The Bum’s Rush #10

Shoot ‘Em In The Head

This weekend I went to see the fourth installment in George Romero’s legendary Living Dead Saga, Land of the Dead. To tell you the truth I wasn’t really expecting much. My personal feeling about Romero is that he made one REALLY great movie in Night of the Living Dead and it’s been a bit downhill since then.

Still, the lure of zombies running amok combined with the added bonus of the ever-zany Dennis Hopper was too strong for me to fight. So I found myself sitting in the Ridgmar Movie Tavern (they’ve got beer and pizza!) preparing for the worst and hoping for the adequate. I’m happy to report that I wasn’t let down in the slightest! Sure, the ending may have been a bit weak, but overall it was a great zombie movie and I had a blast.

On the way home I found myself thinking about how much I love zombie movies (and comics like The Walking Dead from Image). About the same time I realized I still had a column to write. And I had no idea what to write about. Then it dawned on me that I had a perfect column already percolating in my brain. Zombies, baby, zombies.

So sit back and let me tell you . . .

The Top 5 Reasons Zombies Are The Best Movie/Comic/ Video Game Monsters

5) Infinite Patience – Face it, the zombies aren’t going anywhere. They’ve got all the time in the world and nothing to do but walk around in a mindless daze waiting for some poor living soul to wander into their midst. Then it’s feeding time. Sure you can hole yourself up in a mall, or wall up a city, or hide out with the military, but the hard truth is your patience will run out long before theirs does. And that’s usually when you make a mistake. Just the slightest mistake. And before you know it . . . zombie city, baby.

4) Overcoming Disability – You have to hand it to them, when it comes to finding a way to feast on the flesh of the living the undead have got it wrapped up. They will walk, crawl, bite and roll their way over and through almost anything to get a piece of your ass. You can take them apart bit by bit, but nothing, and I mean nothing, short of a bullet in the head will stop a zombie from killing you to death. And I’ve always had a special place in my heart for any legless zombie that learns to walk on his or her hands.

3) Strength In Numbers – If it was just one zombie it wouldn’t be a problem at all would it? Trouble is, though, it’s never just one zombie. There’s millions of them wandering around. And they’re always somewhere. There’s no place you can go in a zombie movie where you won’t find at least one undead prick waiting in the shadows ready to bite off a chunk of your arm. They never stop coming. There are WAY more of them than there are of you. And perhaps most importantly – kill all you want, they’ll make more.

2) Keeping It Simple – There’s no explanation needed for zombies. They just are. One day you’re mowing the lawn, the next day you’re mowing down the living dead. Simple as that. In a zombie movie there doesn’t need to be any explanation about where the zombies came from. All you need to know is that they will kill you on site and they spread like a virus. Sure, there are postulations and theories and reasons for zombies in almost every zombie movie. Sometimes they are there to appease dumbass producers, in the case of Night of the Living Dead. Sometimes they are there to make philosophical or sociological statements, like in Dawn of the Dead (i.e. “when there is no more room in hell the dead shall walk the earth”) or 28 Days Later (i.e. the Rage drug). Sometimes they are there just to get the show on the road, like the nuclear waste in Return of the Living Dead. But it really doesn’t matter where they came from. No explanation is needed. All you really need to know is that the dead won’t stay dead anymore and, pal you ain’t at the top of the food chain anymore.

1) They’ve Already Won – In most monster movies (Alien, Dracula, Halloween, Predator, Friday the 13th, etc) it’s all about stopping the monster from reaching its goal. Whether it’s preventing a nefarious plan from coming to fruition, stopping aliens from reaching the Earth or just making sure the monster can never kill again. But in a zombie movie, well, it’s already too late. You wake up one morning to find that the world has completely changed. Millions dead, cities abandoned, the entire infrastructure of civilization collapsing. So whether it’s really their goal or not (considering a zombie’s only real goal is to eat your brain) they have, in effect, won. There are more of them than there are of you. All that’s left is to survive . . . if you can.

Quick Bits

• I’m starting to think (if I can apply the opinions of my group of friends as some sort of statistical norm) that I might be one of the only people looking forward to this new Fantastic Four movie. I’m not a big Fantastic Four fan, never have been, but the movie looks fun and that’s all that really matters to me.
• Check it out, it’s the DC Solicitations for September 2005
• Marvel Solicitations for September 2005 too!
• I may not have been a big fan of Brian Azzarello’s Superman run but I am digging his current Lex Luthor: Man of Steel mini series. The book gets inside the mind of the greatest villain in the DC Universe and shows us that he is a master of manipulation. And once you see Superman through Luthor’s eyes you might start to have doubts of your own about the Big Blue Boyscout.
• I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – Read Breach! Read it and love it!
• Speaking of zombies, check out Zombie Tales from BOOM! Studios.
• Josh Middleton’s art on the Shazam/Superman mini looks amazing!

NEXT WEEK:  Give me Grant Morrison’s job!

Send me hate mail at thesuperleezard@yahoo.com

Read more stupid crap I write at www.livejournal.com/users/superleezard

End of Line