Santa Clarita Diet is a new-ish Netflix original series and stars Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant as Sheila and Joel Hammond, a married realtor couple whose lives take a turn after Sheila becomes a zombie. The trendy zombie genre has become a bit of a joke over the past few years, with TV shows like The Walking Dead and iZombie ruling the network, but movies like House of the Dead and the Resident Evil franchise have caused the market to die down (hehe, zombie joke). With Santa Clarita Diet, both the zombie genre and the comedy genre are combined and let me tell you, it is great.
Both Barrymore and Olyphant kill it in their roles (sorry, I had to), as well as the other actors and actresses, especially Liv Hewson, who plays the couples’ daughter, Abby. The chemistry between each of these actors is great, and the writing for the characters is really great as well. Let’s talk about the writing. The dialogue is hilarious for each and every character, and the laughs never stop. Timothy Olyphant is perhaps the funniest as Joel, whose actions after the realization that his wife needs people to live are gut-bustingly funny. The daughter, Abby, mixes funny, sarcastic, and serious very well, and I really have to give props to the writers for convincingly creating a show that has a very common plot but making it stand out from others like it.
As well as that, the show takes gore to a whole new level. Instead of eating her victims on the spot, Sheila kills them and then freezes them in a cooler, in the family storage unit. Her first kill (Nathan Fillion) is a bloody mess, and while burying his guts, they spill out all over the couple in a hilarious but extremely revolting scene. Always remember your cooler lids, readers. This is one of the best original shows on Netflix right now. With only ten 30-minute episodes, this is a pretty fast watch and you won’t regret it. There are some inconsistencies in pacing, and there’s also a lot of back and forth, but the overall show is pretty good. I’m going to give Santa Clarita Diet an A-.
Santa Clarita Diet stars Drew Barrymore, Timothy Olyphant, Liv Hewson, Skylar Gisondo. Created by Victor Fresso.
