The Evolution of the Zombie

The Evolution of the Zombie Concept

Zombies have been a popular concept in movies for many years. In fact, spanning as far back as 1932; where the film 'White Zombie' first introduced the world to a much loved concept. All though...the zombies are nothing like the zombies seen on screen today. These zombies follow the rules of Haitian voodoo practices. Innocent people manipulated by their master’s spells, turning them into emotionless slaves. The stiff ,stumbling, frakenstein like movement that is still iconic today also debuted during this time. It was a simple and effective concept, yet it was a concept destined for change.

This simple concept stayed until director George A Romero came onto the scene in the late 1960's. What some would call a legendary director of the zombie concept. 'Night of the Living Dead' was released in 1968, and with it the zombie was reborn. Romero brought change to the scene, one that would create a more horrorfying zombie to keep the genre fresh.

No longer were mindless voodoo practices the cause of the zombie, nor were they living innocent people. Zombies became the living dead; reanimated corpses that craved human flesh and brains. They were not under the control of any spells or masters and act based on instincts. Other aspects were also introduced through Romero's movies such as:

- High levels of gore
- Being bitten by a zombie results in the bitten survivor slowly undertaking a transformation in a zombie themselves
- Overwhelming crowds of zombies

The next stage of progression would not be as drastic as to change the zombies origins yet again but to turn them even more horrorfying. Directors began to realise that slow 'shamblers' as they became known as, were not scary enough and realisticly not too much trouble to evade. The solution? To add high-paced running aggressiveness to the mix. This next generation of zombies made there debut in 'Return of the Living Dead' in the 1980's and could sprint and swarm over victims like animals. Suddenly the survivors didnt have the upper hand...

From then on the directors choice off 'sprinters' and 'shamblers' has fluctuated. All though the sprinting concept has become more popular in recent years; a prime example would be Danny Boyles (one of my favourite directors if I may add) '28 Days Later' (2002), as well as the sequel (under a different director) '28 Weeks Later' (2007).

The latest phase of the concept, particularly since the dawn of the millennium, focused on making the zombie more believable and possible to what is a modern and more sceptic audience. And thus, the virus was introduced. In a twist from past zombie movies an incurable virus spreads rapidly and anyone who gets infected will change in a matter of seconds. Before, bite victims would have at least several hours before transforming into zombies. As well as the origins of the zombies changing, Boyle has made some radical changes to the zombie:

- They do not focus on eating flesh, instead focusing on killing the uninfected on site in extremely violent ways including punching, biting and even thrusting fingers into eye sockets. Or infecting the survivors on site.

- They can pass on the virus through transfering bodily fluids to victims, such as spewing blood in the victims face (as well as the inevitable bite)

Although the changes being big, traits such as hunting humans and not being in control of mind, body or will have stayed. There has been much debate that the type of zombie in 28 Days Later is not a real zombie, because they are infected human beings. But those who agree with that point do not know the history of zombie cinema very well. As shown throughout this post, being undead and eating flesh only emerged through Romero's creations, the zombie has many variants. There is no set definition for the zombie in the world of cinema. Fans must accept that zombies are going to continue to evolve.

Over the course of nearly 80 years the 'zombie' has under gone many changes. Some major and some minor. It has evolved to keep the genre fresh and appealing to our current generation. I doubt zombies and what defines them will ever stop to evolve. The only thing that limits writers, directors etc... is their imagination. There will always be a movie that does something of significance to change how we view the villain we have come to love and call the zombie.

Based on this research, I put forward to the group that the best path to take would be to implement 'sprinters' into our opening sequence. They result in the viewers feeling un easy as the sense of security that used to arise from the zombies being slow, is no longer there. They are a much more horrorfying zombie.

- Will