The Return of the Living Dead 4K (1985)

 

One of the best zombie movies of all time is getting a 4K release from Arrow Films in both UHD and Blu-ray editions, with two discs in each set.

In the years running up to the release of both RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD and George A Romero's DAY OF THE DEAD (also 1985) the movie press had been full of speculation about how Romero and his NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD co-writer John Russo would separately take  things forward, as the two of them had both retained the legal right to make sequels to the 1969 film. A 'tie-in' paperback, written by Russo, had even hit US and UK bookshops with mention that 'A sequel film will be released soon' on the cover, even though the plot of the eventual RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD movie bore little relation to it.

Full credit, then, to writer-director Dan O'Bannon who solved the tricky legal problem of 'How do you do a sequel to NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD without it feeling it could be in the same universe as DAWN OF THE DEAD (1978)?'. He did it very cleverly, too, slyly suggesting, with a twinkle in his eye that RETURN was set in the 'real' world and giving the film a punky, bouncy aesthetic that felt very different to Romero's sequels but somehow also managed to squeeze a little bit of satire in amongst all the fun. 

Arrow's 4K transfer looks far more vivid than any previous version, but if you are an ROTLD obsessive be warned that the music track Deadbeat Dance by The Damned is still removed due to rights issues. Obsessives will also want to know that the tarman's voice is still the redubbed version, as is the voice of the confederate soldier who asks them to 'send more cops'. Also, a curious music edit sees Roky Erikson's Burn the Flames cutting out much earlier than in previous versions so you are just left with Frank's unaccompanied scream. 

        Extras include four commentary tracks ported over from the previous Shout Factory release - Dan O'Bannon and production designer William Stout; Stout and the cast; actors Thom Mathews and John Philbin with FX artist Tony Gardner; and a fan track by Gary Smart and Chris Griffiths.

Other extras are essentially archival from the Shout Factory double disc Blu-ray set from 2016, including an interview with Russo (15 minutes), a featurette on the effects (33 minutes), a making of (21 minutes), location tour (10 minutes), designing the dead (14 minutes), a piece about 1980s horror classics (24 minutes) and a featurette on the film's soundtrack (30 minutes). Talking of the soundtrack, why has nobody interviewed (or even mentioned) British composer Francis Haines who provides the memorable main title music ('The Trioxin Theme')? This is a man who has done everything from SPLIT SECOND to CBeebies, and the story behind The Trioxin Theme itself is surely worthy of a featurette, originating as it did from a Dungeons and Dragons cassette tape ('The First Quest') that was then revamped for the movie.

Arrow's set comes with a second Blu-ray disc in both editions featuring the two hour long documentary More Brains which tells you all you need to know about the film (apart from what I've mentioned above about the soundtrack). This disc also comes with Dan O'Bannon's final interview (29 minutes), 15 minutes of deleted scenes from the documentary, a 10 minute location tour and ROTLD in 3 minutes from the interviewed cast members. The set comes with a reversible sleeve (no Graham Humphreys artwork, by the way) double sided poster and a booklet with new writing on the film.

Dan O'Bannon's THE RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD is out from Arrow on 4K in a two disc set (either UHD and Blu-ray or two Blu-rays) on Monday 13th October 2025