sweetcell wrote:Couldn't we say, though, that plants feed off the decomposing remains of an ultimately killed zombie? It's more like a water cycle of food then a pyramid.
in case anyone needed a reminder:
Since the gun ban has been reversed...
I don't think that is the case. Traditionally, all non-human (and human too, if they're smart) organisms avoid the living dead and certainly do not find satisfaction in making their remains into a palatable meal. While the evidence is deep and broad that scavenging feral animals, such as dogs, alligators and confident foxes, will instinctively eschew contact with homocidal walking corpses, there's less data around less-intelligent organisms such as insects, plant life and very small rocks.
More importantly, given the consequential stakes at hand, it is imperative that humans avoid contact with any plantlife that may have grown in the soil of fallen zombies. The virus that transforms otherwise peaceful, innocent human carrion into murderously moaning soldiers in an army of unholy cannibals is a persistent organism that may survive generations of plantlife cycles to further infect human hosts. For this reason, individuals who previously or currently make their living through agricultural pursuits should be deemed suspicious, shunned and relieved of their limbs for safety's sake.
More importantly, given the consequential stakes at hand, it is imperative that humans avoid contact with any plantlife that may have grown in the soil of fallen zombies. The virus that transforms otherwise peaceful, innocent human carrion into murderously moaning soldiers in an army of unholy cannibals is a persistent organism that may survive generations of plantlife cycles to further infect human hosts. For this reason, individuals who previously or currently make their living through agricultural pursuits should be deemed suspicious, shunned and relieved of their limbs for safety's sake.
yet another reason to be mistrustful of vegetarians (as if we needed any more)
So I just started reading The Walking Dead, you can read the first issue for free here.
I'm only 6 issues in (first trade paperback), but I like it so far. Even more than the plot or characters, I love the idea of doing a zombie story as a never-ending/long-running serial in comic book form. Unlike a book or a movie, the story never just ends abruptly.
Anyone else read this? I'm guessing it won't take me that long to get the other 8 paperbacks and get caught up on the story. I could see myself heading to Big Monkey comics every month to pick this up.
I'm only 6 issues in (first trade paperback), but I like it so far. Even more than the plot or characters, I love the idea of doing a zombie story as a never-ending/long-running serial in comic book form. Unlike a book or a movie, the story never just ends abruptly.
Anyone else read this? I'm guessing it won't take me that long to get the other 8 paperbacks and get caught up on the story. I could see myself heading to Big Monkey comics every month to pick this up.
HoyaSaxa03 wrote:
Run for the hills. Now.
Sweet. I was thinking of paddling out this evening anyway….
Nice recommendation. For all of my nerdiness, I've fallen way off on comics in the last several years, so I had no clue about this (or that Image Comics was still around!).
I picked up Vol. 1 today and cruised through it in about 30 minutes. I might as well grab the Books…seems better cost wise. How many issues are they into? Thanks again for the heads up…this was far better zombie entertainment than Diary of the Dead.
I picked up Vol. 1 today and cruised through it in about 30 minutes. I might as well grab the Books…seems better cost wise. How many issues are they into? Thanks again for the heads up…this was far better zombie entertainment than Diary of the Dead.
HoyaSaxa03 wrote:
So I just started reading The Walking Dead, you can read the first issue for free here.
I'm only 6 issues in (first trade paperback), but I like it so far. Even more than the plot or characters, I love the idea of doing a zombie story as a never-ending/long-running serial in comic book form. Unlike a book or a movie, the story never just ends abruptly.
Anyone else read this? I'm guessing it won't take me that long to get the other 8 paperbacks and get caught up on the story. I could see myself heading to Big Monkey comics every month to pick this up.
nkotb wrote:
How many issues are they into?
62
"If zombies actually existed, an attack by them would lead to the collapse of civilisation unless dealt with quickly and aggressively. That is the conclusion of a mathematical exercise carried out by researchers in Canada. They say only frequent counter-attacks with increasing force would eradicate the fictional creatures."
"Professor Robert Smith? (the question mark is part of his surname and not a typographical mistake)"
"That's right, Professor Robert Smith, bitches. Come on, how surprising is it that I'd be an authority on the living dead?"
relaxer, you've made my day. again.
