Zombie Cliche Lookout: Old News
Survival groups have to be pretty fluid to survive the zombie apocalypse. People will come and go. Sometimes voluntarily, sometimes people will be forced out by circumstances. And, of course, sometimes they’ll be eaten by zombies. This means that, as times passes, the chances that old companions will be reunited becomes more and more likely. However, due to the nature of the zombie apocalypse, people are going to change much more rapidly than they would in a more stable world. That friend that got separated a couple of months ago when the zombies broke through your defences? He might be a very different person when you meet again.
About this Episode:
This is a plot thread I’ve been eager to get to ever since Sam got snatched up a couple hundred episodes back. Sam has had quite a rough go of it since he volunteered to act as a diversion to allow his friends to escape. Of course, the odds that he’d be rescued by his buddies after his daring act was pretty slim, but one imagines he’s none too happy that a rescue hadn’t been mounted yet. Of course, Cheryl and company have been dealing with their own share of problems.
Discussion Question: Feeling Salty?
Once again, I’m going to ask you to step into the shoes of one of the characters, Sam in this case. You managed to survive carrying a boombox into a horde of zombies, getting kidnapped by crazy survivalists, and even a trigger-happy and confused old man. You’re stronger and more confident than you’ve ever been. So how do you feel when you are suddenly reunited with one of the people you acted as a human shield for? Is this a happy reunion, or are you angry at their lack of attempts to find and rescue you?
Well, given that Sam doesn’t know they came back for him, he probably is wondering what happened. Ideally, what they should do is what the military would do in similar situations, after sending their troops on a military mission or posted somewhere: They should debrief him.
What they will probably do is exchange stories about what they’ve been doing, have lots of questions on both sides, and likely have heated exchanges about what happened. It’s also going to be a big question for Sam: What will he tell them about his kidnappers who rescued him only to have all but one of them die because of circumstances that went horribly wrong?
“They should debrief him.”
Right you are, unfortunately, characters in stories like this rarely seem to do the obvious, rational thing. Instead, they keep pointless secrets and foster mistrust.
“They should debrief him.”
Don’t do that. The underwear shortage is a great unspoken tragedy of the zombie apocalypse.
Here’s a Discussion Question for Wednesday: Should Sam tell them the truth about what happened, and try to start with a clean slate, or should he lie blatantly and make up some really tall tales about what actually happened? Will his friends figure out he’s lying, anyway, if he does lie to them? 😀
I like it! I’ll totally use that.
Apologies for the lack of comments from me lately. Things have gotten extremely busy, and likely will continue to be so for the next several weeks.
I’m curious, now. What has got you extremely busy? 😀 Workload started to turn into an immovable object or something along those lines? 😉
Well, I hope it’s not an immovable object. We’re expanding right now, and I lost a key person on my team, so I right now I’m struggling to get everything done and get other people trained up. It’s short term, for certain, but it’s going to be a very hectic couple of months.
I see. Well, all the best to you! I hope you get a suitable replacement trained up and get the workload eased up! 😉
Time to update the copyright symbol to 2016 ain’t it Dave? 😉
Question of the day… I think I’m gonna be happy to see familiar faces around at some point… As you said, it’s gonna be easier to reunite with people you know instead of… Crazy survivalist or trigger friendly old man LOL. Plus… in a Z A, I think it’s best to remind others they kinda owe you something like Cheryl and other owe Sam for distracting Z.
Yeah, it sure is. I’ll do that for next week’s comic. Thanks for the reminder.
I think the overwhelming priority of survival might push any resentment out of my mind. Not saying that others wouldn’t have time for emotional reactions; that daily stress could easily grind someone down, until they snap. Or there could be a single event or series of events that lead to the same result, a mental breakdown.
We saw that on TWD with Morgan. He saved Rick at the beginning, snapped, ended up saved by another, and wanders into Alexandria like he’s Kwai Chang Caine, with a new personal code that bars him from unnecessary killing, which has already endangered others in the core group. As much as I like his character, I can see him getting kicked out in this next season, because his code is incompatible with the group’s aims of survival and eliminating threats.
Excellent points. I’m definitely curious to see what they’re doing with Morgan. His personal code does seem completely incompatible with surviving in the world of the show.