9 Amazing Shows That Netflix Delivered This Year

Santa Clarita Diet (Season 1)

On the face of it, Victor Fresco’s Netflix comedy series, Santa Clarita Diet, is about one family’s attempts to adjust to Mom becoming a zombie. But – to quote Rose Tico in Star Wars: The Last Jedi – “Look closer.”

Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant star as married real estate agents Sheila and Joel Hammond. In the opening scene, their morning alarm rings, and we learn that Sheila’s notably more careful and considered in her actions than the spontaneous Joel. We meet their 17 year old daughter, Abby (Liv Hewson), who’s trying hard to spread her wings, and we catch a glimpse of the minor familial issues that generally fill their days. The Hammonds live in an idyllic property development, but are sandwiched between the family homes of two law enforcement officers – one from the Sheriff’s Department, and one from the local police – and these two men are evidently professional rivals.

During the first episode, Sheila disrupts a house viewing by spewing a phenomenal amount of vomit over the property, and seemingly dies on the bathroom floor. She immediately reawakens, though, and she and Joel must then get to grips with the fact that Sheila’s essentially a zombie and needs to eat. This is where most of the comedy lies – in the couple’s attempts, along with their daughter, to adjust to a new lifestyle in which Sheila has to kill people for food in order to ‘survive.’

But, this isn’t really a Zombie-Mom comedy. This is a show that’s layered and nuanced and deals with a range of very human issues through the metaphor of the Undead. It’s no accident that the series presents this family at this particular life-stage, where everything to which they’re accustomed is undergoing transformation. Both Sheila and Joel are in the throes of their own mid-life crises, and they’re fast approaching the time when their only child will be leaving the nest.

For this reason – while the whole cast delivers outstanding performances – it’s the character of Undead Sheila that’s ironically the beating heart of the show. She undergoes the most fundamental transformation, as her zombie self is entirely governed by her Id, as opposed to her head, as she previously was. This provides a portrait that’s at once heartwarming and heart-rending, of a woman dealing with the challenge of the ever-shifting role she plays in the lives of her family – and in particular, her child.

At the same time, Santa Clarita Diet effortlessly skewers all aspects of social attitudes and trends, as Undead Sheila slices through convention like a slab of fresh meat – from her response to a lecherous and sexually harassing colleague, to her renegotiation of her boundaries with Joel. This is perhaps most evident in her change of tactic with their Sheriff’s Department neighbour, who has no respect for boundaries at all. But the beauty of this aspect of the story is the way in which her most subtle changes do not appear in a vacuum, but rather lead to changes in Joel and Abby, too.