HoyaSaxa03 wrote:
"Professor Robert Smith? (the question mark is part of his surname and not a typographical mistake)"
i knew a guy whose last name was always written in lower case- he explained that his family never earned the right to write it in upper case.
zombeeLOL:
The Economist has gone paid subscription only on their website so I'll have to post the whole thing. I apologize in advance for the long post:
Zombie films
Invasion of the living dead
Dec 17th 2009
From The Economist print edition
Even Jane Austen has been infected
?FROM a corner of the room, Mr Darcy watched Elizabeth and her sisters work their way outward, beheading zombie after zombie as they went.? That sentence springs from ?Pride and Prejudice and Zombies?, a surprise literary hit (it was a bestseller in America last April) that imagines Regency England being overrun by the undead. Elizabeth Bennet and her beau flit from dancing at balls to employing Asian martial arts, a sort of Fred Astaire and Ninja Rogers.
In a sense, the author of this pastiche, Seth Grahame-Smith, has turned Jane Austen into a zombie, reviving her text from the grave and turning it into a grisly version of the original. Hollywood is planning a film version next year, the latest in a series of movies to star the undead. The recently released ?Zombieland?, one of the more successful versions, combined romance, the undead and comedy (a romzomcom, in the jargon), and garnered more than $85m in worldwide sales.
Zombies spring from the Caribbean superstition that sorcerers could use voodoo to revive the dead and turn them into slaves. In early film treatments, such as ?I Walked With a Zombie? (which drew on the plot of ?Jane Eyre?), zombies were eerily passive rather than the crazed flesh-eaters of today. The cannibalism really started with George Romero?s 1968 cult film, ?Night of the Living Dead?.
Perhaps the zombie has achieved greater cultural resonance as the world has become more crowded. Filmic depictions often involve a small group of individuals under siege from the undead or fleeing a flesh-eating mob. Any resident of a big city will understand the feeling of being overwhelmed by the mass of humanity on a subway train or high street.
Modern zombies are usually created, not by voodoo, but by infection. During the cold war, when nuclear tensions were at their height, rampaging B-movie monsters were the result of accidental exposure to radiation; nowadays plague seems a greater threat to humanity. A single drop of blood from an infected patient turns humans mad with rage in ?28 Days Later?. In the most recent film version of ?I Am Legend? (a 1954 story by Richard Matheson), the zombie-like mutants are the result of an attempt to cure cancer.
With its pagan roots, the zombie may be the ideal monster for those who do not believe in life after death. Zombies are denied the comforts of the afterlife, and destroyed, not with anything as elaborate as a stake through the heart or a silver bullet, but with a whack on the head.
The undead also serve as a wonderfully utilitarian cultural symbol. In ?Dawn of the Dead?, his 1978 follow-up, Mr Romero created a satire on consumerism, as survivors take refuge in a shopping mall, besieged by zombies driven by a ?primitive memory? to gather there. A British film, ?28 Weeks Later? (a sequel to ?28 Days Later?), showed American troops gunning down infected natives roaming wild in London?s docklands, and was perceived as an allegory of the Iraq war.
But the zombie, with its staggering gait and glassy expression, can also be comic. In ?Shaun of the Dead?, the hero, recovering from a hangover, easily mistakes the undead as Londoners stumbling through a drunken haze similar to his own. The hero of ?Zombieland?, a nerdish teen, makes the mistake of giving the neighbourhood prom queen shelter for the night, only to see her awake as a slobbering monster. Having desperately defended himself with every household implement to hand, he finally beats her into submission with a toilet lid, before lapsing into double entendre: ?The first time I let a girl into my life and she tries to eat me.?
From a film-maker?s point of view, the zombie has many advantages. It is not necessary to spend a fortune on special effects?a horde of extras spattered with fake blood can do the trick, and tends to look a lot more realistic than a computer-generated werewolf. Whereas vampires can be charismatic and sexy, zombies lack personality; audiences do not mind when they are killed since they are dead already. Indeed, ?Zombieland? ends in a theme park, with Woody Harrelson mowing down row after row of attackers, like any teenager with a Nintendo.
One part intriguing allegory to nine parts gore, zombie films are hard to love. But as the reworking of Austen?s classic shows, their territory is expanding. Much more of this, and zombies will find they have bitten off more than they can chew.
Zombie films
Invasion of the living dead
Dec 17th 2009
From The Economist print edition
Even Jane Austen has been infected
?FROM a corner of the room, Mr Darcy watched Elizabeth and her sisters work their way outward, beheading zombie after zombie as they went.? That sentence springs from ?Pride and Prejudice and Zombies?, a surprise literary hit (it was a bestseller in America last April) that imagines Regency England being overrun by the undead. Elizabeth Bennet and her beau flit from dancing at balls to employing Asian martial arts, a sort of Fred Astaire and Ninja Rogers.
