Zombie Thanos in a still from ‘Marvel Zombies’, exclusively on Disney+
| Photo Credit: Marvel Television
The first season of Marvel’s animated anthology series What If…?exploring alternate timelines, had the ultimate fan favourite in What If… Zombies?! The episode explored what would happen if events took a different turn in Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) and Avengers: Infinity War (2018). With the world and its superheroes turned into zombies (even Happy!) and Vision willing to do anything for love, What If… Zombies?! was the perfect mix of gore, tears and laughter.
And now, with the mini-series, Marvel Zombies, we get to further explore the battle royale between the undead superheroes and the survivors of the plague through the eyes of Kamala Khan/Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani), who the creators, Bryan Andrews and Zeb Wells, describe as the Frodo of the story.
“When we looked at the timeline of when the adventure was starting and what the characters were doing, Kamala seemed like she was in a perfect spot,” says Bryan over a video call from Studio City, near Burbank, California.
Peter Parker/Spider-Man (voiced by Hudson Thames) in a still from ‘Marvel Zombies’, exclusively on Disney+
| Photo Credit:
Marvel Television
Bryan, who had also directed What If… Zombies?! says, “Kamala hadn’t had her adventures yet. She’s green and new and we figured that is a perfect person to have come into the adventure the same way that Frodo was unprepared for the adventure he was put on in The Lord of the Rings. Kamala is unprepared to a certain degree, but she has her bangle, though she is still figuring out her powers.”
Putting Kamala’s hope and youthful outlook against the horrible, zombie event, the audience wonders if she will weather the storm, Bryan says. “It is the classic question that is asked often in these zombie movies — does who you are survive the horror that you have to go through?”
Featuring the voices of Elizabeth Olsen (Wanda), Paul Rudd (Scott Lang), Florence Pugh (Yelena Belova), David Harbour (Alexei Shostakov), Tessa Thompson (Valkyrie), Simu Liu (Shang-Chi), Awkwafina (Katy) and Hailee Steinfeld (Kate Bishop), among others, Marvel Zombies is Marvel Studios’ first animated series with a TV-MA rating.
(L-R): Alexei Shostakov/ Red Guardian (voiced by David Harbour), Yelena Belova (voiced by Florence Pugh), Kamala Khan (voiced by Iman Vellani) and Blade Knight (voiced by Todd Williams) in a still from ‘Marvel Zombies’, exclusively on Disney+
| Photo Credit:
Marvel Television
“Bryan and I are fans of the genre,” says executive producer Brad Winderbaum over a video call from Burbank, California. “We love zombie movies, and were excited to make a show that was true to that genre. We needed to ensure that Marvel Zombies had the deadly stakes and visceral moments of graphic violence that zombie films have, to show how bleak and dangerous the universe is. That meant Marvel Zombies had to be a TV-MA series.”
The series features zombie versions of beloved heroes. “We would tell the vis dev (visual development) ‘Hey, so and so’s a zombie’,” Bryan says. “They would give us a variety of options to look at. And we would say, ‘That’s not gruesome enough’ or ‘We have to dial that one back’. It was a playground, figuring out the story and bringing it to life. It was a lot of fun and an embarrassment of riches.”
What If… Zombies?! was ripe for such a wide variety of ideas, and Bryan says, that the challenge was trying to fit it all into the four half-hour episodes. “In some ways, we actually failed that challenge, because there’s so much story that we couldn’t get into the one that we told. There are other storylines and characters just waiting on the sidelines, ready to be told. So hopefully, if enough people watch this and they are loud enough about their approval, if they love it, maybe we get to make another season and tell those other stories.”
Marvel Zombies streams on JioHotstar from September 24
Published – September 22, 2025 08:04 pm IST
