but I enjoyed weeks more for the same reason I prefer Aliens to Alien.  It incorporated all the terror of the original and made it a kick ass action movie.   The only things I like more than zombies and england are Big Daddies and Splicers.   I have seen this story on several sites, but I’ll explain why I referenced the good people at Kotaku:

Last we’d heard, the BioShock movie had been put on hold while studio execs looked for a cheaper place to film, along with a new director. Looks like they’ve found the latter.

According to SlashFilm, Spaniard Juan Carlos Fresnadillo will replace Gore Verbinski in the director’s chair (though Verbinski will remain as a “producer”). Never heard of Fresnadillo? He’s the guy who directed 28 Weeks Later, and…nothing else you’ve ever heard of

Hrm.

Whether you liked his zombie sequel or not (brilliant opening aside, I hated it), replacing Verbinski with a relative unknown is certainly a step down for the production, which was - courtesy of the big-name director and big-time budget - at one time being hailed in this post-Peter-Jackson-Halo world as Hollywood’s first crack at really taking a game adaptation seriously.

Saying you “hate” 28 Weeks is like saying you hate pizza or eating Kourtney Kardashian’s ass.  If you hate things like that, I’m not sure what I can do for you.  Also, I don’t agree with the aurgument that Fresnadillo is a huge step down from VerbInski.   Look, I loved Swingers, but did ANY of us think Jon Favreau could have done the job he did with Iron Man?  Certainly not based on Elf or fucking Zathura.  Sam Raimi is a legend and a cult hero, but Spiderman 3 is a steming pile of shit.  These things are hit and miss.  28 Weeks Later was gritty, brutal, raw and realistic.  That sounds like exactly what I want out of a Bioshock movie.

Nazi Zombie Map Pack 3 is almost here. Kotaku has a great video breaking down all the new weapons and perks. To check it out, click here. It is amazing how far they have come with what I assume was just intended to be a mini-game. Weapons, perks, maps, story and character developement are all top notch. Think about the potential this things has. It appeals to FPS fans, WWII game fans, horror survival fans and scores of other demos. I think if Treyarch was smart, they would start on a full Nazi Zombie game based on this same plot now and use the time Modern Warfare 2 is going to buy them to get it out there quickly. I prefer World at War to MW but MW2 has the potential to be one the biggest titles every released. WAW’s multiplayer numbers will dwindle, so use that time to get this thing together. It would be a smash hit.

If you missed the first trailer for Map Pack 3, do yourself a favor and click here. It is steamies inducing.

Upon completing the campaign for Call of Duty: World at War, we the gamer were rewarded with something miraculous. No, not a video of Bob Sapp mounting Hayden Panettiere, but something nearly as good. Nazi Zombies. A mini game that involved Marines holed up inside a large structure, repelling wave after wave of undead fascists. It was glorious and in many ways it trumped the game itself. Expansion packs were then made available for download on Xbox Live and the maps got more difficult and more involved.

Treyarch (the game’s developer,) seemed to realize what they have on their hands. What they had on their hands was a hit. So they decided to make these maps more that just mindless, zombie slaughtering fun. They added things like characters development and back story. They hid clues through out the next two maps hinting at the origin of these undead brutes. I was oblivious to said backstory until last night when the group I was playing with stumbled across the easter egg featured in the video above. A quick google search led to several different parties that had a dearth of information on the subject and may not have put stones in a while.

If you are still reading, then you feel like I feel. Click HERE to go to a thread on wethegamerz.com. There seems to be a bevy of theories on the backstory for said zombie plague. Here is just a sample of the origin story being speculated on by nerds like you and me, just with more time on their hands:

What we know as fact: (Written by Telixion)
So what we know so far is that Dempsey, Nikolai, and Takeo have travelled together to the location you know as Shi No Numa. Richtofen has not been confirmed to travel with them or if he met them at Shi No Numa. Why they were sent there we don’t know. Perhaps to survive? Or maybe to finish a project? A message has been sent to a man named Peter. Peter is unknown to us. Did he die, move to a different location, is he the man that hung himself? We don’t know. The message goes on to talk about how a project was moved here. The message also mentions that the “Giant” (Derese) must be contained at all costs. Is this giant the project or something else? We can also gather from this data that we can use the element 115. However dangerous it is. Element 115 seems to have been extracted from the meteor which crash landed nearby. Element 115 appears to be what is contained in the DG-2. The meteor is known as the tunguska meteor. From what we know we will have to rely on help from certain doctors.
So close to the shield!

This is why gaming is so close to the cusp of main stream entertainment value.  This is big budget movie shit.  This is million copy selling horror novel type content.  I can’t wait to get to the bottom of this mystery and then treat my private area like a child that has stole something.  If you uncover more, please share with the class.