We’ve all heard the one about the deer with no eyes, but what do you call a deer with no soul? In The Walking Dead‘s latest episode, ‘Say Yes’, Rick Grimes had his back against a fairground ride, surrounded by zombies, and to escape the situation, he decided to shoot a nearby deer as a fresh-meat distraction. Only problem was, that deer looked like it had wandered straight out of Minecraft.
The glossy cervid in question was at the nadir of uncanny valley. It didn’t catch the light in the right way; it didn’t cast a realistic shadow, it didn’t fit cleanly into the 3D space it was meant to be occupying. It looked about as convincing as Donkey in Shrek. The result is totally jarring, especially considering there was a real-life deer in the second season of The Walking Dead. By comparison, this seventh season seems to be having weird budgeting issues – a lot of money seems to have been spent on making the zombies look as awesome as possible; deer, not so much.
Twitter’s reaction was strong, and there were many pisstakes. Pisstakes like this one:
Actual deer used in this weeks Walking Dead #cgifail #thewalkingdeaduk pic.twitter.com/sp5FUGScj6
— Colin Jellie (@Jelliewobbler) March 6, 2017
And this one:
The Walking Dead has always had cheesy CGI. But they just tried to pass this off as a live deer in tonight's episode: pic.twitter.com/c6bXZjZkAD
— Bryan Griffith (@Notorious_B_A_G) March 6, 2017
And these ones:
https://twitter.com/DingItTV/status/838879057517375490
I couldn't believe how realistic that CGI deer was on 'Dead' tonight. #WalkingDead #zombies #FearTheDeer pic.twitter.com/2kfXSrL4AS
— Sentient Cow Games (@sentient_cow) March 6, 2017
FX budget cut hard on #WalkingDead #walkingdeaduk #cgi #deer #minesbetter pic.twitter.com/3IQXmc1YVq
— Mark Rayman (@markrayman) March 6, 2017
Other fans couldn’t quite believe how cheap the show looked:
Did the walking dead go back to season one funding with CGI, Jesus that deer… #thewalkingdeaduk #TheWalkingDead pic.twitter.com/9diAA4z9wq
— Paul Edwards (@P_Edwards8) March 6, 2017
And some even thought they could have done a better job:
https://twitter.com/ope_aaron/status/838614629714653184
Deer oh deer.