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Odd title I know, sorry but couldn't think of any other thing Ok so our club is starting to get in to SoTR and it looks good. Now I'm holding back as I'm too impressed with the occult stuff, by this I mean that Europe has a whole shed load of mythology and us Brits get no real occult characters. Anyway that aside, one of the major horror monsters used in the game are Zombies (cop out if you ask me). So this is what got me to thinking about them and what they do and also the concept of Werewolves.

My two queries are this:

Why is it that Zombies are always shown trying to eat the living? They're dead for crying out load! What purpose does eating serve to an animated corpse? It's not going to digest, it's going to sit there in the stomach doing nothing... or falling straight out of the holes in the stomach!?! See my point?

Werewolves... why do stories have them eating people? I mean Wolves are not known for killing humans and humans (unless they crash into the side of a remote mountain) don't general go around eating human flesh. So why when the two mix do they become human flesh eating monsters? Heightened senses, stronger and faster I understand.

So that's my random thoughts for the day out of the way

Wolfstan wrote:
Why is it that Zombies are always shown trying to eat the living?

Werewolves... So why when the two mix do they become human flesh eating monsters?

1. Only the rough instinctual area's of the brain are left, thus they follow out basic urges built into our brains, for example to eat something that isnt rotten and the nearby humans are the easiest option.

2. closest supply of easy meat i guess.

Not sure about the zombies part. My guess? Back in the day, people who were prematurely buried (surprisingly common) got out and were hungry and people freaked out and assumed they were out to eat human flesh.

The werewolves one is probably a mix of idiots running into a starved wolf and getting attacked or people getting attacked by a rabid wolf. Exaggerations ensued and then they became "man-wolves".

Monsters in general are made up to viciously attack and eat humans. They are usually (with exceptions of zombies) intelligent creatures, but what separates them from humans is that they will unprovokedly attack and eat people, which is generally considered sociopathic behavior. The eating of people is what truly dehumanizes 'monsters' and helps set a sort of moral high-ground when some hero comes along and mindlessly slays the monster.

Pretty simple really. People are afraid of dying painfully. Being eaten-sub-section of the painfully dying fear, and also a major obstacle to survival when and where we weren't exactly the top of the food chain.

Being fed upon is a primordial fear, and therefore everything we make up to be afraid of wants to eat us.

Railguns wrote:Pretty simple really. People are afraid of dying painfully. Being eaten-sub-section of the painfully dying fear, and also a major obstacle to survival when and where we weren't exactly the top of the food chain.

Being fed upon is a primordial fear, and therefore everything we make up to be afraid of wants to eat us.

Exactly right,this is why "Jaws" had such impact with people.

I think big stuff scares us a lot, but swarms of smaller stuff tends to freak us out even more.

Hence the swarm of zombies being terrifying. One giant zombie is not all that scary, compared to a horde of brain-hungry undead.

Oh, and zombies are HUMAN!!! NO, not you Ted... Please, stop... DIE, TED DIE!!!

If you think about it a little bit more I would say most people have a greater fear of never dying than dying at all. Imagine the amount of pain you would have to endure by living forever, you would understand what the Hellraiser movies are really speaking about, but no one would be there as long as you... pretty lonely stuff.

Fear of being alone is what it really comes down too.

The reason zombies eat people is because zombies are a metaphor for the unskilled working class in an industrial society. Zombies lacks any capacity to learn and rise above what they are; they rely on physical force and a large group working to a similar goal (assembly lines, factories etc.) to overcome obstacles. Living humans are the "elite" upper class who use their brains(knowledge), control of technology and better coordination (government) with a smaller group to suppress zombies. Zombies desire the brain specifically because it represents what the lower class believes is an escape from their lot, which is education. Zombies can only become free by casting off the shackles of society and devouring (rebelling) the old order.

As for werewolves, they's plain messed up.

When the zombie apocalypse occurs we'll be asking the same questions... the same damn questions...

2012 man.......2012.....

Nom Nom Nom

Wolfstan wrote:Why is it that Zombies are always shown trying to eat the living? They're dead for crying out load! What purpose does eating serve to an animated corpse? It's not going to digest, it's going to sit there in the stomach doing nothing... or falling straight out of the holes in the stomach!?! See my point?

Werewolves... why do stories have them eating people? I mean Wolves are not known for killing humans and humans (unless they crash into the side of a remote mountain) don't general go around eating human flesh. So why when the two mix do they become human flesh eating monsters? Heightened senses, stronger and faster I understand.

For Night of the Living Dead, Romero and Russo admitted they drew heavily from the book, I am legend. In I am Legend they were essentially zombie/vampires that needed human blood to feed the bacteria that exists within them, although many (not all) were in fact dead and reanimated by the bacteria while others survived and found alternate food sources (i.e. the smart ones)

With me so far?

