The word means different things to different people. In today’s world, “zombie” is often taken as a metaphor for the nearly mindless white-collar cubicle slave1. In Vodou religion, the word can refer to the hapless, dominated victim of a sorcerer. Many think the whole “the dead rise to consume the flesh of the living” thing was a fresh innovation of the last century, but the Sumerian princess Ishtar first mentioned zombies after being slighted by Gilgamesh2. It seems almost as long as we’ve been writing things down, our dearly departed have been waking up and moaning for a quick bite to eat.
Whatever you call us, be it GMs, DMs or some other M, the best of us draw inspiration from the everyday world around us. It comes as no surprise, then, that when zombies are quickly supplanting Dracula and other iconic characters as the quintessential horror movie monster, the transition should begin to affect our games. Zombies are everywhere: there are comic books, movies, novels, songs, video games and even modeling websites3 incorporating everyone’s favorite dead cannibals. In the 21st century, it seems that Western civilization has zombies on the brain (pun definitely intended).
Here we will discuss numerous topics, starting with an analysis of why zombies are scary and why they work so well in literature and cinema. In a second installment, the “crunchy bits” of Zombie Horror will be explored, including template adaptations of zombies from cinema and literature.
Anatomy of the Dead
“Yeah, they’re dead… they’re all messed up.” - Chief McClellan4
The majority of this work will emphasize the walking dead, the shambling corpses we all know and love. However, in D&D, the traditional zombie (a corpse magically infused with Negative energy so it may walk around, attack its master’s enemies, etc.) is closely modeled after another mythological tradition: the victims of Vodou bokors on the island of Haiti. These poor souls are attacked using something called “zombie powder,” which places them in a coma so compelling it appears the subject has actually died. Preliminary hypotheses suggest the primary agent is probably tetrodotoxin, the toxin Japanese pufferfish use to defend themselves from predators. This is usually fatal, but as the theory goes, any bokor worth his salt would know how to spare his victim’s life.
Anyway, a day or two later (after the subject has been mourned and buried by his or her family), a healthy mix of further hallucinogenic drugs and “faith healing” is used and the victim is either revived or dies5. Assuming the former, more drugs are used to keep the hapless new zombie, well, “zombified,” and because Haiti’s economy is largely agricultural, slaves who can’t protest and have no capacity to even consider running away are supposedly quite lucrative.
By my estimation, this is similar to D&D’s archetypal zombie in that neither of them is based on a virus or disease, and neither variety consumes the flesh of the living. The Vodou zombies are simply mindless servitors compelled to do the master’s bidding, which is scary for two specific reasons. First (and this applies to all zombie types), and perhaps most importantly, when battling zombies the moral lesson is always that it could happen to you. This point is further driven home when your opponent is not dripping with gore or missing a limb, but is just like you in every way except for the “thousand yard stare.”
The other reason some players are made to feel uneasy around a bokor’s victims is similar to their apprehension about killing a dominated subject: it is not their fault. Theoretically, were it not for the evil sorcerer responsible, the PCs and the zombies would never have met on the field of battle. Also, there is always the chance that a cure might be found, making every kill cause for regret. No one will fault the brave heroes for defending themselves from the mob, but true heroes will always ask themselves, “Why didn’t we try harder to save them?”
Dead zombies, by comparison, at least have that in common but the circumstances of their death (and more to the point, the reanimating force that sustains them) are as varied as the movies and novels they appear in. Sometimes it’s supernatural, as seen in “classics” like The Evil Dead (1982). Here, there is often some evil force permeating the area when people die, fall asleep, become injured or are otherwise exposed to the corruption, they join the ranks of the walking dead and turn on their friends. This variety of zombie is frightening mainly because magical things are oft misunderstood and just plain creepy. It’s bad enough that you have to fight zombies, but zombies possessed by evil spirits are just too much to handle for some people. On the other hand, as seen in Jackson’s Dead Alive (1990), sometimes only the initial outbreak of the zombie plague is supernatural. Religious reactionaries, however, may see the signs and claim (Insert Group X here) are being punished for some transgression. The idea that the human race is cursed by the powers that be to do battle until the end of days with their fallen friends and families is scary in its own right.
If it isn’t magical, the DM has some explaining to do. First of all, viruses don’t work in dead tissue, which leads us to our next topic: contagion.
