Zombie Cliche Lookout: Safe At Last
Here’s another pretty common one in not just zombie stories, but horror in general (and sometimes even non-horror movies). The survivor somehow managers to make it away from the bad guys, and runs somewhere they should be safe, only to get completely and unexpectedly slammed by something comparatively innocent, like a car or another survivor that mistakes them for a bad guy. This can often be done really cheaply, occasionally as an easy way of making the end of the movie grim by showing that no one survives (The 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead comes very close to this). Other times, it’s only a minor hiccup, or serves to introduce a new plot arc of some type.
About this Episode:
Some more high-tech photo trickery in this installment of Bricks of the Dead. Here we see an incline leading to a raised roadbed, with a mighty forest in the background. I accomplish this incredible feat by placing the road base plate on a book and then just sort of leaning the incline against it. That’s the magic of comic making, ladies and gentlemen.
Oh, and the lights on the van? All Photoshop. I used a radial gradient with one side being black and the other transparent to get the effect. It’s not perfect, but any means, but I’m pretty happy with the result. Especially in the third panel.
Discussion Question: Kindergarteners Guide to Zombie Survival
Clark could have saved himself a lot of pain and embarrassment (and possibly death, stay tuned to find out!) by following a simply maxim that every kindergartener should know: look both ways before crossing the street. Taking this idea and running with it, what sort of kindergarten-level knowledge could you take and apply to surviving the zombie apocalypse?
Or, you know, move when bright lights start shining?
Not a bad bit of advice there. You’ll get hit by much fewer cars and trains.
I wonder how much Dave paid the actor who plays Clark to get run over by a truck? 😀 I’m damn sure nobody in their right mind would ever cross a roadway at night! 😀
As for the incline effect, perhaps I’m not quite seeing it, but it is very subtle! 😉
It’s subtle indeed, but the studs are angled slightly back toward the camera, as though Clark is walking out of a roadside ditch (as indeed he is).
i dont know, for my webcomic, the guy from District 3 had to get his head sown back on, and he tried to sue me! Webcomic acting is hard, you got to bribe everyone so that they stay quiet. (heh, i dared to rip his voicebox out.)
Working with actors is tough.
Ooh, dang that’s got to hurt, wonder if we’ll get to meet a new character (or characters) out of this incident! Whoever was driving must’ve been going pretty fast for Clark not to notice despite being alert of the surrounding dead. Then again, who wouldn’t want to drive crazy on the open road during the zombie apocalypse?
You should be able to suss out who is in the van by looking closely at it.
Basic kindergartener lesson? Keep clean! If the zombie effect is transmitted by bodily fluids, particularly blood, you’ll want to cover up and stay away from possible vectors!
… which would likely mean staying away from kindergarteners, but…
And I couldn’t help but think of the school bus’s role in “Mean Girls.”
Excellent lesson, Lich!
Hah, the Mean Girls bus didn’t occur to me before, but it certainly does now.
To be fair, though, it’s not like avoiding traffic is as much of a concern during the zombie apocalypse, so it’s logical to think that some survivors would forget little things like that.
Especially while being chased by zombies.
May I just say… THAT IS A CARAVAN. No character up to know had a caravan. This leaves us whith two or three options.
1) New characters implemented. Really wish this one is not true.
2) The people from the news station are back and will get killed by stoping, checking what they hit and eaten by the zombies. Dave is disposing of all secondary characters and wants to concentrate on only on the cop and their group and Sam and his unconventional allies.
3) Sam and his group of unconventional allies have left the church and somehow we were never aware of the cliffhanger Dave left us with about a month or two ago.
Predictions are more but time there is none.
If you look carefully at the van, there is a pretty substantial hint as to who is driving it.
I know who it is. It is Master Colonel that has the awesome beret and M1 Carbine.
It’s a TV van!
Both good theories.
Okay, confession time: I hate stinger endings. Absolutely hate them. To me, they serve only 2 purposes:
1) To deliver a cheap jump scare right at the end and milk that last little bit out of the ol’ adrenal glands;
2) To invalidate the entire story that preceded them, all the toil, effort, and triumph that may have come before.
Case in point: Dave brought up the ending of the ’04 remake of Dawn of the Dead. I love this movie… but I always turn it off at the beginning of the credits. Why? Because that makes for a complete story, which has a lot of death and pain, but also some hope. I guess maybe I’m just not nihilistic enough for modern horror… I like the old stories (like Dracula) where there’s some credit given to basic goodness and the good guys can win. Hear that, everyone? The good guys can WIN a horror movie, and it can still be scary.
Sigh. Losing battle, I know, but a guy can hope, right? I mean, that’s the whole point.
