Discuss: The Future of Zombiedom
Filed under: Horror, Fandom, DIY/Filmmaking
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With today's announcement that the graphic novel Zombies of Mass Destruction would be making the leap to the silver screen, it got Erik Davis thinking. And, as is often the case when Erik starts thinking about horror films, he turned to me and said "What's the next step for zombie movies?" So we started talking about it and he said "Aha, I tricked you! I don't want to have a conversation about it! I want you to write a Discuss post on the topic!" He then cackled like a cartoon villain and logged off. He's really crafty, I'm telling you.
But while all us gorehounds have been arguing about "slow vs. fast" for a few years now, it seems that the zombie sub-genre has been sprouting fresh legs and finding new ways to devour screaming humans. Just this morning, the amazingly undead Elisabeth Rappe told us that the shuffling man-eaters were about to get the Jane Austen treatment! (Yes, really!) So between fast and slow, funny or serious, semi-sentient or entirely brain-dead, which are your favorite zombies? And, more amusingly, what is the sub-genre going to give us next? I know that Nazi Zombies are making a comeback in Dead Snow, but those have been done before. Pirate zombies? Alien zombies? Zombie politicians? (Insert your own witty commentary here.) As always, let us thank George Romero for the ability to even discuss such wonderful things.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-11-2009 @ 5:23PM
Clayton said...
Who cares! They're zombies!
And how exactly does Dead Snow work? Wouldn't the freeze!?
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2-11-2009 @ 5:30PM
Dan said...
I think I'd dig pirate zombies.
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2-11-2009 @ 5:41PM
JoB said...
Whatever happened to "28 Months Later"? I suppose Danny Boyle will be too popular after Slumdog sweeps the Oscars to revisit the the 28 series.
I think fast zombies are here to stay. Land of the Dead and Diary of the Dead were bad because slow zombies just look idiotic and un-threatening now. Poor Romero can't get anything else greenlit. And while we're talking about the UN-Dead... I think the popularity of vampires now has put zombies to the curbside.
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2-11-2009 @ 6:03PM
St said...
There is no future because zombies can't procreate...
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2-11-2009 @ 6:40PM
craig said...
World War Z is the next step. That movie has the possibility to be great. I think it will set the bar for zombie movies after it is released.
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2-11-2009 @ 8:56PM
adamboy said...
the faster the better. much much more horrifying
as for zombie films, it's like superhero films and their sequals. they used to suck balls (HULK,SPIDERMAN3) but now they're being taken more seriously(NEW BATMAN,IRON MAN). if they did the same with zombie flicks i'd be right there opening night.
as for 28 months later i don't know if i'll bother unless boyle comes back.
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2-11-2009 @ 10:10PM
Peter Hall said...
Mark my words, the next big, popular, game changing zombie film will revolve around nanotechnology gone awry.
After World War Z, of course.
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2-12-2009 @ 2:41AM
nelson said...
Ya know, i've always wanted to see the stories at the back of the Zombie Survival Guide turned into individual films or even a miniseries or something...
Elijah Black the Zombie Hunter
Lawrence of Arabia meets Zombies
Roman Centurions vs. Zombies
the list goes on and on!
and please. Romero zombies are the only true zombies. logically, dead tissue can't make you run like way faster than you could when it was animated tissue.
my ultimate dream is a zombie western, where the sheriff has to team up with the local native american tribe and defend the town from the zombie hoards. that or Seven Samurai with zombies.
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2-12-2009 @ 9:44AM
Kevin said...
Did you just claim that slow zombies are the only way to go because logic would preclude fast zombies? Umm, how is it that slow zombies move, they're dead. None of it makes sense, so you just check those rationalizations at the door and have a good time. Because of that I don't find any slow moving zombie movie scary. "Oh no, here comes a zombie shuffling at me!! Oh wait, all I have to do is walk 2 miles an hour and they can't catch me. What hell was I so worried about?"
2-12-2009 @ 2:42AM
nelson said...
wow. hoRDEs.
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2-12-2009 @ 5:19AM
dazluss said...
Craig:
World War Z is one of my favourite books of just about ever and yes I'd love to see a film version of it or a worst turned into a TV documentary series in the style of the old World at War series.
