So You Want To/Write a Zombie Apocalypse: Difference between revisions

Possibly the largest challenge is dealing with the fact that a traditional Romero-style zombie is not much of a threat to a healthy human. They're slow and dumb. Since the key to any horror movie is peril, you need to find some way to either advantage the zombies or disadvantage the humans. You can: [[Dawn of the Dead (2004 film)||Make the zombies faster]], [[Resident Evil|have the zombies mutate into more dangerous forms]], [[Land of the Dead|have the zombies learn]], [[The Horde|add a lot more zombies]], [[Resident Evil 1|trap the zombies and humans together in tight quarters]], [[Game-Breaking Injury|injure one or more of the protagonists so they can't simply escape]], [[The Load|introduce a character that the protagonists must defend]], [[Not a Zombie|establish that the characters don't understand the rules (initially)]], or introduce dissent in the ranks of the survivors, either by introducing [[Day of the Dead|a power struggle among them]] or [[Dead Rising|plain old psychological breakdowns.]] There are any number of ways to increase the danger. However, the biggest and most common pitfall of the genre is to balance the scales by [[Idiot Plot|making the survivors dumb]]. Since part of the appeal of the genre is the "What if this happened to you?" effect, making the characters act foolishly breaks the immersion of the audience.

Watch George Romero's original ''Dead'' trilogy -- ''[[Night of the Living Dead]]'', ''[[Dawn of the Dead (film)|Dawn of the Dead]]'', and ''[[Day of the Dead]]''. Most of the classic zombie tropes that people now take for granted, as well as the genre's association with social commentary, come from these movies. All three have been remade. ''Night'', thanks to its public domain status, has had several remakes over the years, but the 1990 version starring [[Tony Todd]] and directed by Tom Savini is generally held up as the best of them, to the point where Romero himself has given it his stamp of approval (he produced and wrote the film). The [[Dawn of the Dead (2004 film)||2004 remake]] of ''Dawn'' by [[Zack Snyder]] is also considered a good movie in its own right, albeit one with a very different, far more action-packed tone than the original. Romero's later ''Dead'' films (''[[Land of the Dead]]'', ''[[Diary of the Dead]]'' and ''[[Survival of the Dead]]'') are generally considered a mixed bag, but all three have their fans.

As long as we're on the subject of video games, ''[[Resident Evil]]'' (especially the earlier games) is also a must-play for anybody interested in zombies. Not only is it the [[Trope Codifier]] for the [[Survival Horror]] genre, it is also largely responsible for the resurgence of interest in zombie media in the late '90s and 2000s, as well as popularizing the idea of zombies being created by [[The Virus]]. Every game in the series (other than ''[[Resident Evil 0Zero]]'', the ''[[Resident Evil Gun Survivor|Gun Survivor]]'' games and the ''[[Resident Evil Outbreak|Outbreak]]'' games) is available on [[PlayStationPlay Station 3]], be it on a disk or through the [[Playstation Network]], so if you own a [[PlayStationPlay Station 3]] you have no excuse not to play them. A word of caution: starting with ''[[Resident Evil 4|RE4]]'', the series started downplaying both the zombie and horror elements in favor of an action-shooter direction, with the "traditional" zombie enemies replaced with a cross between ''[[Invasion of the Body Snatchers]]'' and the "sprinters" of modern-day zombie fiction—a shift that wound up creating a [[Broken Base]] in the ''RE'' fandom. There also exists [[Resident Evil (film)|a live-action film series]] based on the games, but be warned: it is a classic case of [[Love It or Hate It]].

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