If you’re a goalie playing in a city with iconic landmarks or history, things can get a little predictable. Oh, look, the Statue of Liberty on Henrik Lundqvist’s mask. Oh, hey, is that the U.S. Capitol on a Washington Capitals’ mask?!

Philadelphia is ripe for the same kind of clichés: The Liberty Bell, the ‘Rocky’ statue, the cradle of U.S. democracy stuff. That’s why goalie Steve Mason deserves all the cheesesteaks and Victory beer he can ingest for his new mask for the Philadelphia Flyers, featuring … zombies. America’s Founding Fathers (and Betsy Ross) … as zombies.

Brilliant.

These images were provided by Anthony SanFilippo, the Flyers’ in-house beat writer. The mask was created by Franny Drummond, who runs PaintZoo, who worked with Mason on the theme:

"He said, 'I want horror, but without a horror movie,' " Drummond told NHL.com. "He [Mason] said, ‘why don't we do Ben Franklin as a zombie,’ [and] I said, ‘I guess we could do it.’ I said I'll do sketches, over the summer we'll go back and forth over design work, and this is basically what I came up with. Betsy Ross, any historical figures, and taking it and making it into a zombie apocalypse that hit Philadelphia in 1776." … "We have the logo, and it's going to be like she [Ross] stitched it to the mask," Drummond said. "Ben Franklin, him with the key, he's kind of giving the key to the city. Just weird stuff. He loves stitches. We're going to keep that feel.

Here’s Betsy:

As you can see, it’s painted so it appears she’s stitching the Flyers logo to the top of the mask:

Along with zombie Ben Franklin and other Walking Dead American heroes, there’s a George Washington on the back of the lid:

It’s the undead $1 bill!

Of course, the greatest thing about this mask is probably the last thing that Mason and his artist considered, which is that the Flyers’ crease is the NHL’s preeminent goalie graveyard. Expect to see Steve Mason and Ray Emery staggering by moaning “brrrrrraaaaains…” by Summer 2014.