In a sense, the author of this pastiche, Seth Grahame-Smith, has turned Jane Austen into a zombie, reviving her text from the grave and turning it into a grisly version of the original. Hollywood is planning a film version next year, the latest in a series of movies to star the undead. The recently released ?Zombieland?, one of the more successful versions, combined romance, the undead and comedy (a romzomcom, in the jargon), and garnered more than $85m in worldwide sales.
Zombies spring from the Caribbean superstition that sorcerers could use voodoo to revive the dead and turn them into slaves. In early film treatments, such as ?I Walked With a Zombie? (which drew on the plot of ?Jane Eyre?), zombies were eerily passive rather than the crazed flesh-eaters of today. The cannibalism really started with George Romero?s 1968 cult film, ?Night of the Living Dead?.
Perhaps the zombie has achieved greater cultural resonance as the world has become more crowded. Filmic depictions often involve a small group of individuals under siege from the undead or fleeing a flesh-eating mob. Any resident of a big city will understand the feeling of being overwhelmed by the mass of humanity on a subway train or high street.
Modern zombies are usually created, not by voodoo, but by infection. During the cold war, when nuclear tensions were at their height, rampaging B-movie monsters were the result of accidental exposure to radiation; nowadays plague seems a greater threat to humanity. A single drop of blood from an infected patient turns humans mad with rage in ?28 Days Later?. In the most recent film version of ?I Am Legend? (a 1954 story by Richard Matheson), the zombie-like mutants are the result of an attempt to cure cancer.
With its pagan roots, the zombie may be the ideal monster for those who do not believe in life after death. Zombies are denied the comforts of the afterlife, and destroyed, not with anything as elaborate as a stake through the heart or a silver bullet, but with a whack on the head.
The undead also serve as a wonderfully utilitarian cultural symbol. In ?Dawn of the Dead?, his 1978 follow-up, Mr Romero created a satire on consumerism, as survivors take refuge in a shopping mall, besieged by zombies driven by a ?primitive memory? to gather there. A British film, ?28 Weeks Later? (a sequel to ?28 Days Later?), showed American troops gunning down infected natives roaming wild in London?s docklands, and was perceived as an allegory of the Iraq war.
But the zombie, with its staggering gait and glassy expression, can also be comic. In ?Shaun of the Dead?, the hero, recovering from a hangover, easily mistakes the undead as Londoners stumbling through a drunken haze similar to his own. The hero of ?Zombieland?, a nerdish teen, makes the mistake of giving the neighbourhood prom queen shelter for the night, only to see her awake as a slobbering monster. Having desperately defended himself with every household implement to hand, he finally beats her into submission with a toilet lid, before lapsing into double entendre: ?The first time I let a girl into my life and she tries to eat me.?
From a film-maker?s point of view, the zombie has many advantages. It is not necessary to spend a fortune on special effects?a horde of extras spattered with fake blood can do the trick, and tends to look a lot more realistic than a computer-generated werewolf. Whereas vampires can be charismatic and sexy, zombies lack personality; audiences do not mind when they are killed since they are dead already. Indeed, ?Zombieland? ends in a theme park, with Woody Harrelson mowing down row after row of attackers, like any teenager with a Nintendo.
One part intriguing allegory to nine parts gore, zombie films are hard to love. But as the reworking of Austen?s classic shows, their territory is expanding. Much more of this, and zombies will find they have bitten off more than they can chew.
edit: smackie posted an article at the bottom of the previous page - it's a good read.
vansmack wrote:
Much more of this, and zombies will find they have bitten off more than they can chew.
Yeah, I feel like the zombie oversaturation point has already been reached… what's going on with the film version of World War Z? Also can't wait for the AMC adaptation of the Walking Dead
Again, thanks for the Walking Dead suggestion. Picked up books 1 & 2 as Christmas presents and finished them that evening.
HoyaSaxa03 wrote:vansmack wrote:
Much more of this, and zombies will find they have bitten off more than they can chew.
Yeah, I feel like the zombie oversaturation point has already been reached… what's going on with the film version of World War Z? Also can't wait for the AMC adaptation of the Walking Dead
finally, the police are starting to take the threat of zombie infection seriously.
gilbert arenas should use the zombie defense