So it's the 4th of July, and I have nothing to do. Among parades, picnics, and parties I find myself with no car and no plans even if I had one. What is left to do but to kick back and watch AMC's Walking Dead marathon and Season 4 preview weekend? Of course, since it's my favorite television show, I have seen ever episode countless times. But I still watch it anyway because even though it's nothing new to me, it's still better than most of the other pointless shit that's on every other channel.
And I think to myself..."Why do you suppose that the zombie apocalypse is such a popular theme in our media, such to the point that it is the subject of a mainstream basic cable network television series?" Well, many from psychologists to fellow bloggers have speculated on this. Explanations posed thus far have spoken of political unrest, global warming, and increasing idea that the end of the world is near. These theories might explain the recent move of zombie themed movies and television shows from the usual low budget horror flicks, but the theme of the zombie apocalypse has been around long before the current social climate. So some part of why we are fascinated with an end of the world scenarios where just surviving is not treacherous enough, but there are flash eating undead walking about has to be more primal than that.
I think that the idea of the zombie apocalypse is so fascinating because it breaks one of our society's great taboos. Death ritual. In the United States death is much different than in other parts of the world. We take extra care to separate death from life. We usher our dead off to strangers who prepare them for their last viewing, for their burial or cremation. We separate our dead in morgues, far away from the living as if death is somehow contagious. We view those who deal in death for a living as strange. We separate ourselves from death, even when it happens to our loved ones, as much as possible. The zombie apocalypse breaks this taboo.
The zombie virus appears in many different ways. But the result is always the same. Uncontrollable death. The dead rise again, and turn others into zombies. The virus spreads and is unstoppable despite medical and even military efforts. Death overcomes us and becomes part of our every day lives. Out in the open at all times. Death goes from something that happens to other people, to something that happens to you...repeatedly. It becomes such commonplace that the death of a loved one no longer stops your world and becomes something that just happens. Like the sun rising every day. It becomes impossible to tuck death away in a corner as if it doesn't really exist. I imagine it must be like Europe during the years of the plague when death was such a part of life that it reflects in much of the popular art of the time.
The zombie apocalypse is to fascinating to us because it breaks one of our most fundamental taboos in such a way that no one can ignore it. The destruction of our death ritual taboo is both frightening and fascinating because it would change not only our world, but ourselves in irreversible ways. There would no restoration of life as usual. Not only the world, but human life would completely cease to exist as we know it permanently and the idea of that is attractive to a lot of people.
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