How Ian Ziering aced the Zombie Tidal Wave pitch with three simple words

The coast might be clear of that pesky Sharknado, but something else is washing up on SYFY.

Beware! It's a Zomie Tidal Wave, and producer/actor Ian Ziering and director Anthony C. Ferrante, the duo behind the Sharknado movies, are here to tell you all about it.

While speaking with SYFY WIRE recently, the duo revealed that they were tempted to fish out some references from the jaws of the Sharknado franchise, but wanted to make this upcoming undead day at the beach its own thing. No chainsaws. No teeth. Just a swarm of undead rising from a monster wave and bashing onto the sand.

“If I’m gonna pitch this to SYFY, it’s gotta be something they can’t say no to,” Ziering remembered.

Meaning, it couldn’t be your average zombie movie. And really, how can anyone say no when the first three words you tell an entire boardroom are "Zombie Tidal Wave?"

Ziering and Ferrante went through hordes of zombie movies to make sure they weren’t about to repeat something that had already been beaten to death with a baseball bat, a piece of furniture, a machete, a machine gun, and, yes, a chainsaw.

These are zombies you can’t kill — or at least, as the creators teased, zombies that can’t just go down in any way you’d expect. It isn’t The Walking Dead, where you can blast something’s head off. A severed head will still bite you, and a severed hand will still grab you.

But worry not, there's plenty of blood. In fact, Ferrante’s favorite thing in the world was shooting an ocean of fake blood.

We also found out the best drinking games to play along to Zombie Tidal Wave during its splashy debut on SYFY, Aug. 17 at 9 p.m. ET. But you'll have to watch the video to find out!

This article was contributed to by Elizabeth Rayne.