Expelled Grey Matter

George A. Romero gets most of the credit for Night of the Living Dead , pretty much because he directed it and carried on the series that everyone knows.  However, there were others involved, and one of them was producer John A. Russo.  When the original movie became a hit he and Romero differed on where the story should go and the two parted ways amicably, with Romero agreeing to left Russo using "Living Dead" for any movies he would do while future Romero ones would be "Dead".  Thus, Dawn of the Dead being the first sequel.   Russo wrote a screenplay for The Return of the Living Dead and adapted it into a novelization that was released in 1979.  Both a sequel to the first movie and to its book tie-in, it featured a world 10 years past the events of the original story and another small town dealing with a resurgence of whatever it was that woke the dead in the first place.  When Dan O'Bannon got involved he thought the story too bleak and decided to ...

One simple mistake - not properly applying a copyright notice to Night of the Living Dead  - hamstrung George A. Romero throughout his career.  I'm sure he still would not have been handed huge budgets to do what he wanted but, with the ongoing success of that movie, it wouldn't have mattered as much.  There was also some unnecessary waywardness in his first couple films following his debut, and I don't think he had a clear vision on where to go with his series until he made Dawn of the Dead , but we may have been able to see a real end to his Living Dead saga.  As it stands Land of the Dead is the true finale, with Diary of the Dead and Survival of the Dead being asides that happen concurrent with the events of the first two films.  This is not the ending that Romero desired; that is in the Living Dead  novelization, which was completed after his death.  This is more a continuation of Day of the Dead , incorporating elements that had to be left out o...