8.13 Ep.4 “Destination”

Johnny, Sonia, and agent Frost arrive at their destination with their groups… just before 8:13 p.m.

More info below…

2 Swirlies

“Sorry Johnny. Next time I’ll be more careful about not kicking sand in your vagina.”

Quick note: It looks like the encode to YouTube ended up stranding this video in the wrong aspect ratio. That sucks when that happens, but I guess they chose not to re-upload it. Or, it could be something screwy on my end.

I think this episode is about creating trajectories – there’s three scenes, each with a different group of people. I haven’t watched an episode from this series in a while, but I’m not sure who the people of two of the groups are – I’m pretty sure we’re meeting them for the first time. I’m guessing they are headed on a collision course. I think putting the main characters at the end of the video was a bad move, I was confused as to why we were following these new people until I saw the guys I recognized.

This is yet another show where I feel like I’m still waiting for the story to start. It’s fine to have character moments and interactions, but at some point we should be realizing why we care about these guys. Why are we being told this story? Why now? Why this scene?

I’m not sure I can answer those questions. And even if the creators could, the answers can’t be ‘because something cool’s gonna happen later.’ This isn’t a movie – we’re not committed for the full two hours or however long it is.

Enough set up and character introductions. Let’s get to the zombies, already!

More info taken from YouTube:

CAST:

Website: http://813series.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/813series
Twitter: http://twitter.com/zom813s
Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/eightthirteen
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/813series

8.13 Ep.3 “Dinner for One”

FBI agent, Greg Frost, is introduced in the spiderweb along with his fiance, reporter, Sonia Pierce. The young couple attempt to have dinner in their new condo as the clock ticks.

(More info below…)

1 Swirlie

“Hello Agent Frost.  Hello Mrs. Frost.”

Woah.  Since when were we watching Mr. & Mrs. Smith?  Or True Lies for that matter?  Minus the funny.

After a real thriller interrogation of a first episode, in which, we were promised Zombie destruction la 28 Days Later— and then a second episode packed full of conspiracy theory—we’re stopping for a flirty domestic picnic?

I’m all for character.  But a five minute scene between two characters that we haven’t seen up to this point, discussing their marital difficulties, seems a bit like… stalling.

I felt like shouting at the screen: GET TO THE ZOMBIE ACTION!

Also, aren’t law enforcement/government agents the first to get it in these kind of horror stories?  If so, the filmmakers had better not be building these characters up just to kill them off at the first sign of zombie infection.

Filmmakers: Never betray your audience’s expectations.  We won’t like it.  Really.  (Hello, Lost, anyone?)

Though, I have to hand it to the actors.  A marital scene loaded with subtext and subtlety is hard to pull off, but they do.  (Although, I had a hard time believing the male lead was a government agent—but then again, Matt Damon has spoiled me).

The director has some nice nuanced moments, and the score helped to emphasize when we should care—which, if overdone a bit more, would have felt overly sentimental.  But the biggest issue here is the writing.  Not that it’s all bad, but it just goes on for too long.  Get in and get out.  That’s how an effective scene works.

This was not an effective episode for building upon the greater zombie conspiracy arc.  If anything, it feels like a strange tangent—a subplot that we’d have time for in a feature film or television show—but not so much a web series in which you only have so much time to hook your audience.

All I have to say is that there had better be some action in the next episode!

More Info:

CAST:

Sonia Pierce… Marisha Ray
Agent Greg Frost… Richard Lara
Erika (VO)… Traycee King

CREW:

Created by… Traycee King
Producers… Traycee King, Beau Ryan
Director… Mando Franco
Director of Photography… Beau Ryan
Writer… Marisha Ray
Lighting… Beau Ryan
Editors… Traycee King, Joshua Evan Ovenshire
Makeup… Chrissy Lynn
Visual Effects… Ryan Anderson
Music by… Drew Krassowski

8.13 EPISODES:

Episode 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UhuMLU4k78
Episode 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXqUC3QUQT0&feature=re…
Episode 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ko4ehzVKHzs&feature=re…
Episode 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tw-gD3HJ_uk&feature=re…
Episode 6: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ln5xX8a27c8&feature=re…
Episode 7: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y78u4Njlj5I
Episode 8: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7a4Mon0o-0
Episode 9: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRb40bm2aTo

8.13 SITES:

Website: http://813series.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/813series
Twitter: http://twitter.com/zom813s
Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/eightthirteen
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/813series

8.13 Ep.2 “Hacker (13 hours earlier)”

Johnny, a super hacker who is obsessed with conspiracy theories, tracks guerrilla resistance group M.A.R.S. and pharmaceutical company, Rundberg. Johnny and his friend Toby start the evening 13 hours before the interrogation.

1 Swirlie

“Fine. If she gets into one of her moods, I’m dropping her off – Skid Row.”

I don’t really have much to say about this one. After the tension and mystery of the first episode, this exposition heavy second part is a let down.

There’s so much talk, I barely caught a fraction of it. And still no zombie action.

When I can’t find something to recommend in a video, I feel like I’ve failed you guys. But for this one you should give it a pass. Maybe the third episode will pick up.

More From YouTube:

Website: http://813series.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/813series
Twitter: http://twitter.com/zom813s
Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/eightthirteen
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/813series

8.13 – Ep. 1 “The Interrogation”

4 Swirlies

“Where were you at 8:13 PM? Start at the beginning.”

Regular readers will know thatI’m a little wary of first episodes that are short on character or story, but these guys manage to pull it off.

The writers, Melissa Kay and Mando Franco, manage to jam a lot of story hooks into 2 minutes (Like, there’s a guy named Mars? What happened at 8:13 PM?) and the episode is nicely produced with very little distracting us from the brutal interrogation. I also give them props for keeping it nice and short.

I felt, however, that there wasn’t much going on that we hadn’t seen before in many brutal interrogation scenes – that it was largely a vehicle for some exposition. I would have liked to see a little more character details in therewith the hints and foreshadowing of plot points to come.

But still well worth checking out. I’ll be very pleased if this develops into a thriller drama that gets me excited to keep following.

From YouTube
Johnny Dixon (Beau Ryan) is captured and interrogated by an unknown organization during the peak of the zombie uprising. Johnny will then reveal his whereabouts from the beginning of the outbreak, 8:13 pm.

Website: http://813series.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/813series
Twitter: http://twitter.com/zom813s
Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/eightthirteen
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/813series