Justice for the Dead: How iZombie Turned Death Into Insight

Zombies are a pop culture institution. In the 2010s, they experienced a boom on television, resulting in some of the medium’s biggest hits, like The Walking Dead (2010–2022) and some of its weirdest experiments, like Netflix’s horror-comedy The Santa Clarita Diet (2017–2018). In that same vein came iZombie, a supernatural procedural dramedy series that aired on The CW for five seasons. It was never a mega-hit by any means but gained a dedicated fan base thanks to its snappy dialogue, charming characters, and its effective mash-up of weekly crime procedural plots and monthly installments of zombie mythology.

The original iZombie comic was a Vertigo title by writer Chris Roberson and artist Michael Allred. The main character, a zombie named Gwen Dylan, was a gravedigger in Eugene, Oregon. Every 30 days, she must consume the brain of a recently deceased individual to retain her memories and cognitive function. Her best friends are a 1960s-era ghost named Doug and a were-terrier named Scott “Spot,” and the three of them deal with all sorts of supernatural menaces, from vampires to mummies. The showrunners of the series’ live-action adaptation were Rob Thomas and Diane Ruggiero-Wright, who drew on Allred and Roberson’s work for inspiration while essentially discarding everything else.

Rose McIver played the show’s hero, Liv Moore, a pre-med medical student in her last year before residency. Her life was turned upside down after being scratched by a zombie during a graduation boat party and left for dead in a body bag on the shore. The cause of the outbreak was later revealed to be a combination of a highly caffeinated energy drink called Max Rager and a batch of the designer drug Utopium laced with a zombie virus. Liv breaks off her engagement with her long-time boyfriend, Major (Robert Buckley), so as not to drag him down, moves away from her best friend Peyton (Aly Michalka), and gets a job at the medical examiner’s office so she can get her brain diet under control.

Liv’s boss, Ravi Chakrabarti (Rahul Kohli), soon realizes the truth about her situation. Ravi, a virologist fired from the CDC for mistakenly warning they should be preparing for a zombie virus, is enthralled by Liv and dedicates himself to coming up with a cure. She is also placed on the team with Detective Clive Babineaux (Malcolm Goodwin), who is convinced that Liv is psychic. The catch is that when Liv eats a brain, she not only receives flashes of the deceased individual’s memories, but also certain aspects of their personality, from as innocuous as a foreign language fluency to as inconvenient as a crippling phobia. More often than not, these brain dumps end up helping the police solve murder cases.

Brains, Villains, and the Characters We Can’t Forget

In any drama, there has to be a great villain, and iZombie has that in Blaine DeBeers, portrayed by David Anders. Blaine is the zombie who turned Liv during the boat party and who, as a result of her changed priorities, she has difficulty killing. He originally made his money dealing the tainted Utopium, but once the zombie outbreak becomes a city-wide emergency, he switches to trafficking brains to turn more people into zombies and create a new customer base for his brain-hungry clients. Blaine is a combination of charming and nefarious, and, though a villain, is often an ally to the team when it suits him and is constantly haunted by regrets and family problems.

Much of the humor in iZombie was in the details. Major’s last name is “Lillywhite.” Blaine runs a butchery called “Meat Cute” in season one, Ravi and Major get a dog they name “Minor,” and the zombie bar is called “The Scratching Post.” Fans also developed an appreciation for the show’s pun-heavy brain-inspired meals, from Liv’s takeout box mix of stir-fry, pizza roll, and hushpuppies to Blaine’s upscale medulla oblongata-stuffed gnocchi.

A rotating cast of eccentric characters became a highlight of the series. Jessica Harmon’s Dale Bozzio starts as an FBI investigator in season one and later becomes Clive’s partner. Bryce Hodgson has two starring roles: first as Scott E., a memorable mental hospital patient in season one, and later as his identical twin brother Don E., a brain collector in Blaine’s business. The show also includes one-off appearances that add flavor, such as Daran Norris as sleazy weatherman Johnny Frost or Steven Weber as Max Rager CEO Vaughan du Clark. Vaughan’s daughter Rita (Leanne Lapp) met a suitably gruesome end in the season two finale, killing herself after being “murdered” by her father in her rage at him turning into a zombie. She then ate Vaughan’s brains before being put down herself.

Arguably, the most consistently rewatchable part of the series is Liv’s rotating personas after she eats a brain. These range from the comedic (dominatrix, chain-smoking professor, conspiracy theorist, shirtless construction worker, and a brooding goth rocker) to the earnest (a lonely retiree, a kids’ basketball coach, and an emo dad). McIver is a versatile performer, and fans relished being able to spot a particular actor or actress being channeled in Liv’s next role, even if the results were sometimes meant for humor value only (Liv’s date with Lowell after eating the brain of a gay man or Liv, Blaine, and Don E. bonding over shared conspiracy theories after eating paranoia-inducing brains). Season two’s “Flight of the Living Dead” remains one of the series’ most popular episodes: Liv eating the brain of her free-spirited former sorority sister Holly (Tasya Teles), who is killed in a suspicious skydiving accident.