So, back to Romero and Russo. Night of the Living Dead on through Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead all used Romero's metaphor for eating the living as the 'new' society (i.e. Zombies) consuming the old (i.e. the living) one as they slowly became the dominant life on Earth. The colorful description that avantgarde laid down really didn't come into play until Romero's fourth Zombie masterpiece Land of the Dead.

Now Return of the Living Dead, written and directed by Dan O'Bannon (the first and good one and, I might add, a 'legal' sequel to Night of the Living Dead, not the multitude of crappy sequels) introduced the idea of zombies going specifically for brains. Apparently eating living brain tissue made the pain of dying go away temporarily. This information came right from a zombies mouth. It can only be speculated on that the active neurons somehow help the zombies by dulling the pain of rotting.

Okay, on to Werewolves. Werewolves never traditionally ate people any more than any other food source. Humans are just plentiful. The Wolfman starring Lon Chaney Jr. had the cursed wolfman attack people with aggression because he was cursed, not because he was hungry. American Werewolf in London, introduced the idea that Werewolves attacked, killed and ate specifically humans. The reason? John Landis (writer/director) said it himself. (paraphrased) "Lycanthropy is like cancer, instead of killing you, it kills everyone around you." Since cancer literally feeds off of healthy living tissue, we can only assume he also meant that as eating others as well because the character of David was well on his way to eating through half of London with an incredibly voracious appetite, like cancer.

Does this help?

Funny then that the middle class suffers just as much or more than the upper class in these prole-zombie uprisings. I wonder what that means. Though didn't Return involve zombies created by some nerve gas that were literally unkillable without completely incinerating them? The movie strikes me as a much less, ahem, cerebral, horror jab than Romero's work.

Railguns wrote:Funny then that the middle class suffers just as much or more than the upper class in these prole-zombie uprisings. I wonder what that means. Though didn't Return involve zombies created by some nerve gas that were literally unkillable without completely incinerating them? The movie strikes me as a much less, ahem, cerebral, horror jab than Romero's work.

Well, in this (and I believe the movie Metropolis) metaphor, the Middle and Upper Class are both the Bourgeois. They enjoy the fruits of the Proletariat's labor so they both pay the terrible price. I will say the Bourgeois/Proletariat analogy didn't come from Romero (i don't think so, anyway).

As for Return of the Living Dead, Dan O'Bannon combined Night of the Living Dead with The Crazies as he apparently was a fan of Romero and Romero never really explained why zombies reanimated. He suggested it (i.e. characters speculated) but never really explained it. In The Crazies Romero's crazy people were exposed to (drum roll) a type of gas developed by the military for combat purposes! And yes, the zombies in Return of the Living Dead were nigh indestructable.

Know who's really been left behind?

Vampires. We haven't had a good vampire movie in God knows how long. Twilight doesn't count, Edward is too sparkly to be a vampire and he's a stalker anyway.

When are we going to see a new Dracula or Nosferatu? The last movie about a vampire that I enjoyed was Van Helsing. I thought that did quite well because it displayed not only the human side of the vampires, but their scary demonic form as well.

Mind you, Underworld is supposed to be a fresh take on the vampire/werewolf mythos, but I still haven't seen it.

If you have the means, I would suggest The Night Stalker. Yes the old Kolchak movie (in 1972 I think) in my home town (back when it was more of a town). I just watched that again recently and it holds up really well. Good Vampire flick.

Yeah, thanks to Anne Rice, Vampires got WAY too crappy. Don't misunderstand, she offered some interesting takes on Vamps but her later stuff and the damned Vampire: The Masquerade game really crappified Vampires in general. Also, check out a movie called Let the Right One In its more contemporary, but it is foreign. Its about a teenage Vampire, but don't let that fool you, it's no Twilight. Thankfully, it is nothing like Twilight at all. For starters, its good.

I just read about Night, and during one of the radio(?) broadcasts the characters here it is speculated that the dead are reanimated by the radiation from a Venus probe that exploded in the atmosphere. Doesn't sound like a real explanation though, more like a guess as to why when the popular portrayal of radiation could do anything. I know I've read the Marx-ish metaphor about the series too, I don't think it even comes up in the first movie, which everyone believed was making a racial statement.

Cheese Elemental wrote:Know who's really been left behind?

Vampires. We haven't had a good vampire movie in God knows how long. Twilight doesn't count, Edward is too sparkly to be a vampire and he's a stalker anyway.

When are we going to see a new Dracula or Nosferatu? The last movie about a vampire that I enjoyed was Van Helsing. I thought that did quite well because it displayed not only the human side of the vampires, but their scary demonic form as well.

Mind you, Underworld is supposed to be a fresh take on the vampire/werewolf mythos, but I still haven't seen it.