Anyone read The Walking Dead graphic novel, it's begging for a series of films or TV series.
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2-12-2009 @ 5:23AM
dazluss said...
Asterix Vs The Zombies
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2-12-2009 @ 7:39AM
Stacia said...
Though I love pirates and zombies...I think that might have been done *kinda* in Pirates of the Caribbean...sure they weren't technically DEAD but they couldn't be killed while they were in that form and they were all creepy skeleton thingys...
so...kinda like zombies...
but as for zombie films in general, I do hope they get taken a bit more seriously to make some great films. Although comedy zombies are the best (Shaun of the Dead, Rave 2 the Grave) to me.
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2-12-2009 @ 10:37AM
ramtron said...
Zombie movies have definitely been hit and miss over the last few years, but the conflict of slow vs fast moving zombies will always be an issue for this genre. Both, I think, have been executed well, Romero has done well with slow moving zombies and in Zach Synder's remake of Dawn of the Dead his fast moving zombies work too. I guess my answer to this debate would be why can't both exist in the same movie. Fresh zombies can move fast and as the decaying of the muscles and flesh takes its toll the speed of the zombies can decrease. This could give a new element to zombie movies, to try and figure out ways to escape the fast zombies and not to get snuck up on by the slow ones, and also determining which one is which. Anyways that is just my opinion on the topic.
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2-12-2009 @ 12:48PM
JrSS23 said...
I agree with ramtron on the fast and slow zombies.If you love zombies go pick up some of "The Walking Dead"comic books.They should really make them into an HBO series.
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2-12-2009 @ 5:00PM
Mark5four0 said...
I really hope World War Z can be a great movie.
I think the next step would be a TV series set in the world of "The Walking Dead" that story is too epic for one movie.
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2-14-2009 @ 11:26AM
Seregaur said...
Honestly? I would like to see Romero do a final chapter to his 'Living Dead' series. Something Like...'Twilight of the Dead'? Could show a group of survivors held up somewhere... go through the standard routine... live, fight... things start to go sour... time to make a run for it.... and at some point towards the end time and decay finally catch up to the zombies. As the zombies reach the point of decay where there is nothing holding their bodies together a ray of hope is seen for humanity.... perhaps adding a scene after the ending credits hinting at the true cause of the problem that may or may not have been resolved?
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2-12-2009 @ 6:23PM
craig said...
Oh man I have the utmost respect for Romero, but his last movie was bad. The next one coming up looks even worst.
Romero needs to stop beating us over the head with social commentary.
As far as fast vs. slow zombies, I think that both are great to use. When you have slow zombies the uninfected turn out to be a bigger threat than the zombies.
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2-13-2009 @ 12:41AM
Clark Parker said...
Here is what I think... The fast and slow Zombie crowds need to come compromise here. Fresh zombies should be fast and angry and the um... Older ones should start to slow down. The creeping menace of a rotting undead is important to the themes and is very powerful in it's steady relentlesness but you must concede, it was both awesome and logical (in so far as you can be so with zombies) when the husband at the begining of the New Dawn of the Dead freaks out and chases Sarah Polly down, only to vear off at a better target as she drove away.
Oh and Word War Z is the next step... Or anything global in it's scale.
Enough with the barns and malls and bunkers... I mean, we love it and all, don't get me wrong, but let's see the world wide impact, let's have an epic zombie film. Something around the lines of The Stand, only where Captain Tripps makes you eat faces, not curl up and die in a yellow pile of mucus.
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2-15-2009 @ 8:10PM
laytle said...
The scariest zombie creation I've ever watched on film was the zombie vampire *things* in Sammo Hung's Spooky Encounters... that scared me more than the 28 series, Dawn, and anything Romero could conjure up, mushed together! I don't know what it was... but it gave me the heebie jeebies. Fast zombies, slow zombies, stupid zombies, smart zombies... they're all awesome. I'd love to see a film involving the evolution of the zombie, and what would happen if they COULD breed. EEK!
PS. Asterix Vs The Zombies would be hilarious... but it would need to be the French version with Christian Clavier and Gerard Depardieu.
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