Zombie movies need something new

[cmastah]

All the zombies movies now (did I say all? I meant LITERALLY all) have zombies that eat flesh or brains, I mean what, you can't have a zombie movie that also has wraiths in it? Walking skeletons? Ghosts?

And don't give me the whole 'it's a virus, you can't animate a skeleton or make a ghost/wraith with a virus', we're talking about the living dead, this is pseudoscience territory. Pop something new on us for a change, even Romero experimented with land of the dead by having zombies begin to learn how to use tools (he even experimented with one movie where a zombie was somewhat restored its sentience).

Undead movies (as in if it features werewolves it doesn't fall under undead) are now:
1. Vampire only
2. Ghost only
3. Zombie only
4. All or two of the above

I remember I found the mummy to be entertaining because it was different (in the first movie he wasn't some mummified corpse walking around, he took on a human form and had some magic to him).

Some newer zombie movies have them with some degree of sentience but it's still just zombies. Even video games explore a wider range. If I'm correct L4D has several types, Jericho was all about the undeadie goodness and others such.

To my knowledge I can only think of two places where several variations were touched on:
1. Evil dead (and they weren't really undead, they were demonically possessed)
2. The TV show angel (and most of its foes were demons)
3. Lord of the rings with its nazgul (I think even in the hobbit elrond, gandalf and the other two fight off some different forms of undead creatures).

If you get rid of the whole 'zombie bit you, now you'll become one' mentality, inserting creatures like wraiths becomes easier (and yes, I want to see wraiths) because wading into combat with zombies becomes easier.

[Pan]

Its not the zombies that are interesting with zombie movies (good ones anyways). Not sure adding more monsters would make zombie flicks any more interesting.

[Nohwear]

I would argue that the main way to shake them up would be to create one that is a LOT less bleak.

[Sissyl]

Warm bodies?

[cmastah]

Sissyl wrote:

Warm bodies?

Not sure if you're replying to Nohwear, but if it's to my post then I specifically mentioned the 'Some newer zombie movies have them with some degree of sentience but it's still just zombies' EXACTLY with that movie in mind, heheh. There's also (technically) I am legend (which I thought was actually pretty nice), the alternate ending was FAR superior to the one they ended up screening in cinemas. Oh, and I also forgot to mention pulse (Japanese version was called Kairo I think), AND the one missed call movie (I think that was the name), BOTH different takes on the undead genre (still ghost stories but they work far different than normal ghost stories).

@pan, the thing is, is that zombie movies are no longer scary, something like a wraith would add just the level of fear that zombie movies have been lacking. Killing a zombie is a piece of cake, and the worst that can happen is that someone gets bit and the viewer just goes (at best) 'daaaaaamn', but a wraith? Something that can go through walls AND deals some major physical damage? You can't fight that, you just run.

@Nohwear, those exist in the form of comedy horror zombie movies.

[Aranna]

Nohwear wrote:

I would argue that the main way to shake them up would be to create one that is a LOT less bleak.

Like Twilight?

[cmastah]

Aranna wrote:

Nohwear wrote:

I would argue that the main way to shake them up would be to create one that is a LOT less bleak.

Like Twilight?

If Twilight is the future of vampire movies I would argue that that's pretty bleak.

[Pan]

The original night of the living dead was freaky because of the atmosphere. Romero did a great job with the feelings the film incited. It still was all about the humans and not the monsters. You dont need to make the zombies themselves scary they are immaterial. I dont believe zombie flicks have ever been about the monster and dont think they need to be about the monster. If you want a scary horror film you should pick a different monster IMO.

[MMCJawa]

To me its not so much giving zombies new powers. I am fine in seeing more different types of movie monsters, including undead. To me the interesting element is what they do with the zombies in the context of the movie.

Compare Contracted or Dead Girl with any of the standard "zombies trap people in confined location". Those movies manage to use zombies in a complete novel way that is pretty horrifying.

[Alric Rahl]

Zombies as the next evolutionary Stage of Humans. Babies are born with rotting flesh yet still alive, they talk normal and everything but the only thing that satisfies their hunger is other flesh (not just human) and only raw flesh. This becomes a morale movie, in either scientists fix the problem or they let the evolution happen.

[Greylurker]

There are a couple of interesting Zombie ideas out of Japan

Magical Girl Apocalypse: an invasion of evil magical girls that turn people into zombie magical girls when they kill them.

