When it comes to “sequels that didn’t happen immediately after the first film came out, I would be lying if I said I thought Zombieland 2 would ever come into existence. And yet, that’s exactly what it looks like is happening, now that Sony Pictures has brought in screenwriter Dave Callaham in to rework the sequel’s script, which will be supervised by returning director Ruben Fleischer. Somebody get Woody Harrelson’s name on a contract immediately, and bring some Twinkies just to make sure.

Callaham broke into Hollywood by co-writing 2005’s video game adaptation Doom, not a film that many would slap on their business cards. He then went on to pen the first Expendables movie with Sylvester Stallone, which gives him a little bit of leeway in the world of over-the-top action movies. I think Zombieland counts as that, though the first film’s script from Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick is far more hilarious than anything in the Expendables franchise. (Let’s hope they do the same thing with Deadpool.) Callaham even got a story credit on Godzilla, alongside screenwriter Max Borenstein.

I think we’re at a point in cinema when the only thing worse than porn spoofs of films are the legitimate spoofs of films. Especially when it comes to horror parodies, which are seemingly the only ones still getting made. And now we’ve got what could potentially be the worst of the worst coming, as production company MNDFCK has recently cast Walking with the Dead, a send-up of — you guessed it — AMC’s The Walking Dead. I mean, it’ll probably still be better than The Walking Dead during its worst moments. Really, it sounds like it’ll be taking on all forms of zombie-related fiction, but I guess it’s smart to stick with what’s current as far as promoting this thing goes. Plus, adding hottie actress Jacqui Holland (My Best Friend’s Girl) can’t hurt.

Here’s how this zombified story will unfold: a group of survivors come together a month after the zombie apocalypse begins, and each is named after their favorite cities — Chicago, Green Bay, Brooklyn, and Harlem. (Obvious ties to Zombieland there.) One of them is a Sheriff who’s just awakened from a coma, his small-business owner 10-year-old son, and a zombie named Romeo who uses a lot of voiceover in his quest to get the others to realize he’s not really dead, just slow. The fearsome foursome are forced to vacate their mini-mall camp headquarters in order to seek out a more long-term safe zone. So it’s obvious Dawn of the Dead and Warm Bodies will also get skewered.

While this story isn’t really steeped in science fiction, or even tiptoeing in it, it’s winter weather during Thanksgiving, so our Giant Freakin’ Robot hearts are warming up to things that have a good message behind them, free from alien tyranny. You may recall the shoddy Amazon pilot for Zombieland that didn’t go beyond the single episode. Izabela Vidovic, the young girl who played Little Rock, wrote and produced the upcoming short film Because These Kids Are…, which shines a light on the problems that bullying causes with a unique way of tackling the issue.

Directed by Brian Patrick McGuire, the short follows Vidovic’s Kat, who watches a group of children hassle a young boy. Rather than run over and interject herself into their argument, she is inspired to draw the situation, which apparently makes the bully think twice about what he’s doing. Or maybe he beats her up and steals it. I can’t tell because it’s not out yet.

They say never bite the hand that feeds. But the opposite side of that is, you don’t feed somebody a home-cooked meal at first and then give them an artificially flavored freezer version of the same meal afterward, expecting everything to go by smoothly. Also, when the thing that is biting is a zombie, run!

When Amazon ordered a pilot for a Zombieland series, there were no throngs of fans cheering from the rooftops, and during its time on Amazon Prime, the roofs continued to be free of jubilance. As I said then, it wasn’t terrible or anything. It just wasn’t that great, even when you take the film out of the equation. Do you know how hard it is to take Woody Harrelson out of an equation? Anyway, viewers got to choose what pilots Amazon kept, and viewers did not put Zombieland near the top of that list.

Show co-creator Rhett Reese gave his theories about why this happened via his Twitter account, and quite surprisingly, he did not blame the writing. Here is his Tweet run-down:

Our Zombieland series will not be moving forward on Amazon. Sad for everyone involved…I’ll never understand the vehement hate the pilot received from die-hard Zombieland fans. You guys successfully hated it out of existence…Anyway, we did our best, and we’re very proud of our team.

Hahaha. He actually gave a pretty good jab that doesn’t sound too much like whining, and that’s something. There’s no point in kicking a guy while he’s down, and it’s impossible to teach a zombie to play “Taps” on a bugle, so everyone just say their farewells. Assuming one of the 200 other avenues of televised fiction doesn’t step in.

Last week, Amazon Studios released 14 TV pilots (eight comedies, six children’s shows) for viewers to watch for free on their website. The online retailer also gives viewers the ability to rate and vote for their favorites to see which shows will get picked up for production. One of the more popular selections was the TV adaptation of Zombieland, which was written and produced by the movie version’s screenwriters, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick.

Originally, Zombieland was supposed to be a TV series, but it was re-purposed as a full-length feature film for director Ruben Fleischer. While the critical and audience response to the TV version is mixed, it still has potential and could be fun to explore more of the world of Zombieland. The creators also tell MTV Geek that Amazon Studios has been a very good partner in bringing Zombieland to the small screen.

They say Amazon has been a good partner here, not restricting the original vision for the series or asking them to scale back the splatstick humor. At the same time, they say they don’t feel Zombieland is especially gory and that they’ve been deliberate in the way the zombie kills play out as comic instead of horrific beats. That extends to the show’s zombie rules which don’t follow the traditional zombie movie logic — we’ll see smarter and dumber zombies and most will simply die the way humans do. They’re infected, but the show won’t focus on the origins of the plague.

But in your streams, whatever they may be, stream a little stream of me. The Internet wasn’t exactly forthcoming with its science fiction releases this week, but there are a few options worthy of your time. Maybe this is the week when you finally start building those dinosaur birdhouses you always talked about.

Zombieland & Dark Minions (Amazon Instant)
These two series are one-offs in a big promotion Amazon Instant has that pits 14 pilots against each other, allowing viewers to vote on which ones make it to series. Two of the eight comedies happen to be sci-fi shows, and they both happen to vary wildly in quality. As we’ve covered both shows, it’s mainly worth noting that Zombieland awkwardly lives in the shadow of its feature-length predecessor, with a cast and script that don’t mesh well. Dark Minions, on the other hand, is an amusing stop-motion workplace comedy with a great cast and great jokes, but like Zombieland, it doesn’t leave a lot of room on where to go should it get picked up to series. But having a voice always counts, so watch both shows for free and get your vote in.