Ruminations and Realizations about the Zombie Narrative and Horror Studies offered as part of the shuffling journey of a retired academic who is still just a student.
Gilmarie Brioso has blogged her personal list of survival items, using the idea of a zombie plague as her inspiration, that she suggests having on hand both at home and at the office. I am intrigued by her blog (not necessarily what she said, but that she said)and what it says about American society at this moment. Given the uneasiness, even a decade later, that the 9/11 terrorist attacks inflicted upon the American psyche, I am not surprised to see ongoing talk of keeping a personal emergency survival kit on hand. Indeed, I am glad to see ongoing words of warning. (Why haven't I set up my own kit, both at home and office, given my proximity to two nuclear power plants on an island nation prone to earthquakes, typhoons, and someday perhaps a major tsunami?) What I am interested in is how the zombie icon continues to inspire imaginations. While we can be aware and wary of the forces of nature, do we really "fear" them? How much more terrible is the strength of a truly infuriated, maniacal person? If the woman at the table next to me in Starbucks decides to leap at me with teeth gnashing, would I really be able to throw her off me without suffering severe scratches and even a bite? I think I can see why the zombie plague, which would bring threat to every corner, would inspire ongoing discomfort in people with enough imagination to say to themselves: "what if?"
First the CDC, now a local government. This originated in the Bangor Daily News.
Is the Zombie Apocalypse Coming to Maine? Residents Sure Think So
By: Nick Romano
Apparently not everyone is convinced that zombies don’t exist, even after the government so graciously cleared up this matter
for us. The residents of Bangor, Maine — eight counties worth of
people, actually — are among these non believers. In fact, this past
Thursday they all participated in an emergency zombie apocalypse drill of sorts in the event that the undead will rise in the near future.
How does one prepare exactly for a
zombie uprising? Basically, members of hospitals, nursing homes and
public service agencies all joined together to simulate what it would
be like.
So here’s the scenario they came up with — the hypothetical pandemic
originated in Jamaica and proceeded to spread all over the world
through zombie bites. Participants of the dry run who were “bitten”
were marked with a sticker, but if they didn’t receive the necessary
hypothetical medical treatments in time, they would then enter stage
two and eventually turn into full-blown zombies.
“This gives us the opportunity to do something a little bit
different, but it still has the same principles that would apply in a
real situation,” said Kathy Knight, director of the Northeastern Maine
Regional Resource Center.
To make things more fun (lots more fun), those portraying zombies
were decked out in heavy makeup, wax and fake blood. If all of you want
to get in on the excitement (excuse us, emergency response drill), just
watch ‘Dawn of the Dead,’ which was airing on a projector screen as
part of this whole apocalypse initiative. We’re confident the
principles are the same.
A new novel is due out, the premise of which is a couple whose marriage is already in trouble being forced to rely upon each other for survival in the post-apocalyptic world of zombies. Check out Jesse Petersen's novels.
Another Irish zombie film is due out soon. Author David Moody wrote a perceptive blog commentary on the film. I'll share that with you. He spoke with the director and came away with some really interesting insights. I've seen this film and enjoyed it, though I suspect many people might find it too "slow." For me it was interesting to see the filmmaker attempt a "non-verbal" approach to allowing us the zombie's POV.
The Superman television show Smallville had an episode called "Rabid" features a zombie-like infection hatched by a Superman archenemy. It looks fun in an old fashioned way. Fan reviews were positive.
This local Minnesota news piece goes farther than other items into the reasons why people participate in these zombie walks. I am extremely curious about this phenomenon, and wish I could undertake more in-depth interviews with a number of these individuals. What a field day for a psychology major in need of a thesis.
Zombie Walk: Death Imitates Art
Faced with a few dozen young people in ragged clothing, mumbling and shuffling, covered in fake blood, the bystanders had to ask: What ... is this? And why is this?
Well, it’s a zombie walk.
But people pretending to be zombies are not the best conversationalists, so mostly they just moaned and sometimes cried “braaaiiinsss,” as zombies are wont to do. And while this was a good hint for the first question, it doesn’t speak to motivation.
Organizer Ben Hodapp, 20, is a huge fan of zombie movies and learned online about people in other cities dressing as zombies and going for a walk.
“I thought it was pretty hilarious,” he said, and thought it would be fun to do himself.
Getting people to dress up like zombies and stumble around Mankato was easier than one might imagine. He just set up a Facebook and people joined. More than 180 people said they were going and hundreds more listed themselves as “maybes.”
In the end, between 25 and 30 people met in the Wal-Mart parking lot at about 5 p.m. Friday afternoon. By 5:30, they were off.
