Dear diary,
I wonder if people realize that nowadays zombie movies and books have become fashionable since the famous TV series The Walking Dead went out on air a few years ago, but in fact they do not know what those stories are really about.
Firstly, I believe that the main theme of those kinds of movies, books and comic-books is actually not the fictitious zombies but the human race itself. Zombies are a manageable threat while the most dangerous thing is ourselves. The key message of these stories is that we are who we are thanks to the world we live in, with its laws, societies and cultures, but a demised world would take out of us our worst and wildest personalities just to survive another day. There can be no doubt that this is straightly related to Psychology and Freud’s Structural Model. For instance, if a group of armed men knock at your door and try to steal your scarce food and water and your weapons, if they try to kick you out of you house or refuge, rape your women or try to kill your son, what would you do? I think we would take out our primal instinct of survival and do unimaginable things in order to save our lives and the lives of our beloved ones.
Furthermore, people usually criticize zombies saying that they are dumb and not scary at all, yet they do not even know how this fictional character was invented. As a matter of fact, the definition of the word ‘zombie’ has its origins in Africa, centuries ago. It is thought that a kind of wizard, using hoodoo magic, hypnotized men and made them act like zombies, doing whatever the wizard wanted. Besides, their heart rate lowered so much that they seemed dead. Personally, I disagree with those people who say that ‘the living dead’ are dull because if you think for a moment… Are we not zombies already? I mean, doing whatever the government or some religious sect wants. Also, some scientists are playing God, making experiments with dead stem cells and different viruses like the rabies virus. In addition, my personal favourite type of zombie is the one who is infected by an unknown virus that runs through the bloodstream to your brain, it kills you from the inside and then you wake up with hunger of flesh, that is to say that the virus is spread through bites. So if a zombie bites you it means you are dead because there is no cure. Moreover, what is dead may never die so the only way of killing the undead is to destroy their brain where the virus is.
On the other hand, some writers and directors have such a huge imagination that make their stories lose credibility. I realize that zombies are not real and probably a zombie apocalypse is impossible to happen, but you never entirely know. For example, the ‘father of zombies’ George Romero made ‘Night of the Living Dead’ in 1968, one of the first zombie movies in history, in which dead people rise from their graves because of toxic wastes. There are also films about zombies that are able to run faster and who are stronger or have special powers or that the cure is love, these directors focus on the monster itself and end up missing what it should be the main idea: People staying together and cooperating with one another in fighting the undead. I strongly believe that the described chaos is more likely to occur as a consequence of a disease created by us causing an epidemic among the living people.
In conclusion, some people are so plain that cannot see beyond the zombie and they assume that zombie movies are nothing more than just another science fiction film, with its special effects and bloody scenes. In truth, zombies are secondary characters in what it thoroughly is a story about the survival of the human race in a ruined world, how we mistrustfully interact with each other, how much we change our personalities and feelings and how we return to our primal instincts in such an extreme situation as in an apocalypse. To sum up, the most important thing in these movies is, and always will be, the human factor. Because, is not the human factor the only true difference between us and the enemy referred to as ‘the living dead’?
Natalie.
