Thriller Dance AI: One Photo, and Your Cat or Dog Leads the Halloween Zombie Dance

A full moon over a foggy graveyard, jack-o'-lanterns glowing along a wet stone path. A corgi stands up on its hind legs in a red leather jacket and red trousers and stretches both paws straight out in front, zombie style. A kitten in a skeleton suit dances on its left, another hides under a white ghost sheet behind it, and the three of them swing their arms, shuffle sideways, drop into a deep bow and pop back up together.

That is the pet version of the Thriller dance, and it is all over October. This post covers how it took off, what actually happens in those 15 seconds, and how to put your own cat or dog in the middle spot with a single photo.

Why does the Thriller dance come back every October?

The Thriller dance is probably the most famous zombie dance there is: arms stretched forward, fingers curled into claws, shoulders jerking as you shuffle sideways. Every October it shows up again at schools, offices and street flash mobs. Searches for it jump several times over during the month and go quiet again once Halloween is over, year after year.

This year the version going around is a short one, a dozen seconds or so: sway, reach out, shuffle, show the claws, then a deep bow and a jump back up. Right behind it came the kitten version, with a kitten in a red jacket leading and a skeleton kitten and a ghost kitten dancing backup. It is hard to watch and not think: what if that were my cat?

That is exactly what our Thriller Dance template does. Upload one photo of your pet and it puts on the red jacket and leads the two costumed kittens through the whole Thriller dance.

What happens in the 15 seconds

The setting never changes: a foggy graveyard at night under a full moon, crooked tombstones, bare trees and jack-o'-lanterns lining a wet stone path. Your pet stands in the middle, the skeleton kitten on the left and the ghost kitten behind on the right. One continuous shot, 15 seconds, vertical.

Here is roughly how it goes. For the first four seconds the three of them sway and open their arms. Around second five they turn sideways, stretch both arms straight out in the classic zombie pose and shuffle a few steps. Near second eight they turn the other way and raise their claws overhead. Second twelve is the big moment: all three bend all the way down into a deep bow, faces almost on the ground. At thirteen they spring back up and finish with their claws out.

Five moments of a corgi doing the Thriller dance: swaying with open arms, reaching sideways like a zombie, turning with claws raised, all three in a deep bow, springing back up with claws out

And in motion. The animations in this post are silent and shortened; the real clip runs the full fifteen seconds.

A corgi in a red leather jacket reaches both paws out sideways in a moonlit graveyard, shuffling along with the skeleton kitten and the ghost kitten

Which photo works best

The template needs one photo, and cats, dogs or any other furry friend all work:

A sharp face in good light. The lead dancer's face comes from your photo. If the photo is blurry, so is the dancer.
The whole body, if you can. The camera shows the dancer head to toe, fur, markings, legs and tail included, so a full-body shot helps a lot.
One subject per photo. Two pets in one photo, or a pet and a person, and the template can't tell who is supposed to dance.
Any outfit is fine. The costume is always the red leather jacket and red trousers, so whatever is in your photo gets swapped out.

Pets keep their own face, fur colour and markings, stand up on their hind legs and dance with round furry paws. The background of your photo never comes along: the setting is always the same moonlit graveyard, so anyone can tell it's the same trend.

Photos and results side by side: a corgi, a ragdoll cat, a woman in a yellow cardigan and a golden retriever, each one wearing the red leather jacket next to the jack-o'-lanterns and the ghost kitten in the row below

Pick "Person" and you become a big-head chibi

Want to dance it yourself? Switch from "Pet" to "Person" and upload a photo of yourself. You keep your face, hair and expression and step into the middle spot in the same red jacket.

One thing may not be what you expect. You don't stand there at full human height between two kittens. You shrink to about their size while your head stays the same, so you come out as a big-head chibi. The first time we saw it we thought something had gone wrong. A few more viewings and it became our favourite version in the whole template: a tiny person with a big head doing the Thriller dance in a graveyard with total commitment, more expressive than any of the pets. So we kept it.

A small detail: the clothes change, but not all of them. The woman above lost her yellow cardigan and black trousers to red leather, yet kept the white T-shirt underneath and her black loafers.

A big-head chibi woman with blonde hair in a red leather jacket bows deeply in the graveyard with the skeleton kitten and the ghost kitten, then springs back up laughing with her claws out

Make your Thriller dance video with ZOOOP

Open the Thriller Dance template and upload one photo of your pet (or of yourself).
Keep "Pet" for a pet, or pick "Person" if the photo shows a person. Keep 480p, or pick 720p if you want it sharper.
Hit generate and download the clip.

No prompt, no editing. The graveyard, the jack-o'-lanterns, the two backup kittens and every step are already set up.

What surprised us while building the template

During the bow, all you see is the back of their heads. The deep bow at second twelve of the Thriller dance goes all the way down. The corgi is just the top of a head and two ears, the golden retriever is a pile of golden fur, and the woman's long hair falls straight onto the stones. As a still frame, your friends probably won't recognise who it is. In motion it's the funniest second of the clip.

All four leads in the deep bow at the same moment: the corgi, the ragdoll, the blonde woman and the golden retriever with their heads down at the ground, only the tops of their heads and backs showing

The backup dancers are always the same two kittens. Only the middle spot changes. The skeleton kitten and the ghost kitten are the same pair in every clip, with exactly the same moves, so your pet is the only new face on stage and nobody has to ask who the star is.

Tails sneak out on their own. The ragdoll's big fluffy tail hangs down behind the red trousers to the ground, and the golden retriever's tail swings out from behind when it turns. Nobody asked for tails, but they stay, and they make it obvious a real pet is dancing.

Pets dance a little differently every time. People come out looking much the same from run to run. Pets vary more: now and then the face isn't quite right, or a step looks a bit sloppy. If you don't like one, generate it again; the second one is usually the keeper.

More ways to play

Got a cat and a dog? Make one each, post them back to back and let everyone vote on whose zombie shuffle is better. Or make a big-head chibi of yourself with "Person" and pair it with your pet's version for a Halloween double feature. For more seasonal ideas, browse our Halloween templates, and the pet ones all live in AI pet video templates. Every photo-to-video idea is in the template library, and if you'd rather write your own scene from scratch, start with AI video generation.

One photo, one red jacket, one moonlit graveyard. Before Halloween arrives, let your furry friend lead the Thriller dance with the Thriller Dance template.