Earlier this week the power went out at work, and naturally my first thought was-maybe it’s the zombie apocalypse-of course this made me question if my first thought was really natural-perhaps not so much. It could have been that on the way into work my husband and I heard about someone having hacked into those light up road signs and warning people that there were zombies ahead (something my husband thought was really cool and thought it would be fun to do until I pointed out the illegality of it….) but I think that this would have been my first thought regardless.
Now I don’t really believe that the zombie apocalypse is really a problem I need to prepare for (or do I?) but I’ve had an unnaturally curious interest in zombies since I was a little girl, before I even really grasped what zombies were. Marrying my husband has only served to increase it. I remember at the tender age of four my uncle sat me down to watch my first zombie movie. You can be assured that my mother had no knowledge of this and I, who was prone to nightmares, should have spent the night screaming-but I didn’t. I was entranced.
Throughout the years I have spent many an hour watching zombie movies. Romero is still probably my favourite director but the 28 days/weeks saga was also amazing. They actually accomplished something the Romero movies were never able to do-they made me jumpy for a good few days. Of course I can’t forget to give props to Peter Jackson’s death by lawn mower scene….that one is truly a classic. But, it wasn’t until university that I realized that zombies were more than just pure entertainment or a commentary on our mindless sheep-like consumerist society. Zombies had a purpose.
Watching zombie movies with my husband’s housemates, before my husband and I were dating, I found myself surrounded my zombie enthusiasts discussing things that I had never thought about before. Was this room defendable? Yes and no-the house my husband lived in back in those days, while it had its charms, should have been properly condemned for poor upkeep and housecleaning. The zombies, if they had any good sense (which typically zombies lack), would have avoided it like the plague (pun totally intended) but it had large windows….and was missing a window pane for a large period of time.....and probably would have collapsed should a zombie hoard try to lean on the house too hard.
Should zombies have attacked, what was the best available weapon? While the sword to person ratio in that household was unnaturally high, I knew perfectly well that unless I wanted to become the screaming defenseless girl in the movie, I’d need to wield something a bit lighter. And while at one point we did find some unspent amo rounds, there was a serious lack of guns. (I should put a disclaimer in here for my husband should he read this that NO, you still can’t store your hunting rifles in our apartment…not that you have any yet….and not that you’d do so before we got proper gun storage-I know how prudent you are with all of that…..) Even still, I knew that should zombies start walking the streets, this would be the house I would want to be in. The sheer amount of zombie knowledge and the amount of time these guys (and girls) had spent mentally preparing for this occurrence was amazing. No matter what they were faced with-typical slow movie zombies, the more terrifying running zombies, zombies brought about by aliens, disease, radiation-these guys would know how to handle things.
You see, zombies seemed to provide a bonding experience for these guys. Thinking about them, studying them and planning for them was a common ground for these geeks of different varieties. The gamer geek, the D&D geek, the movie geek and the comic book geek could all relate to zombies because they existed in each of their favoured mediums. In a zombie apocalypse, just like in a D&D game, these average geeks could become heroes among men even though both scenarios were entirely fictional.
Lately though zombies have taken on yet another purpose in my life. When my husband has a bad day at work or if he’s just not feeling like his usual self, zombies have become an outlet for him. All he has to do is turn on his Xbox and there he is, in the zombie apocalypse. Here, he is able to take out his frustrations by using an entire armoury of weapons from shot guns to machine guns to pipe bombs to destroy the enemy-an enemy we can all get behind killing because despite some recent defense for zombies, we all know that if someone who looked like a walking corpse came at you, moaning for your brains, you’d go for the head shot. Somehow, after this mindless killing spree, my husband can put a smile back on his face and life goes back to normal. I can get behind almost anything that makes him so happy.
Thank goodness for zombies.
No comments:
Post a Comment