From the press release:
After 15 years away from directing, the indie filmmaker who turned $15,000 and home-video camcorders into the cult zombie hits “Deadlands: The Rising” and “Deadlands 2: Trapped” returns with a 100% self-aware, meta-comedy that weaponizes AI against the zombie genre, bad fan-film drama, and AI filmmaking itself.
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WHY AN AI FEATURE? (AND WHY IT TAKES THE STING OUT OF THE AI BACKLASH)
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Let’s address the elephant—or honey badger—in the room right away.
Most film fans and working artists hate the idea of AI movies. Honestly, I get it. When studios or lazy creators try to generate 100% photorealistic humans to replace real working actors, it’s uncanny, soulless, and steals work from the people who actually do this for a living.
That is the exact opposite of what we’re doing here.
Stoffel vs. The Living Dead is a 100% self-aware, tongue-in-cheek meta-comedy that uses AI as a satirical punchline rather than a replacement for human performers:
– Zero “Digital Clones” Replacing Working Actors: Even when human characters appear in the film, we are NOT chasing 100% photorealism to mimic real people. Every character—from Stoffel and his badger clan to the panicking soldiers and zombies—is rendered with a heightened, stylized “Pixar-meets-CGI” visual sheen (think R-rated Paddington meets Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness). Nobody is being tricked into thinking they’re watching real actors get replaced; it plays like an R-rated animated/live-action hybrid where real flesh-and-blood performers provide the voices, comedic timing, and soul.
– Full-Tilt Meta-Humor: This movie doesn’t hide behind AI—it actively roasts it. Stoffel knows he’s trapped inside a low-budget AI production. He breaks the fourth wall to call out rendering glitches, mock zombie-movie tropes, poke fun at my 15-year hiatus from directing, and even roast me directly on camera when I make a cameo appearance in a comically oversized military uniform.
– Paying Real Human Artists First: On an indie budget, nobody could ever train a million honey badgers to storm the Monroeville Mall or board C-130 cargo planes. By using AI strictly as our stylized creature shop (“Spaghetti Industries Digital”—a nod to our original Deadlands practical makeup crew) while paying a real screenwriter ($1,000–$5,000), a real film editor ($1,000–$2,000), and our returning Deadlands and Thug Life: All In The Game voice cast, we get maximum absurdity without taking a single gig away from working actors.
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THE STORY: JUST ANOTHER TUESDAY
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Stoffel vs. The Living Dead is every bit as absurd as the title sounds. This tongue-in-cheek, stylized AI feature takes the viral mythos of the infamous honey badger and drops him headfirst into the most unlikely event in history: a Zombie Apocalypse.
The Year is 2030. When the dead begin to rise across the United States—and ONLY the United States—society collapses overnight. On the brink of total defeat, the surviving U.S. military makes a bizarre scientific discovery: beyond a bullet or a destroyed brain, the undead have one primal weakness… They are terrified of honey badgers.
Because honey badgers aren’t native to North America, the Pentagon launches a last-ditch covert mission to recruit and import every badger they can find—starting with the undisputed legend of the species: Stoffel.
Tracked down in South Africa by General Daniel Glover, Stoffel has finally calmed down in his golden years—no longer escaping his enclosure to fight the neighboring lions, and living peacefully with his ride-or-die partner in crime, Hammie. At first, Stoffel waves the General off as an annoyance—until Glover pulls out the ultimate peace offering: Chinese eggrolls.
Over eggrolls, Stoffel learns three shocking facts:
1. America is a real place.
2. It is currently overrun by flesh-eating zombies.
3. Zombies are terrified of honey badgers—and if a badger gets bitten, scratched, or eats a zombie brain, the virus affects them just like cobra venom: all they need is a 20-minute nap before waking up completely fine.
With his ego inflated to the nth degree, Stoffel flies first-class to Washington, DC (with Hammie) to see the chaos firsthand. Standing on the top floor of the Pentagon, military brass try to explain the “apocalypse” to him until they walk him to the window—just in time to watch a military APC careen out of control, smash into a wrecked semi-truck, flip over, and get swarmed by zombies. Stoffel presses his wet nose against the glass and deadpans: “Oh, you mean that… yeah, got it.”
While the Pentagon wants to use badgers to clear small safe zones, Stoffel and his clan of self-aware chaos agents treat the undead like a cross-country sport and an all-you-can-eat buffet. Still, zombie brains aren’t the real payday. When General Glover reveals that the Florida Everglades are overrun with invasive venomous snakes dumped by irresponsible pet owners—and offers to immigrate the entire global honey badger population into Florida (where badgers and alligators get along just fine)—Stoffel strikes the ultimate deal.
Can humanity be saved? Will Stoffel and his fighting badger clan claim the ultimate prize—FLORIDA—or is America toast?
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MEET THE CLAN & CAST
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– STOFFEL: Our hero—part Deadpool, part Garfield, 1000% chaos. Self-aware and sarcastic, Stoffel knows he’s starring in an absurd AI movie directed by a low-budget indie filmmaker out of the DC suburbs who made cult zombie, vampire, and urban gangster movies in the mid-2000s for under $15,000. He regularly breaks the fourth wall to roast AI glitches and questions why the director even staged the scene he’s standing in.
– HAMMIE: Stoffel’s girlfriend and ride-or-die partner in crime. A legend in her own right with the exact no-nonsense attitude of Frozone’s wife—she sticks by her man, as long as she gets first-class accommodations.
– GENERAL DANIEL GLOVER: U.S. military brass tasked with eradicating the zombie problem and convincing an army of sarcastic badgers to fight for humanity (loosely based on Col. Glover from 1985’s Return of the Living Dead).
– LUCKY (Voiced by Micaiah Jones): A South African honey badger modeled after Eazy-E—complete with dark sunglasses, a black cap, and Jheri curls. Unlike the rest of the badger army dreaming of venomous snakes in the Florida Everglades, Lucky is a die-hard N.W.A. fan whose only goal in the apocalypse is relocating to Compton, California. Voiced by actor Micaiah Jones, reprising his fan-favorite role of Lucky from Gary Ugarek’s 2012 indie drama “Thug Life: All In The Game.”
– FRANCINE (“FRAN”): A tough, exhausted single mama badger brought along for the fight—armed with a blood-splattered gingham apron, a rolling pin, and zero patience (a proud nod to Gaylen Ross’s hero in George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead).
– THE CUBS — BURT, ERNEST & FRANCIS: Francine’s three off-the-chain cubs whose personalities channel Frank, Burt, and Ernie from 1985’s Return of the Living Dead—constantly finding trouble that leads to harrowing situations (especially Francis, who prefers riding on top of his mother’s head mid-zombie-fight).
– GEORGE: A bespectacled badger auteur wearing thick prescription square glasses modeled after George A. Romero in his later years, complete with a suspiciously strong fondness for shopping malls—even turning a zombie sweep of Pittsburgh’s Monroeville Mall into a chaotic film shoot.
