Zombie Cliche Lookout: Lil’ Help?
Fast raging zombies, or slow shambling zombies? It’s a classic questions for fans of the genre, and there’s no right or wrong answer. It all comes down to personal taste. However, I will say I’ve always been a slow zombie backer (I’m not a die hard; fast zombies don’t bother me). I’ve explained these reasons many times in the past, so for now I’ll just offer up an additional bit of supporting evidence for my claim.
Consider that a character is, for one reason or another, unable to escape. They might be boxed in, immobile, or simply paralyzed with fear. There’s nothing they can do be await their horrible fate, and this is where the slow zombie really shines. The fast zombie will just tear in there and make the kill. With the slow zombie, both the character and the audience have a painfully long period of time to think about what’s going to happen next.
About this Episode:
I’m really fond of giving my zombies Hobbit hair. It looks like a half-assed afro, or maybe just like someone who stopped caring about their personal appearance and let their hair do whatever it’s going to do. Zombies, as we’re all aware, aren’t generally too concerned with their looks, so I think it’s pretty fitting.
Discussion Question: Good Guys and Bad Guys
As Bo pointed out recently, our heroes aren’t looking so heroic at the moment. They came into Lou’s store and ended up assaulting and severely injuring him. Of course, he also disarmed them and was holding them at gunpoint, but in light of the fact that these are the early days of the zombie apocalypse, that might be prudent.
That said, is there anything that you could discover or that these characters could do to redeem themselves? Are they all guilty, or only Inez?
If Inez saved him I think that would redeem her. My opinion she is the one that caused the injury and probably the one to point out as guilty. But to be fair, she only knocked him out and didn’t kill him so there is some benevolence in some odd “Let him live because he seems cool” kind of aspect.
Anyway, most likely (and because I want to see some blood) Lou is now zombie chow. Lets just hope someone comes soon to his rescue (not really, but let’s be kind here).
She didn’t “only knock him out” though. There is at least some serious short-term damage there, and possibly a permanent disability.
Inez just KOed him and did not kill him, so even tho she is “kind of” guilty for his recent predicament she did not intend to murder him.
Intent is an interesting question, indeed.
Well, Lou now seems certain to at the very least get bitten! 😀
What will become of him after he turns, we still won’t know, but my guess is that his head injury will come into play somehow. I’m not sure what Dave has in mind, though! 😀
Yeah, poor Lou is having a rough day.
I’m not counting on Brent to come back in time to save him, either, although other characters might! 😀
You never know.
Typo (maybe) in the discussion “them” should be “him”.
Nobody is guilty, they all do what they think is best to survive. Lou didn’t know what to expect from them, and they didn’t know what to think of Lou.
As far as guild goes, Inez could’ve waited a few more moments, She struck him just at the moment he dropped the gun and let the rest of the group get through to him.
There is nothing they can do about it now. A paralysis like this won’t go away (except for when it’s some kind a spinal shock, but even then it’s unlikely he will get better under these conditions) and I don’t think Lou is faking it. An injury like this in a ZA kinda looks like a death-sentence to me… even if they save him in this specific instance.
The only think I’m wondering about is… now he is paralyzed… will he be walking again if he becomes a Zombie… I mean, in these Zombies all kinds of bodyparts are moving and functioning, which shouldn’t be moving if it were a live person.
Good catch on the typo; I’ve fixed it.
As far as paralyzed zombies walking goes, I don’t think so. Zombification isn’t going to repair the damage to the spinal cord, at least in my book.
So in your universe you’ve made here, it is indeed possible to render a zombie useless by just damaging the spine? I like it.
Yessir!
Only Inez, you do not blame a group for one individual’s action. Admittedly they did go along with it quite quickly and gave no qualms about the fact that she had just possibly murdered or disabled a man. They hurridly went to the looting and started taking his stuff as if they deserved it in the first place. Then ripped him from his home and put him onto the streets. It sounds like they can all be blamed for something or another, but Inez really needs to check her privilege.
Very good read here, Calicade. You and I are of like mind.
I think that Inez kinda freaked out when she heard ol’ Lou asking about the presence of females in the group. Cant say as I completely blame her, if she walked in and saw her comrades helpless and some creepy old guy asking is they had any women with them then she cant be blamed for jumping to conclusions. The world is full of borderline anti-social types who would feel like they were set “free” by the breakdown of society. On the other hand, our heroes have invaded a mans property and assaulted him, leaving him seriously injured. I have a friend whose daughter was injured by falling off a 4-wheeler and landing on her back to the point where she was paralyzed for several hours until the swelling went down. Its also possible the Lou had a bad back and the fall messed him up.
Good stuff here, Damage. I like that you point out where Inez likely came into the conversation and look at things through her eyes.
Frodo has let himself go somewhat 🙂
It is no secret that Inez has bugged me since she came onto the scene, got all up in Murphy’s face when he got rid of a dangerous distraction (Brents camera antics), and has been prodding away at him since. Now she has gone and smacked someone in the head with a sledgehammer, yes she may have come in on a conversation and heard something she didn’t like, yes Lou may of needed immobilising, but why smack him in the head? Was she actually intending to kill him? She seems to be making a bunch of emotive rash decisions, which isn’t good for anyone in a ZA scenario, just ask Lou.
I bet Lou is wishing he had locked his doors now, Murphy just opened the front door and walked in, without even knocking.
Here’s my take. We prepare top not only survive, but to preserve my morality. It’s hard to maintain a sense of right and wrong with an empty stomach. A man with hungry kids can commit a multitude of sin. Unfortunately, he can also earn himself a bullet at my hands. That’s the problem we’ve run into with Murphy and Inez. Are they normally nice people? Sure, normally. Unfortunately, this is not a normal situation; and our otherwise-protagonists have lost a bit of their morality. It would be well within Lou’s rights to shoot them dead. Inez committed what the law in these parts call an aggravated assault. That is she caused seriously bodily injury or death. You can’t realistically attempt to “knock someone out” without also causing seriously bodily injury. Investigate traumatic brain injury for examples, and “coup-contracoup injuries”.
I don’t know how guilty they are collectively. Inez is guilty of ag assault, for sure. I have a sneaking suspicion that Murphy will be acting in judgment soon, assuming that they all survive the next zombie horde.
They can redeem themselves by making Lou whole, symbolically and in fact. They’d have to first, kill all the zombies, do their best to heal Lou up, and make restitution.
What was the point of bringing him outside to die? Why not just knock him out and leave him alone. I’m not liking Inez’s right now. Lou was just coming around to our side and she was like ‘nope’
Is that zombie from the civil war? 😀
Thanks for the awesome comic Dave!
I don’t see how people figure Inez should have behaved. He had multiple weapons trained on two members of her group, she had a hammer….. Depending on where she came into the room she could have heard him imply he killed other people who came looking for supplies or perhaps only heard him taking an interest in the possibility of finding women.
What, exactly, were her options?!? She is inexperienced, stressed, no doubt frightened and with no real combat experience that we know of. And the only way I can think of fighting someone like Lou off the top of my head, and remember she had only seconds to decided, would be to attack in such a way that he CAN’T attack back.
I dont pretend Inez in some sweet innocent person, but seriously I don’t see how, with her limited time frame and circumstances she could have done anything else.
The only confusing thing was why she wanted him outside the store. I’m thinking maybe because of limited space, or because he’d be a little more visible to them.