As I mentioned before, in my previous entry, zombies fascinate me, and I think the inevitable zombie apocalypse will some day engulf us. The reason why I think this is because nature is a bitch and I’m pretty sure with how humans are living with impunity, Mother Earth will figure out a way to make sure we know who’s boss (Tool’s song Aenima is playing in the background as I contemplate how she’s already caused five mass extinctions before). I’ve come up with this opinion due to my fascination with natural sciences and, really, all of science in general. Now, because of my interest in science I’ve stumbled across some natural occurrences of “zombism” in nature, and, in all honesty, it scares the shit out of me and I don’t see why these fungi couldn’t, someday, evolve and infect humans.
This debate is for another time because this entry is to talk about how much I’ve grown to thoroughly enjoy reading The Walking Dead, by Robert Kirkman. I’m not a big comic book reader but I enjoy researching the source material for our current media featured on television and in movies; because God forbid Hollywood comes up with their own creative ideas for once.
Robert Kirkman gives a foreword in the first volume, and in it he describes how every zombie movie he has ever seen, the story of the people abruptly ends and it doesn’t allow the viewer to know how the characters live on; this is the point of The Walking Dead. It isn’t about some government conspiracy or why zombies exist, but it’s more about the loss of one’s humanity and how humans that live in today’s society would react to such extreme stimuli. Being a Batman fan, the Joker comes to mind when he talks about how society allows for humans to live in a civilized way, but if the walls, constraints or constructs of civilization crumbled, so would one’s perceived humanity. This idea is illustrated very well in The Walking Dead.
Rick Grimes is introduced at the beginning of the series, and he is a small town cop who has the traditional views of middle America. An honorable man, who loves his wife and son dearly but allowed himself to get wrapped up in his work and he gets injured. Fast forward weeks later, he wakes up from a coma (why do they always wake up from a coma?) and is thrust into the zombie apocalypse that is set in The Walking Dead. He lives in a small town north of Atlanta, so he travels to Atlanta to find his family. After some trials and tribulations, he makes it out of Atlanta to find his family living with some other survivors outside of the city, alive and well. Now, in this time his wife has hooked up with his fellow officer and friend Shane Walsh, both believing he was dead, and gets pregnant. There’s some drama that go into this whole ordeal, but I don’t want to spoil it in case you want to read this story, but I would like to point out the fact about how marriage is thrown to the wayside when civilization seems to crumble. The need to procreate and ensure the survival of the human race seems to out weigh the constructed morality to stay monogamous. Of course, when Rick finds his wife, and she realizes he’s still alive, she puts her instincts aside and wants nothing more to do with Shane ever again. Something I admire in the character, but at the same time I could understand why she let herself go before because she had originally thought her husband was dead.
Robert Kirkman gives a foreword in the first volume, and in it he describes how every zombie movie he has ever seen, the story of the people abruptly ends and it doesn’t allow the viewer to know how the characters live on; this is the point of The Walking Dead. It isn’t about some government conspiracy or why zombies exist, but it’s more about the loss of one’s humanity and how humans that live in today’s society would react to such extreme stimuli. Being a Batman fan, the Joker comes to mind when he talks about how society allows for humans to live in a civilized way, but if the walls, constraints or constructs of civilization crumbled, so would one’s perceived humanity. This idea is illustrated very well in The Walking Dead.
Rick Grimes is introduced at the beginning of the series, and he is a small town cop who has the traditional views of middle America. An honorable man, who loves his wife and son dearly but allowed himself to get wrapped up in his work and he gets injured. Fast forward weeks later, he wakes up from a coma (why do they always wake up from a coma?) and is thrust into the zombie apocalypse that is set in The Walking Dead. He lives in a small town north of Atlanta, so he travels to Atlanta to find his family. After some trials and tribulations, he makes it out of Atlanta to find his family living with some other survivors outside of the city, alive and well. Now, in this time his wife has hooked up with his fellow officer and friend Shane Walsh, both believing he was dead, and gets pregnant. There’s some drama that go into this whole ordeal, but I don’t want to spoil it in case you want to read this story, but I would like to point out the fact about how marriage is thrown to the wayside when civilization seems to crumble. The need to procreate and ensure the survival of the human race seems to out weigh the constructed morality to stay monogamous. Of course, when Rick finds his wife, and she realizes he’s still alive, she puts her instincts aside and wants nothing more to do with Shane ever again. Something I admire in the character, but at the same time I could understand why she let herself go before because she had originally thought her husband was dead.Now, as the story moves along, members of the group die; some key members die; and they run into other groups who seem to have rid themselves of their humanity all together for reasons of either greed, power or survival. A group of cannibals that Rick’s group runs into come to mind, and they explain eating people has become easy after they had to eat the children of their group first when they ran out of food. Now, you’re probably pretty shocked, but they go on to justify eating their children by explaining how bears will eat their young to survive through harsh winters because they need to survive in order to have more. There’s something very pragmatic and natural about their explanation, but it’s still really disturbing to ever think someone could ever justify cannibalism by comparing humans to other beasts of nature. (Oh, don’t worry, Rick and his group fuck these people up)
Throughout the series, Rick changes and becomes a pretty ruthless human being in order to protect his family. Again, a natural instinct that can surely be understood by everyone, but he does some things that do make you realize just how lucky we are to be living in the civilization we do today. The amount of killing between uninfected humans is amazing; especially since you would think people would band together in order to survive the hordes of predators droning around waiting to eat their brains, but human beings seem to become animals once civilization crumbles. Though Rick does some pretty nasty things, he’s almost reminiscent of Dexter, he still has a moral code around how he kills so the reader is able to easily identify and empathize with him.
It would be a rough situation to ever have to really deal with any kind of apocalypse so it’s not really a fun thing to think about, but this comic book series (now a graphic novel) is pretty fun and fascinating. It’s a great look into the human psyche; both raw and unhindered in the interpretation of how humans really are, I don’t think I would like to see how the world turns out. Then again, maybe my instincts would take over and my will to survive will overpower any sense of humanity. Anyhow, this is a great read and a real page turner. There are 14 volumes out right now, so I wouldn’t start reading this series because if you buy the first one you will buy the other 13, and you’ll be looking to drop around $130 as they’re about $10 a piece on Amazon. But, if you have the time and money, definitely get into this, and I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.
**On a side note, I can’t wait for the television series to really delve into Rick’s character, and maybe even introduce the Governor (and no, I’m not talking about Arnold Schwarzenegger).
