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Zombieland hits theaters nationwide on October 2. If you’re not excited, you need to start getting excited. With Woody Harrelson leading an otherwise young but heavily talented cast against a world-spanning zombie infestation, the odds are with the film as much as they are against its characters. In honor of director Ruben Fleischer’s feature debut—and in preparation for the turn of the decade—I count down the 10 funniest, scariest, goriest, most compelling, most intelligent, and most entertaining zombie flicks to make a cinematic splash since 2000.

10. Versus (2000)

I defy you to find a weirder cinematic exposé of the undead than Versus, Japanese action helmer Ryuhei Kitamura’s opus, which chronicles a self-reincarnating prisoner’s fight against endless waves of living thugs and the “resurrected” versions of all those he’s killed. Strange? Yes. Cool? For the most part.

9. George A. Romero’s Land of the Dead (2005)

I’m sure you recognize the name George A. Romero. If you don’t, you should. The creator of the Living Dead trilogy (Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead), which has since become an anthology, Romero is widely considered the zombie genre’s master, and is essential to such—and all of cinema—for having introduced to it satire and strong political subtexts (the latter of which could be credited to filmmaker Jacques Tourneur). But what fun is a genius auteur if he or she only delivers three films? No matter here, for Romero continued—and continues—to offer worldwide audiences reels of gruesome, hilarious, and socially significant zombie fests. 2005’s Land of the Dead (followed by Diary of the Dead in ’08) was his last good one.

8. Fido (2006)

This ripe horror-comedy was inspired and influenced by Romero’s zombie omnibus as well as by Tourneur’s ’43 classic I Walked with a Zombie, according to director and co-writer Andrew Currie, who makes it easy to find parallels between his feature and the aforementioned ones. I’d say he chose good material to mimic. It certainly worked for Fido.

7. Planet Terror (2007)

Nobody does zombies like Quentin Tarantino. Actually, there’s no way to know that—he’s never made a zombie film. But Robert Rodriguez, who split Grindhouse features with Tarantino, made one that QT would happily call his own. Planet Terror (the partner picture of Death Proof) was everything of deep rose blood, ash-black comedy, superfluous schlock, gag-inducing grossness, and hair-erecting coolness. Yup, Tarantino would definitely love to lay claim to this one.

6. Dawn of the Dead (2004)

Zach Snyder’s remake of Romero’s 1978 classic bore witness to zombies’ evolution from slow, hardly functional corpses to fast, vicious flesh fiends. I’m not going to say I wasn’t aroused by the grotesque ascension of adrenaline and terror; I was. And you probably were, too. But while Snyder made aesthetic upgrades, he wasn’t able to fully recapture the subliminal voice of the original. Then again, what of the genre’s exercises since have? Only one. (It’s first on this list.)

5. Slither (2006)

Writer-director James Gunn took the horror satire genre for an uproarious spin in 2006 with Slither, one half an alien invasion, one half a zombie takeover—and TWO halves a heartwarming romance (awwww!). If you’re not howling with laughter throughout, you’re either: a) a slimy alien parasite; b) a brainless zombie; or c) a relative of the once undead (now dead-dead) deer extinguished by Officer Pardy (Nathan Fillion) in front of all of intellectual movie-going America.

4. 28 Weeks Later (2007)

Do you know how difficult it is to make a good zombie movie? (Neither do I, but it’s certainly not easy; and anyway, it was a rhetorical question.) A sequel? (Another rhetorical question—calm down.) How about a zombie movie sequel? (Shut your mouth, please.) Juan Carlos Fresnadillo knows: It’s a synch! …At least it appeared to be when he released this picture, which followed its predecessor in both sounding a political siren (this one regarding the current war in Iraq) and devouring the comfort of its viewers.

3. [REC] (2007)

This virtuoso Spanish shocker took a simple thought and groomed it to near perfection, finally exuding a level of efficiency matched only by its own cleverness and consequential scariness. An American remake, Quarantine, was released in 2008 to modest acclaim despite containing only a fraction of its forerunner’s charge. (That should give you an idea of how snappy [REC] is.)

2. Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Shaun of the Dead is an undeniable masterpiece of lampooning and genre homage, having referenced over two-dozen prior features spanning several genres. Among it’s most outstanding sources are works by Italian cult director Lucio Fulci, horror and sci-fi moguls John Carpenter and Ridley Scott, and—you guessed it!—George A. Romero. If its spoofs were all Shaun had to offer—and it offered them without losing any film value—it wouldn’t be any less a prodigious example of film and modern American and English culture. But it’s more than its riotous quips; and the only reason it doesn’t get additional credit for the rest of what it offers is because there’s no more credit to give it: It’s just about flawless.

1. 28 Days Later… (2002)

…Speaking of flawless.

Want more zombies? …Reread this list. Sorry, that’s the best I can do. But if you leave a message on the comment board below, I’ll tell you what the topic of the first list of October will be! (I’ll give you a hint: It’s a tribute to an upcoming Spike Jonze work.)