Image courtesy of izombie.wikia.com

I had taken a small break from the CW network after my fascination waned with The Vampire Diaries and The Originals. Other friends and family members tried to hook me with Flash and Arrow, though I guessed I’d been “meh” for so long that I wasn’t sure what would entice me to return to the network for entertainment outside of Netflix original shows.

Enter Liv Moore, Medical Examiner, who is undead but able to pass as living by eating the brains of the corpses that come to her autopsy table. Don’t eat brains enough? Or get really super upset? She goes into “Full On Zombie Mode”, a phrase I would probably make up too since I don’t think I’m all that original or punny. Eating brains regularly? She’s content. Sounds like a chemical dependency issue but with a public safety net built in with it.

Liv Moore in iZombie was an over-achiever doctor with a fabulous adorable fiancé who had her life all planned out, never strayed from her goals and direction, and was fierce in her passion for saving lives. After being convinced to let her hair down on a boat party with some friends, she unexpectedly is thrown in the middle of a zombie outbreak on the boat and is scratched while jumping into the water trying to escape. Thereby turning into a zombie herself and waking up in a body bag. She eats her first brain on the waterfront to the horror of the recovery team and they run, leaving her to feast and eventually realize self-awareness as a zombie.

But this show takes a turn most other zombie comedy-mysteries don’t, save for a couple projects here and there beginning with George Romero. The usage of memory to center the theme on what it means to be alive, and specifically to be human. Because when zombies eat brains, they not only ingest the proteins and enzymes needed to continue re-animating. They “become” the person who’s brain matter ingested, including memory and personality traits.

When Liv discovers this, she decides to team up with a detective, Clive, in the Homicide Division under the guise as a psychic who has visions. To him, she is quirky, unpredictable, and prone to position herself as a target for prime suspects. He, along with her now ex-fiancé, sister, mother, and brother, are unaware of her zombie-ness. Under this cover, she feels comfortable teaming with her boss in the M.E.’s office and morgue in solving crimes as a zombie, having a source for food at her disposal, and also finding answers for the not just the larger threats like a bigger outbreak looming or zombie hybrids wanting to profit and exploit the system for their own gain and vanity…but also exploring living-re-living other people’s desires, fears, secrets, motivations, loves, etc as a means of stepping outside the self-imposed box she created before she turned. iZombie is a Philosophy 101 course told in light-hearted contemporary fable minus the heavy handed Scrooge’s ghosts lessons: how can the dead teach us how to live?

I still need to watch Season 2. Looking forward to it though.