Sankarea: Zombie romance story

and someone was telling me about a story where Vampires were protecting the last of humanity from the zombie hordes

[Pan]

Not sure if serious.....

[Kthulhu]

I think the virus zombie variant has become the most prominent because it's actually the most horrifying, if you think about it.

Voodoo zombies only propagate through voodoo rituals. Whereas virus zombies are the type that propagate through any of the normal means that a virus can be transferred...they're much more in line with an apocalypse than are the voodoo variants.

Even worse on a personal level, it also means that even the average layperson can understand at least the basics of what is happening to them, but they're still powerless to do anything about it.

[Kthulhu]

Also, the "scariness" of zombie movies is often more related to how the humans deal with the situation than the zombies themselves. Characters that retain their physical humanity often lose their metaphorical humanity, as they make choices that allow them to survive, but damn others to death or infection.

[Greylurker]

Pan wrote:

Not sure if serious.....

totally serious.

Sankarea is an excellent story about a girl getting a second chance at a life her parent denyed her and the boy trying to keep her from becoming a decayed flesh eating monster.

Magicaal Girl Apocalypse...just damn freaky and pretty gory. Magicaly spawned Zombie apocalypse so a lot more wierd and messed up than a normal zombie apocalypse.

[MMCJawa]

Ultimately...I mean at the end of the day the reason we continue to get generic zombie movies is that they are easy as hell to make. You can pull one off with relatively minimal make up and effects, and they are "simple enough" in behavior that you can pretty easily pull people off the street/friends/relatives and have them do a convincing job acting the part. And there are pretty much an infinite number of iterations you can do with zombies. Zombies on a Boat! Zombies on a plane! Zombies in a bathroom! So it's a really adaptable horror trope.

Wraiths are cool...but to pull them off you are really moving into expensive CGI effects, and I suspect you need a bit higher level of story telling to make them work.

Personally when I browse through netflix and such, I get ecstatic whenever I find a horror movie that tries a monster that just isn't zombies/ghosts/demonically possessed. I still hold dearly to the belief that the 80's were the golden age of horror, because you just had so much variety of films, and people finally had the practical effects and freedom to pull them off.

[MMCJawa]

Kthulhu wrote:

I think the virus zombie variant has become the most prominent because it's actually the most horrifying, if you think about it.

Voodoo zombies only propagate through voodoo rituals. Whereas virus zombies are the type that propagate through any of the normal means that a virus can be transferred...they're much more in line with an apocalypse than are the voodoo variants.

Even worse on a personal level, it also means that even the average layperson can understand at least the basics of what is happening to them, but they're still powerless to do anything about it.

Viral zombies do work better if you are going to take on apocalyptic or survival horror. But Voodoo zombies can be pretty horrific if you play up the idea of becoming someone's puppet, or having some third party in general mess around with your head. It's really in how you want to play that angle.

[Greylurker]

Played a neat game of "All Flesh" once. the Zombies were an alien invasion. The Aliens were kind of a slug that attached themselves the the spine of a corpse and made it move. Took the group a while to realize the Spine was the weak point (Lots of "Aim for the Head...oh god why aren't they going down").

Being aliens the 'Zombies' were telepathically linked, so if one saw you the rest saw you, and they were intelligent so as they got more used to controlling the bodies they started to use tactics and weapons.

Zombie Horde is one problem
Zombie Horde with shotguns is a whole different problem

[Valiant they were]

They did find a mass grave of a million mummies in Egypt so african tribesmen battle a million mummies after a vengeful witchdoctor animates them all.

[GreyWolfLord]

Instead of Viral Zombies...supernatural zombies would be much more scary.

A Virus stands a chance of finding a cure.

A Zombie that can turn you into a zombie by biting you...but it's not because of a virus...but just because...magic or something...

There is NO cure nor any possibility of a cure...

That's far worse.

However, I think most zombie movies aren't really about the zombies being scary, but how humans themselves are far more scary than the zombie.

The Zombie is a marker for something that is without sin, without vice, and without emotion. In some ways, they are the innocent. Sure, they'll eat your brains for breakfast, but they don't have any ulterior motives except eating.

Normally these movies focus on the evils humans do to each other. They use the zombies as tools to further their own agendas...and because of their own evil...turn out to be far worse than anything the zombies would be in and of themselves.