The Palimpsest of Anna and the Apocalypse: Film Parody and the Changing Depiction of Zombie Outbreaks
Item
- Title
- The Palimpsest of Anna and the Apocalypse: Film Parody and the Changing Depiction of Zombie Outbreaks
- name
- Kyle
- lastName
- Bishop
- Abstract
- As zombies become increasingly ubiquitous, one might ask the question posed by Edgar Wright in his 2006 film Shaun of the Dead: if a zombie outbreak were to occur in real life, would anyone even notice? John McPhail provides one answer to this question in his zombie high-school musical, Anna and the Apocalypse (2017), by parodying the morning of the zombie outbreak. Wrapped up in a musical number made possible by self-absorption and noise-canceling earbuds, the titular Anna blithely sings and dances her way to school (via a noteworthy cemetery), completely ignorant of the chaos around her, a biting satire of the tech-fueled isolation of modern teenagers. By mashing up high-school dramas, romantic comedies, movie musicals, and Christmas films with a zombie narrative, McPhail uses comedic parody to make the subgenre exciting and new once more. Taking a memorable sequence from Shaun of the Dead and expanding it into a feature-length film, Anna and the Apocalypse not only reinvents the stereotypical “zombie outbreak sequence” but also offers scathing cultural criticism about contemporary teen life and high-school communities.
- Creator
- Kyle William Bishop
- Bibliographic Citation
- Bishop, Kyle William. “The Palimpsest of Anna and the Apocalypse: Film Parody and the Changing Depiction of Zombie Outbreaks.” Science Fiction Film and Television, vol. 19, no. 1, 2026, pp. 1–21.
- Access Rights
- Copyrighted
- Type
- Scholarship
- Publisher
- Liverpool University Press
This item was submitted on August 24, 2026 by [anonymous user] using the form “Institutional Repository Contribution Form” on the site “SUU Institutional Repository”: https://omeka.li.suu.edu/omeka-s/s/suu-ir
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