Jeremy Warden, 17, dressed up as a zombie for Halloween last year and came prepared. He even brought a cup with fake blood, corn starch mixed with food coloring, for his compatriots to throw on their face to simulate a fresh meal of blood. He even burned his jeans with a lighter and smeared the ashes over his limbs.
Each zombie had to decide for him or herself what “type” of zombie they’d play. Talking or moaning? Stumbling or sprinting? Flesh-eating or brains only? “Well, I figure zombies don’t remember how to talk, so I’m just going to groan a lot,” Warden said. Some of them walked for three hours under the hot sun but lacked a zombie’s infinite stamina, so a sprint was out of the question.
Hodapp cut his beard into a Fu Manchu mustache, bought a camouflage vest at a thrift store and went walking as a redneck zombie. Chris Menton donned a gown to be an escaped-from-the-hospital zombie. Amanda Kleist wore a blue-green dress, emulating a prom-night zombie.
Hodapp had planned some rules for the group. No harassing passersby. No scaring children. Don’t walk in the street. Don’t get drunk first. “I’d rather not get it shut down for a stupid reason,” he said.
Still, they were asked to stay as in-character as possible, to “keep somewhat of an illusion of a zombie horde,” Hodapp said. They had a route picked out that stuck to Madison Avenue, but in the end the temptation to wander through the mall was too great, just as it was for the zombies in John Romero’s 1978 zombie classic, Dawn of the Dead.
Onlookers’ reactions differed. One mother shielded her child from the group, while another asked for a photograph with her baby, said Kleist, the prom zombie.
Hodapp says he’d like to make the zombie walk into an annual event. There often isn’t much to do in Mankato for people under 21, he said. Hannah Moon, spattered with blood and clutching a torn-up doll, agreed. It’s fun to “dress down,” the 17-year-old said. “Summer can get boring.”
---
This coverage was written by Dan Lineham, as posted online at Minnesota's "Mankato Free Press" website on July 25, 2009
Woke Up Dead Jon Heder, the actor who starred in "Napoleon Dynamite" and "Blades of Glory," has announced that his next project will go after an audience of nerd-friendly webheads, Reuters reports. "Woke Up Dead," whose Internet-only webisodes premiere in October 2009, is a sci-fi comedy thrill that will have Heder playing a 20-something college student who wakes up in a bathtub full of water only to find that he's turned into a zombie. "It plays with the conventions of the zombie-horror genre," Heder said. "Drex doesn't believe he's a zombie, but his friends start to realize he may be as he has no heart rate, all his vital signs are gone, and he has this hunger for brains."
The scripted online series, created by John Fascano, is being produced by Electric Farm, with Heder as a co-producer. The show marks Heder’s strut into the world of online programming.
"Woke Up Dead" was developed with Heder in mind as the lead. It will comprise 50 three-minute episodes for online and mobile distribution in the United States. (Does that mean those of us living outside the United States will not be able to watch the program or benefit the program's sponsors?)
The project will combines live-action with limited CGI elements, is a seemingly superb springboard for Electric Farm. The series is being made outside of a deal Stan Rogow, Brent Friedman and Jeff Sagansky’s Electric Farm signed with NBC Universal, which gives the conglomerate domestic rights to the company’s upcoming Internet sci-fi series "Gemini Division," starring Rosario Dawson. Sony Pictures TV International co-produces and internationally distributes "Gemini Division," (which features some elaborate 3-D art) as well as Electric Farm’s first online drama, "Afterworld," a 2.5-D-animated series, on mobile, broadband and traditional television.
Rogow said that "Woke Up Dead" was developed with Heder in mind for the lead. “He will be terrific,” he continued, “he’d always wanted to play a zombie.” "Woke Up Dead" is currently in pre-production and set to be released later this year.
Gilmarie Brioso has blogged her personal list of survival items, using the idea of a zombie plague as her inspiration, that she suggests having on hand both at home and at the office. I am intrigued by her blog (not necessarily what she said, but that she said)and what it says about American society at this moment. Given the uneasiness, even a decade later, that the 9/11 terrorist attacks inflicted upon the American psyche, I am not surprised to see ongoing talk of keeping a personal emergency survival kit on hand. Indeed, I am glad to see ongoing words of warning. (Why haven't I set up my own kit, both at home and office, given my proximity to two nuclear power plants on an island nation prone to earthquakes, typhoons, and someday perhaps a major tsunami?) What I am interested in is how the zombie icon continues to inspire imaginations. While we can be aware and wary of the forces of nature, do we really "fear" them? How much more terrible is the strength of a truly infuriated, maniacal person? If the woman at the table next to me in Starbucks decides to leap at me with teeth gnashing, would I really be able to throw her off me without suffering severe scratches and even a bite? I think I can see why the zombie plague, which would bring threat to every corner, would inspire ongoing discomfort in people with enough imagination to say to themselves: "what if?"
