WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Army of the Dead, now in theaters and streaming on Netflix.
Though it first seems to be a fairly typical zombie flick, Army of the Dead has several layers which may reveal something more original under the hood. Part of this stems from its heist premise, which has a group trying to get away with a load of cash while operating under the threat of undead zombies. However, the nature of those zombies makes the movie and its planned continuations even more interesting. Some of them are clearly more than undead flesh, suggesting that they and their creators have alien origins. Here's a look into the film's robotic zombies and how they tie into the movie's wildest fan theories.
What are Robot Zombies?
Army of the Dead's zombies seems to be biological, with the plague in the Las Vegas area stemming from a sort of Patient Zero released from containment. That seemingly categorizes all zombies as former humans (and animals), quickly explaining their origins. However, several scenes show that some of the undead are robotic, or at least more mechanical than initially assumed. This ties back to one of Zack Snyder's more overlooked interviews, where he dives deeper into where the zombies come from.
"I really wanted this sort of weird ambiguity to their origins -- which, of course, we'll explore in [Army of the Dead: Lost Vegas]. And without giving away too much... if you pay close attention, there's a number of zombies that are clearly not zombies. You see normal zombies, and then you see some robot zombies. Are they monitors that the government has placed among the zombies to monitor them? Are they technology from the other world? What's happening there?" Snyder said.
This begs the further question of what exactly these "robot zombies" are and how they operate. They may be cyborgs that have fused technology with detritus-ridden flesh. On the other hand, they could be androids like the Terminator, designed to merely look like and blend in with Zeus' zombies. If they're either of these, questions remain about how they die and possess the same powers and threat level as the organic zombies. The most important question, however, is who designed them and what purpose they serve in the grand scheme of things beyond Las Vegas.
Alien Nanotech Theory
It'd be a bit strange to conceive that robotic zombies are man-made. Considering a zombie threat would be significantly lessened if mankind could simply build robotic facsimiles to potentially combat them. This also makes sending a team for the real or fabricated mission of recovering money from a vault/retrieving biological zombie material particularly pointless. One of these robotic zombie drones could simply be used for either goal.
One likely explanation is that the technology behind the zombies, namely their robotic counterparts, is alien in origin. This might seem a stretch at first, but note some of Snyder's own words. He mentions technology from the "other world," which immediately brings to mind an extraterrestrial civilization. There's also the fact that Hanada is at one point referred to as a puppet master. This could hint that he's from this other world or civilization and aims to use the zombies, robotic or otherwise, for nefarious plans against humanity.
It may involve the obvious goal of killing off mankind, but it could also entail using the zombie virus, which may be related to nanotechnology, to turn the human race into a more savage and malleable species. This way, humanity and planet Earth would be much easier to conquer. The potential nanotechnology likely also has some sort of kill switch that would destroy those infected whenever the puppet masters desired.
There's also the suggested connection between Army of the Dead and time travel, which could involve the team being sent back multiple times to stop a complete alien take-over of the planet. These theories all seem fairly far-fetched, but given the fact that Snyder feeds into them, there's likely something there for the prequel and sequel to tackle.
Directed and co-written by Zack Snyder, Army of the Dead stars Dave Bautista, Garret Dillahunt, Ella Purnell, Omari Hardwick, Raul Castillo, Tig Notaro, Theo Rossi, Matthias Schweighöfer and Ana de la Reguera. The film is now streaming on Netflix.