Zed Scratch Fever
“ Hour 16: Coma. Hour 20: Heart stoppage, zero brain activity. Hour 23: Reanimation.”6
Viruses can only replicate using a living host’s cells, and if those cells die the virus will eventually peter out too. So, there can’t really be a “zombie virus” capable of reanimating and sustaining a dead body unless the virus can radically alter the host’s body to suit its purposes. Bacterial illnesses don’t have this problem, but viruses are still favorable because the word is itself analogous to something insidious that you just can’t fully eradicate. The fear of avian flu, HIV/AIDS, and mutation of diseases that, in the Western world, were largely stamped out generations ago (TB and smallpox among them) is pervasive in our culture, evoking whispered references to the Black Death of the 14th century.
The virus itself is scary because, of course, no one likes being sick. I myself whimper and beg for merciful death like a wounded animal every time I get the flu so I certainly don’t want to come down with anything worse that, when it finally kills me, will turn me into an undead cannibal. This also touches on what most people in large urban centers feel toward their neighbors: paranoia. Who is already infected? What are the warning signs? If the CDC and White House had been giving press conferences all week saying the first symptoms were “flu-like,” would you want to sit next to anyone on the bus who couldn’t stop coughing? Almost everyone already hates or at least distrusts each other anyway, so when everybody you pass on the street may or may not “let loose the sick juice” on you, these feelings are only amplified.
As we’ve touched on before, difficult ethical questions are often raised when confronted with the undead. If you really want to watch your players squirm, place the PCs in charge of a quarantine zone: no one goes in or out, and if that impacts medical treatment or regular supplies of food and water, so be it. Doesn’t it serve “the greater good” to take extra precautions so the outbreak is contained? But what about the people inside who aren’t sick yet, and may be saved if the heroes would simply go in and kick some zombie butt? And if your friend is bitten in the process, do you execute him or wait to see if he can “fight it off?” These impossible scenarios are the hallmarks of a horror game. If you think they sound like fun, zombies are ideal.
Call of the Wild
“This eerie sound. . . serves as a rallying cry for other zombies.”7
What is scarier than knowing the undead are stalking the shadows, just out of sight? Knowing they are there because their moans mingle with the wind. In some specimens, moaning is coincidental: old habits die hard and the zombies don’t realize they no longer need to breathe. Sometimes, however, the dead use their cries as a distress beacon, crying out for help or summoning more zombies to the feast.
Cue terror when the heroes are being chased through a foggy forest at night, hunted and harried by the moans of the dead. They may not be able to see or hear the enemy but the zombies must surely sense them! If it’s dread or “cabin fever” you want to evoke, moans are best used when the PCs have barricaded themselves somewhere safe. Zombies know someone is inside but can’t quite reach them: kudos on battening down the hatches, but now the survivors’ real enemy is one another. The protagonists may have trouble sleeping the first week but it probably won’t take a month before they start going batty from all the “white noise.”
All that said, however, some writers take a different approach. Most notably in the new millennium, David Wellington’s zombie trilogy features shambling corpses who remain silent. In Monster Island he writes, “Their silence – the silence was the worst. People, real people made noise. These were the dead.”8 This says it all: when the enemy is no longer even capable of crying out if struck, their most unnerving aspect is the contrast between nature and abomination. In fact, in Wellington’s universe the zombies’ already bestial intellect degrades even further without regular fresh meat, to the extent they actually forget how to hunt and can’t prevent scavengers from feasting on their undead flesh.9 This makes no sense at all, which is why it terrifies the audience. In this light, zombies are not a reflection of the human condition but a stark contrast of it; we have more in common with insects.
Dead Can Dance
“Remember the story of the tortoise and the hare. . . the hare stands a good chance of being eaten alive.”10
When asked to describe a zombie’s physical characteristics, what is the first thing that comes to mind? It is often not their state of decomposition or their taste for human flesh; these may only be apparent when the undead are at your throat. From a distance, what distinguishes zombies from humans is their slow, jerky shuffle.11 Real people don’t walk like that because not only are our muscles still living and breathing, most of us have adequate motor reflexes. Many critics of the zombie genre fail to see the point because if the average person who doesn’t even exercise regularly can walk faster than the monsters, what’s the point?
The point is the zombies don’t care. Emotionless, dogged and undeterred, the walking dead won’t quit until they or their quarry are dead. Similarly, a zombie will theoretically continue to pound at a barricaded door his prey fled behind until his arms disintegrate or until something new draws his attention. In Snyder’s recent homage to Dawn of the Dead we can see this supernatural persistence at its best: during the parking garage sequence, several characters hold off the undead by dousing the mob in gasoline and setting them ablaze. Disturbingly, they don’t seem to notice.12
What hope do the living have against such patient predators? If a survivor barricades himself inside a home and destroys the staircase leading to the second floor, he has passed Zombie Preparedness 101. But unless he has enough food and water to last until the dead outside literally rot to pieces, our intrepid hero has only sealed his own tomb.
