Nerds Are Fickle.

That is not a surprising revelation.  Trust me, I am no exception.  We love to nit pick, argue, and correct, all for the sake of that one thing we crave above all else: accuracy.

There are plenty of ways accuracy can be compromised, especially in film adaptations.  Casting (Seth Rogen as the Green Hornet), canon/lore (Han shot first?  Han shot ONLY!), bloat (the unnecessary added plot in 300), audio (Batman's struggle with throat cancer a'la Christian Bale), visual (invisible Bluetooth communication in The Avengers), and Batman and Robin in its entirety.

Pleasing to nerds.

Not pleasing to nerds.

When we are pleased, we elect our Nerd Gods and Goddesses and make them very rich people, indeed.  When we are not pleased, however, reputations can be destroyed.

This tendency to expect strict adherence to canon and lore may seem outlandish and a bit stuck up to some, though I'm not sure why.  I mean, if you took your blonde haired,  blue eyed baby girl to the photographer, paid an arm and a leg for a session of what you expected to be beautiful portraits and instead received blurry images with terrible lighting, the wrong hair color airbrushed on your kid's head and a 3D animated Yoda when you DAMN WELL that he's supposed to be A PUPPET, you'd be angry too.

*ahem*

Sorry, that slipped out.

So, what worries me is this.

Max Brooks.

Yes, Max Brooks.  Son of Mel Brooks and Anne Bancroft (which that alone would make anyone awesome enough to become their own renewable source of energy and power a small country), multifaceted man, and author of two of my favorite zombie related books, The Zombie Survival Guide (2003) and World War Z (2006).  If you haven't experienced the audio book of World War Z, you must.  Go.  Now!  I'll wait here.

What's wrong with Max?  Most of my nerd brethren already know where I'm going with this, so let's cut to the chase and do away with the small talk.

This is my problem.

Terrible movie.

Now, I will spare you *my* zombies-don't-run-or-scale-walls-pyramid-style rant, I will instead provide you with Max's own words.

"The 'walking' dead tend to move at a slouch or limp . . . . The fastest have been observed to move at a rate of barely 1 step per 1.5 seconds." 

-.-

Yes, I know, Max Brooks had nothing to do with the movie (a'la Stephen King and the criminal treatment of his books).  But that's kinda my point.  And, while I read all about his frustrations with the adaptation and his admittance that the film and book are completely different, I couldn't help but cringe when he actually admitted he liked the film in a USA Today interview.

So, was it a brilliant movie?  Hell no.  But it was a brilliant move for Brooks.  It all works in his favor.  If the movie is awesome the satisfied viewers will run out in droves to buy the book and all the movie related memorabilia.  If the movie is garbage (which it is) the disgruntled viewers will run out in droves to buy the book and all the book related memorabilia.  We live in a zombie hungry society, and I think he capitalized on that.  I'm not saying that he is the embodiment of Yogurt, Max is much better looking.

I understand that the aim to make money at our career, and this is career, but did he have to sell his soul?

We already have one George Lucas, we don't need two.  Although World War Z could use with a good George Lucasing (George Lucasing is when you take something that is done and warp it until it is practically unrecognizable).

Cinematically, the movie is bad, for a detailed list of many of the issues with World War Z, check out "Everything Wrong With World War Z in 6 Minutes or Less"