Tear Jerker / The Return of the Living Dead

• Seeing Tina, a lovable sweetheart, be the most afraid and endangered throughout the movie is enough to affect anyone with a caring heart. Especially during the Tar Man scene, where she's alone and defenseless.
• Frank's suicide. The earnestness and sincerity of the scene come from out of nowhere for some Mood Whiplash, as he kisses his wedding ring, prays for forgiveness then gets in the crematorium oven to kill himself before he can turn.
• A scared Casey looks for comfort while trapped in the warehouse with Chuck. Seeing the normally snarky and party-obsessed Casey near tears and terrified tugs at the tear ducts.
  Casey: Chuck, I never did like you... oh, but God, hold me tight.
  (Chuck does so)
• After kidnapping a zombie woman, the group strap her torn in half body to a chair and ask her why she eats brains, to which she reveals with clear sadness that the zombies fully realize the horror of what they're doing, but that they do it because their bodies rotting is extremely painful, and eating brains is the only way to temporarily stop it.
• Freddy's inability to stave off his zombie transformation is both funny and sad.
  "See? And now you made me hurt myself again! You made me break my hand completely off this time, Tina! But I don't care, Darlin', because I love you, and you've got to let me EAT YOUR BRAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIINS!"
  • The line would be even more funny, but Tina's real anguish and sobbing make the line more pathetic and sad than hysterical.
  • Their interactions as the trioxin progresses are nothing less than heartwrenching. Just Freddy's whimpering as he describes the rigor mortis affecting his muscles really sells the pain he's in. And of course, Tina is able to do nothing but futilely comfort him as he turns while crying her eyes out.
• Spider's breakdown upon Freddy's change is kind of funny, but still. The guy witnessed at least two of his friends get their brains munched, saw another slowly turn into a monster who then tried to do the same to Tina. If you listen good, he even briefly apologizes to Tina before going on to rant about how horrifyingly fucked up Freddy's face looked. Ernie's smacking him and saying that Freddy isn't his friend anymore doesn't help before he tries to shut up the female half-corpse on the table screaming about brains. He's only snapped out of it when Freddy is heard breaking out of the chapel and he has to suck it up.
• The ending, full-stop.
  • Tina and Ernie are the last survivors stuck in the chapel with Zombie Freddy, after Burt and Spider are forced to abandon them. They’re barely able to barricade themselves in the attic, given that there’s hardly anything available to keep Freddy from getting to them. Seemingly accepting what will inevitably happen, Ernie anxiously prepares to shoot Tina to spare her the agony of being eaten by her beloved boyfriend.
  • Even Tarman earns some sympathy when Burt decapitates him with a baseball belt, and he belts out an anguished wail that sounds like an unsettling mixture of screaming and sobbing.
  • Burt’s final attempt at calling the cops. When he’s on the phone talking to the police sergeant — his tone of voice is noticeably more desperate and fearful than he’s ever sounded up to this point. To twist the knife further, when he hears the police being mauled by the zombies, all he can do is close his eyes and hang his head in despair. However, he immediately pulls himself together upon noticing the number stenciled on the tank. He manages to get ahold of Colonel Glover and inform him of all the chaos. Though it momentarily seems that Burt’s call to Glover has saved the day, Spider is rightfully skeptical of what Glover is about to do. Needless to say, Glover orders a nuclear strike on the town, effectively killing all of the heroes.