YMMV / The Return of the Living Dead

• Alternative Character Interpretation: Suicide is mean, short-tempered and argumentative with the rest of the gang, and it's implied that he's The Friend Nobody Likes who is only kept around because he has a car. But he's also the first to rush to Tina's defense when he hears her scream, showing that he's willing to put himself in danger to protect people.
  • Frank's suicide by cremation. Was he begging forgiveness for causing all the death and chaos that ensued due to his carelessness? His wife for leaving her all alone to a possibly grizzly fate? Or maybe in general for ultimately taking the "coward's way" out? All of the above? You decide.
  • Trash's attitude, she acts like The Lad-ette, talks about death (claiming it turns her on), and apparently strips off at the slightest provocation, but when it starts to rain and the dead start walking, all of it goes out the window, she is constantly screaming, crying and complaining, is scared out her mind, how much of her pre-outbreak personality is real, and how much was her trying to fit in, especially towards Suicide, who she seems to harbour at least sexual feelings for?
    • In Trash's defense, the chemical in the rain burnt the skin like acid, as discussed repeatedly, so of course naked Trash would get the worst of it.
• Awesome Music:
  • "Tonight (We Make Love Till We Die)" by SSQ and "Partytime" by 45 Grave.
  • The 2011 version of "Tonight" is also awesome! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUUW0Tht2IY
  • Also, the music in the opening credits and the Tarman scene.
• Best Known for the Fanservice: The first thing that comes up if you Google The Return of the Living Dead besides Tarman, are shots of Linnea Quigley dancing naked on a tomb.
• Common Knowledge: Despite the title, the movie was not created by George A. Romero but by John Russo, Romero's co-writer for Night of the Living Dead (1968). This confusion may be why pop culture erroneously remembers the Romero zombies as brain-eaters rather than flesh-eaters.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Tarman, who could be considered the mascot for the series as a whole. He is the only character that is occasionally ranked among the best horror villains, and most merchandise/memorabilia concerning the film is based around him.
  • Trash is also remembered fondly for obvious reasons.
• First Installment Wins: The first movie is by far more well known and respected than the other four.
• Genius Bonus:
  • When Ernie mentions the heart as being harder to incinerate than bones, he ain't kidding. Most notably, the hearts of Percy Bysshe Shelley and Thomas Hardy survived the fires that consumed their corpses.
  • Chemistry nuts will note the similarity of the name of the fictional "2,4,5-Trioxin" to the real 2,4,5-T. The similarity ends with the name, however: the real chemical is an herbicide/defoliant that was one of the two compounds used to make Agent Orange, and it does not reanimate the dead, it just makes things dead. The name of the fictional chemical is a Shout-Out to the real one, which was banned by both the US and Canada the same year this film was released (1985) due to its toxicity.
• Heartwarming Moments: When she's being stalked by the Tarman and screaming for help, Tina's friends do not hesitate to rush to her rescue when they hear her cries. Keep in mind that one of their names is Suicide.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: This movie's portrayal of Night of the Living Dead (1968) as a cover-up story for a real zombie attack gets funnier when one realizes that the later 1990 remake of Night of the Living Dead has Cooper taking a leaf from Ernie and Tina's book by hiding in the attic to escape the zombies.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "Watch your tongue boy, if you like this job!" "Like this job?"
  • "Braaaains!" This one is so famous that, for years, casual audiences incorrectly believed that zombies eating brains was a common trope outside this particular film series.
  • "I can feel myself rot!" This line has been sampled by countless Death Metal artists.
  • "Send... more... paramedics."
• Newer Than They Think: The concept of zombies craving human brains dates back to this movie, 17 years after the modern zombie genre was invented.
• Nightmare Fuel: Zombies are one thing... but bisected half-dogs barking and whimpering... brrrrr.
• Overshadowed by Controversy: The film has gained some negative attention in recent years due to Scuz’s actor, Brian Peck, being convicted for child molestation and serving a 15-month sentence before release.
• Special Effect Failure:
  • It's extremely brief, but when Frank rams the pickax into the yellow zombie's skull, you can tell that it's a dummy based on how motionless it is. Especially when you compare how the zombie was moving frantically in the scenes before and after.
  • Quite a few for Tarman. When his face is first revealed, if you look closely, you can tell that Allan Trautman's real mouth is painted black. Trautman himself has confirmed that the wiggling tongue in that one shot is his own. Also, the zombie's eyes are bit crossed as he's looking off to the right rather than directly at Tina. Later, when he eats Suicide, you can briefly see Trautman's teeth.
  • Production designer William Stout isn't proud of the skeleton that first emerges from the cemetery. It was an actual skeleton from a science center and he was confounded by the fact that a corpse buried for decades could emerge as almost perfectly white as it was presented in the final product. A wire had to be run through the spinal column and is partially visible when the jaws open.
  • If one eagled-eyed enough pays close attention to the shot of the nuke exploding, once the flash goes down enough to see the city again, the light can be seen briefly casting the shadows of the model skyscrapers against the backdrop intended to be the sky. Furthermore whilst the blast destroys the houses in the foreground the skyscrapers in the background are seemingly unaffected, none of their lights even going out.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: In spite of that one brief scene, the Tarman is amazingly done and moves as if it was an actual corpse.

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