Dawn of the Dead (2004): 10 Things You Didn’t Know

Image from Universal

2. The zombie baby was originally going to kill its mother.

While I love Dawn of the Dead, I can understand some of the criticism related to the “zombie baby” scene. Personally, I thought that the moment of the birth— and the subsequent mental deterioration of Mekhi Pfeiffer’s character— was one of the more disturbing moments in horror I’ve ever witnessed. I guess psychological horror is what gets me the most.

Still, some fans just consider the idea of a zombie baby far too cheesy to take seriously, and that’s okay too. But maybe they’d feel better if they knew how that scene was originally scripted— it could have been a hell of a lot worse.

While the details of the original scene aren’t completely clear, it’s been said that the baby was going to kill its mother. The scene ended up being rewritten for being “too graphic”, which makes you wonder how exactly they were going to accomplish this. Would the baby be eating its way out of her stomach? That would’ve been awful.

Whatever the case may be, the scene was toned down, and the mother had simply died during childbirth. It wasn’t necessary (or slightly realistic, even for a zombie film) for the baby to be able to cause any significant damage. Those newborn gums aren’t going to be able to chew through anything.

Next: Dawn of the Dead 2?!