George A. Romero finds next zombie project, and it’s not “of the Dead”

George A. Romero is a horror icon few can compete with, and he knows one specific niche better than anyone: zombies.

His last few films have been “of the Dead,” be it Dawn, Day, Land, Diary or Survival, but now he’s dropping that phrase in favor of a new type of zombie project for his next film.

He’s going to be adapting THE ZOMBIE AUTOPSIES: SECRET NOTEBOOKS FROM THE APOCALYPSE, a book by Steven C. Schlozman, and it sounds different that most of his previous films, which I think might be a good thing at this point. He described a bit what he has in mind to io9. The story follows a man who studies the zombie disease in order to cure it, even while he’s infected with it himself.

“This is Steve’s story, not mine. It’s more like ‘The Andromeda Strain.’ It’s very tense and very medically correct. This guy’s a doctor, it’s all about being medically correct. I think about it like the first Hammer Frankenstein film, which was all about very graphic scenes of brains floating in blood and things like that. I want it to be perfectly accurate, almost shockingly so.”

“Medically accurate” and “zombies” aren’t usually two phrases that go hand in hand, but I’m certainly curious to see how Romero would execute this, and how different it would be from his usual films. Something to look forward to in the genre.