Please share your thoughts on ZOMBIES

[teenagebambam]

I've been trying to gear myself up to watch the new tv show "The Walking Dead", because I've heard such great things about the comic series it's based on, and because I need something to feed my "Mad Men" addiction on Sunday nights. This despite the fact that I seem to be REALLY REALLY terrified of zombies at a primordial level. (After seeing the new "Dawn of the Dead" - albeit during a period when I was suffering regular panic attacks - I didn't sleep well for about three weeks!)

I've really spent a good deal of time trying to analyze exactly what bothers me so much about them. It's not the gore; I sort of think it's something related to the apocalyptic nature of the stories, yet other apocalyptic books/films (like "The Road") I'm fine with.

Wondering if anyone else has some insight about what Zombies represent?

[Sanity Claws]

1. As an adult, I think of zombies as a metaphor for soulless people

who drain us with their demands and want to dominate how we think.

When I was a kid, I just thought of them as monsters, nothing more.

[OneGrassRoot]

2. I like that...

Rather than refer to that type of person as an energy "vampire," I think I'll start saying energy zombie.

That makes a lot of sense and is a great metaphor.

I have nothing to add to the question, unfortunately, TABB. I've never had strong feelings one way or another about zombies or "monsters" of any sort.

Sarah Palin, that's another story.....

:rofl:

[Cleita]

16. Sort of reminds one of Dick Cheney doesn't it?

He really is the walking dead these days.

[Myrina]

3. They're "people" you can't reason with ...

No soul, no conscience, no logic ... just a "pre-programmed set of actions" of sorts - kinda like sharks.

[teenagebambam]

4. Aha, this might be resonating with me....

[Kind of Blue]

5. Yeah, as the Chiller Channel says in it's

promo for Zombie Week, "Zombies are dumb." :rofl:

[Kookaburra]

10. kinda like teabaggers

[Matariki]

6. Yeah, and they'll EAT you.

That keeps me up at night too. I stay away from horror movies, but after I read Cherie Priest's steampunk/zombie novel http://www.amazon.com/Boneshaker-Sci-Fi-Essential-Books/dp/0765318415/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1288211762&sr=8-1-spell">Boneshaker, I had zombie dreams for weeks.

It's kind of a fun book, btw - Seattle, late 1800s. The city is walled because poison gas has turned most of the population into flesh eating zombies.

[FirstLight]

7. I am not sure what they 'represent'

but i share that fear...I am almost able to handle any type of mythical creature, but the undead are my worst fear and have always been...i guess it is the whole idea that they are not supposed to *BE* it's like an abomination of nature, you know...?
I wanted to see Zombieland because it was supposed to be funny and brilliant...but i can't handle the subject matter. :scared: Took me years to work up the gumption to see something as stupid as "shaun of the dead"....and i loved that one, but it still gave me the late night creeps..

I am not a big horror movie person at ALL, in fact i avoid them because my imagination is really way too active and my mind will worry away on things like a dog with a bone while i sleep. I had to swear off Stephen King books after high school, i read 'salems lot' and 'the stand' back to back and couldn't deal for weeks...and after reading 'it' I STILL can;t go anywhere NEAR a stormdrain.

[Shallah Kali]

8. what esp. gets me w/them is the eat brains

they want to eat my mind, the part of me that thinks and controls my body. ugh.

there are other zombie features - the coming back from the dead thing only the original person is no longer present & in control, the rotten corpse perambulating around the neighborhood, the super strength and hard to kill thing... if you break down all of the features is there a particular one that gives you an extra dose of the willies?

Of course it simply could be the traumatic association of watching a horror movie when in a hyperarounsed anxious state that conflated the two inside your brain...

I never watch zombie flicks and rarely watching anything of the horror genre. I am already nervy enough to tolerate deliberately scaring the Dickins out of myself.

[teenagebambam]

9. It's not the gore, oddly enough

I think it does have something to do with the inability to reason with them thing.

[MorningGlow]

11. I'm with you on those critters

Do not like. They are the one type of "monster" that, if I watch a movie or whatever with them in it, I will have nightmares about. I don't give a rip about vampires or werewolves or any other type of scary thing, but zombies do get to me.

I'm also very afraid of apocalyptic stuff--that also gets me on a very visceral level. I wasn't able to sleep for a week after reading The Road. And I think zombies have something to do with that "everything wiped out" scenario.

But also I get freaked out at their relentlessness. They just keep coming. You blast 'em, you slice 'em, you dice 'em, and they get up and keep coming at you. You can't kill them because they're already "dead". And there are so many of them. And they pop up out of the weirdest places, just when you think you're safe and all.

Zombies: definitely do not like. :scared:

On edit: If you want to alleviate some of the stigma that your mind attaches to zombies, have fun with them. I really enjoy playing the cartoon-y video game Plants vs. Zombies--it's VERY funny. It's on my iPod, my son's PC, and the family Xbox 360.

[rosesaylavee]

12. I woke up at 3 am this morning thinking about this thread...

And hadn't given much thought to zombies previously at all as I don't like horror movies and other than Night of the Living Dead, have never watched a movie with Zombies in it. I don't even think I've even watched 'Living Dead' all the way thru and we own that one.

Anyway, my 3 am thought was that the trouble with Zombies are their incredible insatiable appetite. Never satisfied. There's no reasoning with them. They destroy whatever happens to be in their path. They have no goals other than get whatever they want when they want it. They don't work together in groups well except when they are all heading for a good feed and they all see it at once.

You know where I'm going with this, right?

Zombies = Republicans.

Maybe I had DUer Swamprat and his many reworked zombie pics in my head too but I had not made such a visceral connection between the two types of monsters before that moment.

Not sure I am suggesting we hack them to pieces and burn their body parts to overcome this current onslaught... but maybe there is a metaphor worth considering here that is eluding me at the moment.

So, thanks for the Zombie thread. Hope I sleep better tonight.

[I Have A Dream]

13. That's really interesting, rosie.

Zombies = Republicans

...at least the stereotypical Republican. I can see that connection.

:thumbsup:

[Ricochet21]

14. Zombies and republicans

hmmmm, but, hmmmm, there ARE ways to stop a zombie completely.

[southerncrone]

15. Like others here have stated,

I perceive them to be individuals who won't, or can't, think for themselves; but they allow themselves to be "programmed" by the lowest levels of society. They are essentially dead as far as being active humans. Thus, they wreak havoc on the living (thinking), wanting to eat their brains hoping to gain what they don't have.

I don't fear them on the movie/book level. However, I do fear our day-to-day breathing variety. They wreak havoc in the pulpits & the voting booth. :scared:

[Brewman_Jax]

17. On zombies

they aren't necessarily only the brainless brutes from the movies, but, IMO, without souls, or, without heart. That could include the RW reactionary wackos that vote against their interests, which I call selfish narcissistic racist bastards, but I digress. They aren't the only forms of zombies. Some could be lost and without hope or direction. To illustrate, I was driving in town, near downtown at night, during the 8 o'clock hour. I was going to meet some friends for karaoke. On the way, I saw the vagrants, homeless, and various others. They looked like they were milling about aimlessly. It seemed very surreal, lost souls slowly moving, like zombies, like an episode of "Ghost Whisperer" or "Twilight Zone"--but it was real!

[Kind of Blue]

18. Good Lord, I just took a break

and found the opening show of "The Walking Dead" on On Demand AMC. I'm in tears because I can't believe how quickly I started to care for the characters. Good actors, Great storytelling - truly intense.

Confound it, Teenagebambam, for making me aware of this series :rofl: because I've just never been a fan or interested in zombie movies, but I got to know what happens next.