Zombie Cliche Lookout: Never Leave a Man Behind
In zombie stories, no one wants to be a zombie. That’s pretty obvious, of course, but it goes farther than simply not wanting to die a horrifying death and get half-eaten by a walking corpse (thought that does indeed sound unpleasant). Even if they could die painlessly in their sleep, the thought of coming back as a zombie is quite awful. The whole thing is quite icky, and there’s a probably a fair amount of vanity rooting the fear (everyone wants a beautiful corpse, right?), but the biggest issue comes with hurting someone. Imagine dying, and then returning to life to become a threat to your loved ones. No parent wants to reanimate and eat their children. Well, no good parent anyway.
With that in mind, it stands to reason that the good guys often try to put certain zombies “out of their misery”, so to speak. Other zombies – specifically reanimated bad guys – are often left zombified as a sort of punishment. It’s kind of weird when you think about it.
About this Episode:
A lot of you guys pointed out all the guns that are left lying around, so I definitely wanted to make a point of showing our heroes picking up these weapons. However, I didn’t want to make this story-arc too long, so I just crammed it into the “Putting Gene Out of His Misery” episode.
Discussion Question: Would You Mind Being a Zombie?
As I mention about, in zombie stories, people really don’t want to be a zombie. I wonder how true this is in real life. If you were in a zombie apocalypse scenario, would the prospect of reanimating bother you that much more than all the other horrible stuff you’d be dealing with on a daily basis?
Look at Clark go!! big tough guy has just been saved by Barb, he gets his gun and runs off leaving Barb to face the zombies alone.
Several people I know in real life would probably do the same… big talkers, but that’s about it 🙂
Dude, the other guy is off on his own without even the 1911. He’s bound to get downed and somebody should be there to revive him.
In a more realistic sense, having somebody check around for the status of the friendlies and see if there are any more bad guys with guns is kind of important too. Barb seems to be doing well after all.
Another point here: the plan was to get inside, so Clark is just following plan. Barb decided to stick back and take out Gene.
I’m probably a big talker too. I’d likely get eaten by zeds almost immediately.
She’s awfully close to the second zombie there, I hope it doesn’t bite her.
Indeed she is.
On an unrelated note, good to see you’re caught up on the comic now!
To be honest? I’ve constantly wanted to become an undead lich lord with the ability to raise the dead at my will so I could slowly take over the world city by city..
But you know, that’s just my normal every day thing.
Like.. I don’t even care if I’m super ugly, I’ll just burn armor into my flesh. As long as I have those powers I’ll be happy, but screw the whole mindless zombie easy to kill thing.. No way..BORING!
Zombie after market upgrades?
Bolt or deck screw on plates of metal….
Ever notice in all Zed flicks everyone thinks they need some heavy armor?
All you need is something that they cant bite through.I was joking with a friend talking about wearing stormtrooper armor as long as the joints are covered. Of course you would still have to watch for groups or gaggles of Zombies trying to tear you apart.
I’d think some decent quality leather would do the job.
“gaggles of Zombies”
hahahahahahaha
Chain mail. Flexible, metal, and in my experience, relatively light. And it looks pretty awesome too.
What exactly would you call a group of zombies? A gaggle, a herd, a flock, a congress? My vote would have to be the same thing you call a group of crows…..a murder.
A murder sounds great but I like herd. Just seems to describe how they move best.
Sir Marius: Relatively being the word. A suit of mail will still weigh you down by over 20 pounds – although it’s probably not so hot as leather, what with all the holes and all. Still, if you’re wearing jeans, decent boots, a denim or leather jacket and a decent pair of gloves, you’d only be in trouble if they got close enough to bite your face, and that would weigh a hell of a lot less than full mail.
Mindles would indeed be boring. A Lich is a whole different ball of wax.
“I don’t want to be one of those things. Walking around without a soul.” Rain, Resident Evil
Well quoted.
Cleaned up nicely. Good job Dave!!
Thank you, ma’am.
For the question, the thought of being eaten alive scares me way more than coming back. I’d like to say that I wouldn’t want to be the one eating people but I’d be dead and not aware of what my body was doing. I would want to be put down just so I don’t harm anyone I love but that is more a need to protect them from any danger rather than from me specifically.
That’s kind of how I feel too, Angie. Well said.
To Clark’s benefit, he may be trying to go rescue Ted.
But no, I wouldn’t want to be a zombie. If I did, just put me to final rest.
The only way that I would “want” to be a zombie is if I was like a Nemesis in Resident Evil cuz that might be kinda cool 😛
Dave: for a suggestion, would you mind putting a variety of zombies into your comic? Like make some completely unrelated characters (zombie fodder characters) walking through the city, and a pack of fast zombies jump them or something.
And also, the only zombie I would “want to be” would be the Fido type of zombie. Helping out humans, even after death.