The Quickening of Zombies

George Romero

Zombies have taken a prominent part in popular culture thanks to two men: George A. Romero and Michael Jackson. In 1968, Romero released Night of the Living Dead. This movie was followed up 10 years later by Dawn of the Dead, which picked up where the previous movie left off, at dawn. The Romero series focuses on zombies attacking a city. Most of the citizens are turned and attack outposts of hiding humans. Sexual tension ensues.

In 1983, Michael Jackson released the most popular music video of all time, Thriller. In a sad, prophetic fashion, Michael Jackson, for an unknown reason, undergoes a physical transformation turning into a pale-skinned creature we have come to recognize as a zombie, and begins a choreographed dance of the dead (too soon?)

The 80s saw a boom in horror movies and the zombies continued to ride the Romero/Jackson wave. The third movie in Romero's series came out in 1985, Day of the Dead (which picked up where Dawn of the Dead left off), as did Return of the Living Dead. Return of the Living Dead was not part of Romero's series, but referenced Night of the Living Dead and had the same premise. Return of the Living Dead taught us one more important thing about zombies: they still look good topless. Likewise, we learned that a nipple flash can be a substitute for a plot or for special effects. Flash both, and you can save a lot of time and money.

The next significant event in zombie pop culture came in 1996 when Resident Evil came to Playstation. Resident Evil, the first "survival horror" game, introduced the dog zombie and the plant zombie. However, zombies remained, for the most part, slow-moving, flesh-eating monsters. While scary, these zombies provided two methods of escape: walking away with a brisk pace or standing there for a little while to think of a better plan. The Resident Evil movie came out in 2002. It fixed the main flaw that afflicted the video game: no hot chick in a designer dress who killed zombies by jump kicking them.

It wasn't until later that year that we were introduced to the fast-moving zombie for the first time in 28 Days Later. Basically, zombies take over England and kill everyone in the city, except one guy, who was asleep when the attack happened. Then, he escapes to a military base and, naturally, sexual tension ensues. The Dawn of the Dead 2004 remake followed the fast-zombie model. We also learned that if you are locked in a building with bulletproof doors, food, hot girls that want to have sex with you while you record it, DO NOT build an armored bus and try to go somewhere else.

2004 turned out to be one of the most significant years in zombie films. Not only did we see Dawn of the Dead, we also got Shaun of the Dead, quite possibly one of the greatest movies ever made (in England). Shaun of the Dead was the first romantic comedy about zombies (to hell with Warm Bodies. That film doesn't even come close to Shaun of the Dead). It parodied Dawn of the Dead, 28 Days Later and just about every zombie movie ever made. Zombie culture has come a long way and is only expanding. At the beginning of the course, I wasn't quite sure if I believe in the immense popularity of zombies in mainstream culture. As the course has gone on, I now realize that I was utterly wrong. Zombies are taking over our world as we speak!