A Dissertation On Zombies

A Dissertation On Zombies
by Alex Thobaben

In the amazing world of zombie movies, there are several obvious flaws in the monster labeled"zombie".

Firstly, and most fucking annoyingly, is their appetite. Ask little Billy to impersonate a zombie, and he will begin stumbling slowly around, asking impolitely for brains. There are a few things wrong with this image; the asking for brains, for instance. Let's say, hypothetically speaking, that you are dead. For some unknown reason, you are now walking around and have an incredible desire to feed on human brains. But your intelligence is equivalent to a reasonable sized pile of shit, which begs the question: why would you wish to feed solely on brains? Could a zombie even tell the difference between human brains and, say, an old shoe? This brings up the next point: why human? There are many animals that do resort to cannibalism, but only in extreme circumstances, or (in a few cases), after they have mated. I promised the editors I wouldn't talk about the concept of a zombie fucking you, so with the "eating after mating" exception out of the way, the question remains: unless there is nothing else around that is edible, why would zombies choose to eat humans? Surely they would accept any kind of sustenance, be it humans, poodles, or any living thing. Why stop with living things? If a zombie's sole desire is to feed, would they not prefer to take on something that wouldn't struggle? Like a nice sandwich, for example, with several types of meats, a few cheeses, tomatoes, pickles, and perhaps a nice sauce. A spicy sauce. A spicy zombie sauce.

If I were to make a zombie movie (and some day I will, god damnit), my zombies would not be so god damn particular about what they chose to munch on. They'd eat anything organic, so our heroes (let's call them Paul and Danica, because every great horror movie needs that nice romantic "things are going to kill us, let's fuck" kind of thing) would simply have to throw their demon enemies the aforementioned Zombie Sandwiches and their problem would be temporarily solved. My zombies aren't picky. They like soda pop.

Let's return to little Billy, and ask him to do his silly little impersonation again. Poor Billy will never make through acting school with his lisp, so he might as well start selling his body to priests. Oops, I guess that wasn't PC, but neither is screwing small boys, so fuck them. Where was I? Oh yes, Billy. Billy does his little impression again, stumbling around slowly, like the poor bastard zombie he is. Slowly, he walks towards you, again asking for some brains. Stick with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, little Billy, because walking at the pace you are now won't catch you shit. Zombies who walk are zombies who remain hungry, because only someone with a full frontal lobotomy wouldn't simply walk away from them. Run, you bastard! Run! I do accept the traditional stumbling, in some cases. In older zombies, perhaps their flesh has rotted enough that their legs don't work well, hence the stumbling. But even stumbling, the poor dear should be able to do a fast stumble at least. The more healthy zombies, if there is such a thing, would be able to move normally. This means that they could chase you.

So what do we have so far? In my movie, zombies would eat just about anything, including sandwiches, and would be able to move without looking like a retard. But we also must talk about a few subjects that are not often discussed. Let's ask Billy to do his act again, because he really has nothing better to do. This time, let's let him catch us. Billy starts to bite your leg a little bit, and then he'll move on to someone else. Here is the problem: why would a creature whose sole desire is to eat simply eat and run? A single human body could sustain five zombies for several days. Why would any self-respecting walking dead give up a nice meal? They aren't fueled by the thirst for killing, but the hunger for food. My zombies would stick around their latest kill until the bones were clean, and then they'd eat the bones too, because they're like that.

My final complaint on zombies is the method used to kill them. Not so much the method, I guess, but the simple fact that you can kill them. This should not be allowed. These guys were dead to begin with -- how do you expect to kill something already dead? You can't. It's really that simple. The only way to stop them would be to separate them into tiny chunks. Even large chunks, if you cut them up the right way. How will a zombie eat you if he doesn't have any arms or legs? It's rather difficult, I'd imagine. That's not to say their arms and legs aren't still functioning somewhere, though. Think of the commercial uses for this: new artificial limbs; free labor on a factory assembly line; and truckers around the world receiving a quick hand job anytime they wanted.

Forget about taking off their arms and legs. These guys (and gals, we want to be PC here) are the living motha-fucking dead. They are rotting. A good smack to the cheek could easily remove their lower jaw, making them incapable of biting you. Watch some zombie movies, and you'll see that the only way zombies ever try to hurt someone is with their mouth. They totally ignore the fact that they could maybe beat someone up for a bit, and use their hands to bring chunks of food to their mouth. I'm not expecting them to be civilized about it, but they could at least have the same eating habits as people at KFC.

To conclude, zombies in their current state really don't make much sense. I suggest you take into account all of the aforementioned arguments the next time you watch a movie involving zombies; I guarantee that it will at least partially ruin the experience for you.

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