In the first episode, we watch the oddly mundane reactions that our reality TV crew have as the zombie plague starts spreading. At first, they're just seeing it broadcast on the news as "rioting," and because they're in their studio bubble nobody is quite sure what's going on. The main thing they're worried about is that their giant Big Brother Reunion special might get bumped for the news. There are a series of incredibly funny and dark scenes where we watch news reports about deadly mayhem spreading, and zombies start slaughtering people in the crowd outside the studio, while the clueless producers and hosts wail about getting airtime.

Once the zombies take over, though, the show really starts to move. Not because the zombies are fast — which they are, 28 Days Later-style — but because we zero in on what the point of this angry little series really is. Especially when the only people left alive are the reality TV stars on the locked set, slowly melting down as they realize Big Brother isn't watching them anymore. The only ones watching are growling, gore-soaked zombies. Fittingly, reality TV has become ground zero of the zombie invasion, as well as the one place that's already so zombified that it can withstand the rotting onslaught.

Written by Charlie Brooker, who worked on the utterly mental comedy series Brasseye, Dead Set is both genuinely terrifying as well as spot-on satire. It's also produced by E4, makers of Big Brother, who loaned out the sets for the guts-spattering. That the creators were able to use the Big Brother sets turns Dead Set into as much of a cogent allegory as George Romero's late 1970s Dawn of the Dead, famously filmed in a giant suburban mall.

Come to get a vicarious thrill out of watching vacuous reality TV starlets eaten alive, and stay for a social satire of media cannibal culture that cuts right to the bone.

Dead Set's five episodes will air nightly at 10 PM all this week in the UK. If you are in the UK, you can catch past episodes streaming on the show's website. Those of us who live elsewhere will have to wait for the DVD or watch it on the intertubes.

Official Dead Set Site [via E4]

Written by UK Guardian columnist and media critic Charlie Brooker, the show will be mostly zombie horror but its setting obviously gives it a satiric edge to it. According to the Guardian:

It is understood that in Dead Set, the Big Brother house becomes one of the last places where people can shelter from the zombies . . . the contestants in the Big Brother house are unaware of the massacre going on outside. [It's] described as being like cult US show 24 "but with zombies."

Big Brother has always had a bit of a science fictional feel to it — the show is named after the dictator in George Orwell's 1984, after all, and the new Doctor Who paid homage to the show during its first season. The show will be directed by Yann Demange, who recently worked on Diary of a Call Girl with Doctor Who alum Billie Piper. The show, which will span six episodes, is set to air on the E4 digital channel later this year. Hopefully, more details to come on Monday, after the creators make some announcements at the MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival and at the Film4 FrightFest.

Charlie Brooker's E4 Zombie Thriller [UK Guardian]