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‘Walking Dead’ stars to appear at NJ convention

If you don’t live in New Jersey, you may be unfamiliar with Monster-Mania Con. It’s a semi-annual horror convention that takes place in Cherry Hill (there are also Monster-Mania Cons held in Maryland). It typically features stars from the genre, so if you don’t know many of these low-budget slasher films, then you might be a little lost.

I’m not the biggest fan of these types of films, but something definitely piqued my interest when I saw who is coming to Jersey on March 11-13.

Three of the stars from AMC’s The Walking Dead television series will make appearances, and if you’re not into The Walking Dead, get yourself a time machine and go back to Halloween 2010. That is when this magnificent zombie TV series first premiered. I know what you’re saying: Zombies? Really?

The answer is yes, really. The Walking Dead is not only one of the bloodiest TV shows in history, it could be one of the best as well (the jury is still out on exactly where it will fall in the annals of television history). It’s based on the hugely successful comic book series by Robert Kirkman, a man I was lucky enough to meet at New York Comic Con in 2010.

It focuses on a small-town police officer by the name of Rick Grimes, played by the excellent Andrew Lincoln. He’s shot in a crazy shootout and enters a coma in the first few minutes of the series. When he wakes up, he’s alone in a hospital bed, hooked up to IVs and wondering what happened. There isn’t a soul in sight — that is, except the zombies knocking on the door. While he was out cold, something happened, and now all of humanity is either dead, dying or walking dead (meaning a zombie).

The first season only lasted six episodes, but AMC already has the gears rolling on season two. Plus the comic book is still pumping out issues. I also hear there is a video game in the works.

The three stars at Monster-Mania Con: Laurie Holden, Jon Bernthal and Emma Bell (who made our spine tingle in the underrated thriller Frozen). Also at the convention: Nick Castle, the original “Shape” from Halloween, plus some actors from The Last Starfighter and classic sci-fi flicks.

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com

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John Soltes

John Soltes is an award-winning journalist. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Earth Island Journal, The Hollywood Reporter, New Jersey Monthly and at Time.com, among other publications. E-mail him at john@hollywoodsoapbox.com

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