Warning: This article contains SPOILERS for All of Us Are Dead.
While survival and friendship, All of Us Are Dead also dealt with important topics like bullying, depression, and self-acceptance.
It is worth taking a look at the reasons why All of Us Are Dead managed to stand out in an already worn-out genre. While productions such as Train to Busan have brought a fresh take — or at least a fresh execution — to zombie movies and series, many of the genre's tropes have become so well known to general audiences that it is rare for them to work. Perhaps with that in mind, All of Us Are Dead avoided some of the horror stories’ clichés but also worked with other ones in a more different approach.
One of those tropes that All of Us Are Dead flips is that the real villains in a horror story are not the creatures, but the humans. Although that theme can be found in recent productions such as The Last of Us or The Walking Dead, this approach to monster stories traces back to some of the oldest horror movies in history. Films like 1932's White Zombie, which was the first feature-length production focused on zombies, already showed that the greatest cruelties in a story may not be committed by the monsters, but by humanity. In the Victor Halperin film, the character of 'Murder' Legendre would turn his adversaries into zombies to then use the creatures as personal guards.
All of Us Are Dead seems to have found a creative middle ground for these two types of antagonists thanks to its halfbie concept. In the show, those who had a strong enough reason to stay alive managed to survive the zombie virus even after being bitten by several creatures. While they would still have the same eating habits as zombies, All of Us Are Dead's halfbies had much more control over their actions and could even for normal humans.
Introduced as a bully who committed despicable acts, Gwi-nam indicated that he would be the classic human antagonist in All of Us Are Dead. Besides being a bully, the character sacrificed several classmates to survive and even murdered the school’s principal. Eventually, however, Gwi-nam would transform into a halfbie and gain all the abilities of a zombie without losing his villainous personality. In an interesting mix of two types of villains, Gwi-nam retains all of his flaws as a human but also gains the scariness, near-indestructible element of a zombie.
For a series with such a simple premise, All of Us Are Dead surprises by both avoiding and reworking some of the most well-known tropes of the horror genre. The concept of hybrid halfbie zombies in All of Us Are Dead offered a different new dynamic for the latter half of the series and kept the season from losing its great pacing. In the end, All of Us Are Dead works just as well for those who like the more traditional zombie stories as it does for those who are looking for something more innovative.