Sue Johnson in Generation Z on Channel 4
Yes, that is Sue Johnston (Picture: Channel 4)

Sue Johnston, Robert Lindsay, Anita Dobson and Johnny Vegas– three of the country’s most celebrated actors, each a national treasure.

Not the obvious four leads for Channel 4’s most gruesome horror but it’s 2024, Trump could be president again, the McRib is back, and the sanctity of sanity has been hurled out the window.

Created by gore supremo Ben Whatley, famed for the absurdly enjoyable shark franchise The Meg, Generation Z is the unlikeliest high octane zombie series genuinely worth watching.

Dambury is the fictional English town where there is literally nothing to for teenage pals Charlie (Jay Lycurgo), Kelly (Buket Kmur), Steff (Lewis Gribbin), and Finn (Viola Prettejohn) but play videos games, get hammered at house parties or take too many mushrooms in the park.

There is no action, nothing exciting has ever happened to Dambury until an army convey over turns and a chemical leak has an immediate effect on the residents of a nearby care home.

The OAPs savage their care staff and break out of the home to find fresh young meat. Boomers find a new lease of life as immortal blood-thirsty zombies and they’re hungry for the blood and guts of Gen Z.

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The virus quickly wreaks through the older citizens of Dambury, who find they’re actually thriving with this new disease.

Kelly’s nan Janine (Dobson) is among the first to get infected and attacks her. Soon it becomes clear the teenage gang conveniently armed with a crossbow will need to stick together to escape being churned up by infected pensioners.

But these zombies aren’t the walking dead. They’re more focused and bursting with energy they haven’t felt in years – if anything, they’re thriving. They communicate, fully aware of what’s happening to them and their new unbridled thirst for human flesh.

They’re also harder to kill. They’re not gormless, with the exception of a heartbeat they feel very human.

Generation Z is a lot of fun.

Watching Angie Watts throw herself through tables, hurling at her granddaughter at great heights is very special, largely because you can tell Dobson is loving every second of it.

It’s a perfectly balanced horror comedy with as many scares as there are laughs, with genuine jump scares and very funny one-liners.

Anita Dobson as Janine, covered in blood in new Channel 4 series Generation Z
Angie Watts like you’ve never seen her before (Picture: James Pardon)

But be warned, Generation Z’s first episode if not for faint-hearted fans of the cockapoo.

These zombies take no prisoners, and in the first episode alone there is an incident (to put it lightly) which will convince dog owners to never let their pooch off a leash again. I watched Generation Z in a packed cinema and heard many others audibly gasp too.

The zombie genre has been done to death, no pun intended, but it’s never felt tired.

Dawn of The Dead was as much a horror about the constructs of capitalism as it was about zombies; Night of The Living Dead confronted America’s turbulent race relations and even Shaun of The Dead was about the inevitability of growing old more than it was ever about zombies.

Generation Z Channel 4
The first zom com worth watching in years (Picture: Channel 4)

Generation Z is an exploration of the generational divide which has exasperated over the last decade or so with social media, Brexit and the climate crisis.

It’s about two generations feeling as though they have nothing in common, blaming the other for the pitfalls of living standards.

Gen Z are aliens to the baby boomers, who show no mercy in tearing them to shreds – literally.

Watching Barbara Royle ripping out the guts of an unsuspecting tourist feels like a fever dream you never knew you wanted but, the young cast coming through feel particularly exciting.

Kelly, Charlie, Steff and Finn feel very real, which is actually a sad rarity in television. So often Generation X are reduced to lazy stereotypes of being ‘woke warriors’, but the teens here feel like they’ve been written with respect rather than ridicule.

It’s only taken 20 years, but finally there’s a zom-com which will satisfy fans of Shaun of the Dead. Get seated, but just clear the room of any dogs beforehand.

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Generation Z airs tonight at 9pm on Channel 4 and is available to stream on All 4.

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