basic info

In The Flesh is a Sci-Fi/Fantasy/Horror hour-long drama, currently broadcast on BBC Three in the UK and BBC America in the United States. It was created and written by Dominic Mitchell, directed by Jonny Campbell, produced by Ann Harrison-Baxter, and stars Luke Newberry as the protagonist, Kieren Walker. The show began airing on BBC Three on March 17th, 2013, with the first series containing three episodes. The second series premiered on BBC Three on May 4th, 2014, and takes place several months after the events of the first series. The second series was given an extended run, containing a total of six episodes. In early 2014, the show won a BAFTA for its first series.

premise

The show is set in the fictional town of Roarton, Lancashire, and takes place four years after the events of The Rising (which occurred in 2009). During The Rising, anyone who died within that past year in England was reanimated as a stereotypical zombie; i.e., a flesh-eating monster without any form of a working mind. Roughly 140,000 zombies rose during this time, meaning England's primary concern was the large cities, leaving small villages such as Roarton with no help or defense. Because of this, Bill Macy, a citizen of the town, founded the Human Volunteer Force, commonly called the HVF, to patrol through the town and kill any zombies they saw. Zombies were also hunted down by armed militias in the large cities. This time was known as The Pale Wars.

Eventually, scientists developed a medication that brought back the minds of the zombies, letting their brains reset to how they were before they rose. This medication, however, would not bring them back to life, and was not a perfect cure; it merely returned their consciousness. All zombies that were not killed were rounded up and brought to a facility to be treated. Once treated, they were sent to their homes from before the rising, armed with cover-up, contact lenses, and medication to be taken every day on a precisely timed schedule. They were dubbed Partially Deceased Syndrome sufferers, or PDS sufferers for short. Unfortunately, many suffered scraps of memories from when they were in their untreated state, and felt immense guilt and trauma at what they did when rabid.

main story

The show centers around the protagonist, Kieren Walker, who rose out of the grave in 2009. It also focuses much on his best friend, Amy Dyer, and his relationships with his parents, Sue and Steve, and his sister, Jem, who was a member of the HVF during The Pale Wars. Much of the show is about the discrimination directed towards Kieren and the other PDS sufferers in Roarton, and how zombies and the different ways they are treated on the show are used as symbols for real-world issues, such as racism, homophobia, dehumanization, segregation, oppression, power imbalance, self-hatred, and others. One of the show's main themes is about accepting and loving yourself for who you truly are, and not hiding behind a mask for the comfort of other people.