I tend to be on the same page, especially as they become more and more common in horror movies.
I think they can occasionally make sense, like in (spoiler, obvioiusly) [Rec].
I agree. I like there to be a sense of hope, that people will survive. That’s what I’ve got to hate over all with the zombie movies. Most of the ones I’ve seen, there’s no hope, just holding out as long as possible til you finally die and join the horde.
Yeah, that’s more than a little depressing, and makes it awfully hard to get behind characters, especially on follow-up viewings.
I think everyone’s hit the good stuff.
As to Clark, next scene. Whoever is in the truck – Is it did? It’s still alive! Kill it! No! They’re still alive! Well bring ’em along.
Hah, we shall see, Fox.
What!?! After all that he gets hit by a truck!?! That better be the rest of the group. lol
Like Bo stated a few episodes back, Clark is the designated “shit-magnet”.
Kindergarten advice? How about “Don’t talk to strangers?”
Especially gray strangers that grunt and groan and smell like death.
I KNEW IT! I JUST KNEW IT! I KNEW THAT THAT WAS GOING TO HAPPEN!
im also betting that the news teams and the nurse are in that car.
We shall see.
ive read the comic several times, i think that i can figure some of this stuff out
of course i thought that Murphy was the one who was going to hit clark
That you did.
nicely built News van Dave, love the use of that windscreen!
Poor Clark, surviving all that time just to be hit by a truck…….well he shouldn’t be playing in the road 😀
Thank you much, sir.
i wonder whos driving da van
Wonder no more come Friday. Unless I’m a dick about it and keep teasing out the story.
http://www.hatsproductions.com/organtrail.html
This is a zombie text adventure that has some minor visuals as well.. It’s based off of the game The Oregon trail.. Quite fun! I recommend this to anyone with some freetime. Quick tip ~ Just because some one is bitten doesn’t mean they will become a zambie.
This looks sweet Calicade!
wats da oregon trail?
It’s an old computer game (remade many, many times) in which you guide a party of pioneers on the Oregon trail. You have to manage food and supplies, ford rivers, hunter, get dysentery, etc.
Really? You kids literally grew up with the internet; but you can’t use Google?
You’d be surprised how fast the current generation went from using the internet properly and being up to date with change to cell phone zombies in no time (CPU to CPZ). I’m proud to say that I stayed out of the common fad, as well as the conformity loop.
It’s now starting to become a marketable skill to be able to properly Google and find things on the internet.
I guess that makes sense. As far as the web goes, I still see it as a remarkable tool for gathering information; and it’s amazing what you can learn about someone with nothing more than an email address. And for the fads, I don’t have a smart phone and refuse to text message under any but the most annoying and dire circumstances (and almost always work-related, we have some teeny-bopper secretaries that pretty much only text).
I took a theory and research class that had a segment about internet research, building proper Boolean searches and using databases (EBSO, CINAHL, etc.). It was quite useful.
and im not a kid im a young adult
How old is a young adult?
google sucks bo
17
That’s a kid. I’m a young adult. 😛
i clicked da link and played some of da game but it keeps freezing on me so f***ing anoying going to kick my computers @$$!!
So, after all that, the “gotcha” ending as you schmuck Clark, just like the one prepared guy on the block at the beginning of Dawn of the Dead?
And you had the looters from way back a year ago do it? I don’t know how I feel about that. I mean, it’s not like they’re the type to stop and render aid in an appropriate fachion, more like they’d stop to roll the body, and take the knife if it’s worth a pinch (something made by Jerry Busse or Chris Reeve, maybe?).
I did indeed have looters, and I haven’t forgotten about them. They drove a moving truck of some sort.
I figured this van was the looters’. I must have missed our intrepid news crew having a van, too. I’m glad to be getting back to their story.
They were never actually shown having a van, so I put a 9 on the side as a clue.
You said that the van would be a clue to who they are. The only folks I knew had a van were the looters. You tricked me. Shame on you for false advertising.
Hah. That was a panel truck. Big difference.
Funniest strip yet. He just survived a mob of zombies with a knife – only to be hit by an ambulance.
Luck doesn’t shine on poor Clark.
Ahahahahahaha….brilliant!
I am catching up…
Glad to see you catching up.
I feel the need to point out that this wouldn’t have happened to him either if he had stood his ground earlier…
Question:
I dunno, we had “Don’t run with sharp objects” a couple of strips ago.
“Don’t play with fire”? fire might be a good way to dispose of groups of zombies – and a great way of dealing with bodies – but if you aren’t careful, it could spread, and the fire service isn’t going to come help you.