Netflix‘s new thriller Zero Day imagines the horror that would unfurl after a single cyberattack dismantled all of the computers in America at the same time. Hospitals are shut down, cars collide into each other, planes fall from the sky, and, most terrifyingly, fear takes over. The only man the country can trust to fix things is former President George Mullen (Robert De Niro), a bastion of truth and honor. Except, there’s a wrinkle…
**Spoilers for Zero Day, now streaming on Netflix**
By the end of Zero Day Episode 1, it’s clear that George can’t trust himself. He’s exhibiting multiple signs of dementia that he’s working ferociously to hide. At key moments in Zero Day, George is haunted by the chaotic din of the Sex Pistols song, “Who Killed Bambi?” It’s a refrain that stalks George’s psyche, popping up in moments of stress and appearing scrawled in his notes.
So why is George hearing “Who Killed Bambi?” What’s the significance of the Sex Pistols song in Zero Day? And why did the Netflix show use a punk song associated with a never-made movie scripted by Roger Ebert in the first place?
Here’s everything you need to know about “Who Killed Bambi?” in Zero Day…
What is the Meaning of “Who Killed Bambi?” in Zero Day?
Throughout all six episodes of Netflix’s Zero Day, Robert De Niro’s noble former President, George Mullen, keeps hearing the Sex Pistols song, “Who Killed Bambi?” We later learn there is a spoiler-y emotional significance to this song for George. In Zero Day Episode 4, George flashes back to the moment he discovered his son Nick (Jackson Eick) dead from a heroin overdose in the White House. Nick’s stereo is blasting â you guessed it â “Who Killed Bambi?” by the Sex Pistols.
But why did Zero Day choose this specific song to play over and over again in George Mullen’s head? Because Zero Day co-creators Eric Newman and Noah Oppenheim stumbled upon the song watching British documentarian Adam Curtis’s series, Can’t Get You Out of My Head: An Emotional History of the Modern World.
“‘Who Killed Bambi?’ features in that and when we heard it, we were like, ‘This is the perfect sort of freaky, bizarre, strange tune to be inside George Mullen’s head,” Noah Oppenheim told DECIDER.
“Who Killed Bambi?” has a fascinating history because it’s not only a Sex Pistols song, but the title of the punk rock band’s failed movie. Limited footage of the film exists, but you can read the screenplay, penned by none other than Roger Ebert, online.
“It was a great tool, that song, because it’s so iconic,” Zero Day director Lesli Linka Glatter said. “I think being in [George’s] point of view and seeing the world the way he sees it in that moment and how that changes was absolutely essential to the storytelling.”
It’s essential to the storytelling, but listening to the song over and over and over again could potentially grate on even the most enthusiastic punk fan.
“Well, I’m not playing the soundtrack every day now, let me put it that way,” Glatter said, with a smile.
“I think Bob got tired of it,” Eric Newman said, referencing Robert De Niro himself. “We never got tired of it. Bob definitely got tired.”
What’s Wrong With George Mullen in Zero Day?
For the first half of Zero Day, it seems fairly obvious that George Mullen is exhibiting signs of dementia. However, there’s a later twist that conveniently explains the leader’s hallucinations and memory loss.
George’s former mistress and loyal chief of staff Valerie (Connie Britton) remembers that the government was once developing a secret weapon called Proteus. At first, it seems Proteus could be what sparked Zero Day, however it’s not a cyber weapon. Instead, it’s a neurological one. Valerie’s theory is that George has been targeted by someone who now has access to Proteus.
The final episode of Zero Day leaves George’s prognosis ambiguous, but Eric Newman confirmed to DECIDER that George never had dementia. It was Proteus after all.
“When Noah and I were writing it, we made a decision that it was happening. That there was some kind of sonic microwave technology that was being used against him,” Newman said. “Whether we would confirm it or not in the show was undecided, but just for our purposes, we had sort of agreed yes, it’s happening.”
Newman went on to explain that while editing the show, he began to wonder if it had happened at all, joking he had “outfoxed” himself.
“That’s kind of the point of the show, the ambiguity of something that can be completely true and factual for two different people in a completely different way,” he said.
But George was indeed the victim of Proteus the whole time.
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