Day of the Dead

In an abandoned Florida town months into a zombie apocalypse so total that the surviving humans estimate they are outnumbered 400,000 to one, scientist Dr. Sarah Bowman, helicopter pilot John, and radio operator Bill McDermott search empty streets for any other survivors. They find none. They return to the underground missile silo that has become their home, shared with a small detachment of soldiers and the remaining members of Sarah's research team.

The silo is a tinderbox. Captain Rhodes — having succeeded the recently-deceased Major Cooper — runs the soldiers as a brutal authoritarian; he has no patience for the science wing and threatens any civilian who crosses him with summary execution. Dr. Logan, nicknamed 'Frankenstein' by the soldiers, is experimenting on captive zombies penned in the lower levels, attempting to demonstrate that they can be conditioned. One specimen, Bub, shows flickers of memory — saluting, holding a book, mouthing words at a Walkman. Logan rewards Bub by feeding him scraps of meat. Sarah eventually discovers that the meat is coming from soldiers Logan has been carving up — men Rhodes was told were killed by zombie attacks.

Sarah's boyfriend Miguel, already a paranoid mess, is bitten when a zombie-roundup operation goes wrong. Sarah amputates his arm to stop the infection. Miguel, broken and suicidal, later sabotages the silo: he rides the cargo elevator up to surface level and stands at the open gate as the surrounding horde pours in. The silo is overrun.

Rhodes loses his mind. He executes Logan personally, then guns down anyone trying to flee. He orders pilot John to take off without Sarah and McDermott; John refuses, and Rhodes is left alone with the advancing dead. Bub, having recovered a service pistol, recognizes Rhodes — the man who killed Logan, who fed him — and shoots him. Zombies tear Rhodes in half. He laughs hysterically as he is pulled in opposite directions, gasping 'choke on 'em!'

Sarah, John, and McDermott reach the helicopter and lift off, escaping the silo as the dead consume it. The final scene shows them on an empty tropical beach, Sarah marking off another day on a calendar — survival, for now, in a world that has ended around them.