This is, apparently, the first in a series of movies called “Deadscapes”. Episode One, “Broken Road”, joins a Zombie Apocalypse right at its inception. Basically, we’re right at the point where the dead are returning to life and attacking the living. Society is starting its slow crumble, and people are beginning to come together in a push to survive.
“Broken Road” isn’t a terrible start, and it’s enough to make me wonder what the next step of “Deadscapes” will be. But, “Broken Road” is also severely flawed in several ways. The actors are hugely unconvincing–the prep-school princess Jesse, for example, will take a strange and utterly out-of-character turn near the end of this first installment. Meanwhile, dialogue is delivered in a profoundly unconvincing fashion, as though they’re reading their scripts cold for the very first time. It’s horrifically amateurish.
“Broken Road” is a fair start, but Velasquez and company will have to do a whole lot better in the future to make sure the entire “Deadscapes” series isn’t just a cinematic wasteland.