Watch True Blood.

I'm not scared of zombies, and I'm even less scared of zombies that are actually poor people.

What we need is some good mythological monsters. When's the last time you saw the Hydra go on a rampage throughout New York? Never, probably, but it would be cool.

It's harder to make a "whoah,like, DEEEP" metaphor about single big monsters? Usually big monster movies are 1 dimensional destruction derbys. Cloverfield was interesting though.

avantgarde wrote:Watch True Blood.

Don't the Vampires in True Blood have sex? If they do, count me out. Sexuality for a Vampire was simply a tool to get close to prey, nothing more. Again, Anne Rice started the crapification and its been getting worse since. Of course I haven't really seen True Blood so I guess I should hold my comments.

Vampires are supposed to be dead things (unless you count The Vampire Tapestry). I like my ghouls to be ghouls. Whether blood suckers, brain eaters or flesh rippers.

I'm sure someone thinks having two heads grow back when one is chopped off is a metaphor for something.

Railguns wrote:It's harder to make a "whoah,like, DEEEP" metaphor about single big monsters? Usually big monster movies are 1 dimensional destruction derbys. Cloverfield was interesting though.

Yikes! I hated Cloverfield. Actually, it was all the 'human drama' that bored me to tears. I really didn't care for those people, it felt like I was watching Dawson's Creek in Tokyo! Godzilla has some great metaphors throughout the series. Unfortunately they are spread out over too many movies and surrounded by sometimes cheesy special effects.

I've seen an episode or 2 of True Blood. It looks to be about Vampires trying to peacefully integrate into a Southern community. I think there is a love sub-plot, but I haven't seen too much of it.


PS. Loved Godzilla movies. Godzilla vs. Whatever the Pollution Monster's name was was great. Cloverfield was interesting not because of the "human drama" hurk as much as I liked to watch how those hopeless college grad aged kids would get wasted. You usually don't get to see what happens to the random screaming citizens in a Kaiju-style movie. That and I love giant monsters.

GoFenris wrote:

avantgarde wrote:Watch True Blood.

Don't the Vampires in True Blood have sex? If they do, count me out. Sexuality for a Vampire was simply a tool to get close to prey, nothing more. Again, Anne Rice started the crapification and its been getting worse since. Of course I haven't really seen True Blood so I guess I should hold my comments.

Vampires are supposed to be dead things (unless you count The Vampire Tapestry). I like my ghouls to be ghouls. Whether blood suckers, brain eaters or flesh rippers.

What's worse, they're respected citizens. What the feth, they should be running around seducing people and turning them.

Well not exactly, they're kind of like gays where they have their own hang outs, people don't trust them and nutty religious groups attack them.

Most of the vampires are self-entitled manipulative dicks, who go around abusing human and doing whatever they want. The protagonist vampire is more tolerant (barely).

avantgarde wrote:Well not exactly, they're kind of like gays where they have their own hang outs, people don't trust them and nutty religious groups attack them.

Most of the vampires are self-entitled manipulative dicks, who go around abusing human and doing whatever they want. The protagonist vampire is more tolerant (barely).

OH! So its like Rules of Attraction, the television series without the self loathing. I get it.

Thanks for the Zombie info, it does back up my feeling that there actions were artificially added by modern society. I remember an episode of Blood Ties that had Zombies and they were the voodoo ones. Animated corpse that was strong and unstoppable, not a flesh eating machine.

Vampires? Film & TV seems to of milked that sublect to death recently, although I still like the stories. Underworld is a good concept and I think would make a great RPG

I remember paying a great vampire game set in 3 different times. You started in the middle ages and went up to current times.

In short stage one, swords and bows

Stage two: BIG FREAKING GUNS

I have been trying to remember the name, but I can't seem to find it. Does anyone know what I am talking about?

It is a RPG, you are a vampire and I think you might get allies, actually I am pretty sure you get a team to play with.

It reminded me a bit of the devil may cry series w/o all the fancy jumping. Man, I need to play this game again.

"Note"
I think it might have been Vampire: the masquerade, not sure though.

GoFenris wrote:If you have the means, I would suggest The Night Stalker. Yes the old Kolchak movie (in 1972 I think) in my home town (back when it was more of a town). I just watched that again recently and it holds up really well. Good Vampire flick.

The Night Stalker was/is absolutely great,IMO both the movie and the old t.v show still hold up fairly well today.
And while on the subject of Kolchak and vampires,the episode with the female vampire in Las Vegas was pretty darn good as well.

Sorry, after reading some post's on this thread all I can think about now is a giant horde of zombies and werewolves slowly lumbering towards a band of humans, muttering.

Nom, nom, nom, nom

In a slightly whimsical yet deeply creepy and sinister fashion, VERY worrying O_o