Similarly, while it really has more to do with them not seeing each other as food, the eerie tendency of zombies to congregate in large mobs evokes a terror of “Them” in every Westerner. We have grown accustomed to our personal space being respected; most people are a little uncomfortable standing in line in a crowded supermarket or surrounded by thousands of people at a rock concert. Also, and this touches on the terror of infection mentioned above, the idea that given enough people on the other side we could be convinced of doing crazy and dangerous things is a powerful social dynamic. So-called “mob justice” only requires a few instigators to whip the others into a frenzy: oftentimes, participants in stonings or police riots or what have you will admit they weren’t thinking at all and just “got caught up in the moment.”
Exploiting this fear in players is easy: lay it on thick with details about how zombies are crammed together in a relatively small space, closer than shoulder to shoulder. A specimen may not notice if it takes an elbow in the eye, its attention fixed on the heroes. As one, they shamble toward the living, arms outstretched. The strong implication here that they want only to grasp and absorb their prey, or that survivors are somehow outsiders and the zombies want to welcome them back into the flock is welcome.
The Whites Of Their Eyes
“BOOM! Headshot!” – FPS Doug13
I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t at least mention the nearly universally accepted theory that to neutralize a zombie, the brain must be destroyed. It doesn’t matter how you do it: shotguns, ice picks, bricks, sniper rifles or broken croquet mallets will all do in a pinch. All great monsters throughout human history have one thing in common, and that is that they are largely indestructible save for one fatal weakness. Remaining within the confines of Gothic Horror, “classic” monsters like vampires or werewolves can only be killed by being staked through the heart or exposed to silver, respectively (occasionally the line between the two monsters is blurred and vampires share the silver allergy).
This is no different. The use of an “Achilles heel” for the monster serves two purposes: first, it gives the heroes a story goal, something to work toward to keep the plot momentum going. Regarding zombies, if a cure is unavailable at least the secret of their destruction might help turn the tide. Second, and perhaps most importantly, before the secret is uncovered the zombies are in charge. There is nothing difficult about evoking despair if the heroes, throwing everything they’ve got at the threat, can’t even deter their foe.
The problem is that it is almost impossible to find someone today who doesn’t know how to kill a zombie. The “secret” of destroying the brain is very ill kept; indeed, the only people who don’t yet know how to handle the walking dead are characters in novels or movies that face exactly that dilemma. Feel free, then, to substitute “destroy the brain” with anything that comes to mind. Maybe the zombies in your game must be burned or perhaps another organ is their weak spot. In the case of truly supernatural zombies, it could be that no amount of slicing, dicing, exploding or the like will avail the heroes until some specific event has taken place (virgin sacrifice or the reading of sacred incantations come to mind).
When There Is No More Room In Hell…
“An undead world will have as much. . . impact on the global ecosystem [as] the last ice age.”14
It is important to remember that traditional, fantasy RPGs gloss over or make light of the terrifying menace zombies represent: a bastardization of life, a blank slate onto which we can project all of our own malice. If in your games the heroes typically duke it out with zombies or other undead and, moments later, continue on their way as if their foe were just like any other, the previous information is likely not for you. If instead you’ve been craving something more, in our next installment we will discuss the “tools of the trade” in the d20 System for constructing horror encounters, as well as some examples of zombies from your favorite books and movies.
1 Maddox, Alphabet of Manliness (New York: Citadel Press, 2006), 195.
2 Epic of Gilgamesh, trans. by Maureen Gallery Kovacs (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), Tab 6.
3 Zombie Pinups, <http://www.zombiepinups.com/> (1996).
4 George A. Romero, Night of the Living Dead (1968).
5 Bob Corbett, “Some Reflections on Wade Davis and His Essay: The Plants of the Gods” (Webster University: 2000).
6 Max Brooks, The Zombie Survival Guide (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2003), 3.
7 Brooks, 16.
8 David Wellington, Monster Island (New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2006), 35.
9 Wellington, 101.
10 Brooks, 13.
11 “Zombie Walk,” Wikipedia <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie_walk> (2006).
12 Zack Snyder, Dawn of the Dead (Los Angeles: Universal, 2004).
13 “Episode 5,” Pure Pwnage <http://www.purepwnage.com/episodes/5/> (2006).
14 Brooks, 180.
