This just occurred to me whilst streaming some TWD over the weekend. There sure are a lot of people who died in their cars (thus leading to a surplus of Walker Anti-Theft Systems®). You pull the door handle on three or four cars and you’re sure to have a walker tumble out of one of them. Also of note is that the car doors always seem to be unlocked.
So…these folks were so scared they stayed in their cars until they died of dehydration, but weren’t afraid enough to lock their car doors?
Or…ran out of gas / trapped in gridlock and decided to OD on something?
One of the creepiest “walker in car” moments for me was when one of the group popped the trunk on a car and there was a woman (turned walker) with her hands and feet bound. Tied up in the trunk of a car and if that’s not bad enough the fucking zombie apocalypse happens! Talk about your day going from bad to worse.
The walkers don’t seem to have the brainpower/dexterity to operate the door latch, locked or not. They would just try to paw or push their way through the glass.
Based on my experience driving little old ladies and children around, the brainpower and dexterity needed to operate a car door from the outside is a lot lower than what is needed from the inside.
Maybe they were bit and looking for help. I’ve wondered why there aren’t more naked ones. Wandering in the woods for months or years, clothes have to be falling apart.
Most of the abandoned cars seem to be at traffic pile-ups, accident sites, etc… so I’d assume most were either killed in the accident or died of their injuries.
Similarly, they may have been injured or bitten before taking refuge in the car.
Either way they may not have been able to lock all the doors, not sure it it would make much difference anyway.
Would the walkers “remember” how to open a car door and if so would they have the dexterity?
Secondly, why would they close the door afterwards?
Oh, I keep forgetting about the “smarter” zombies from the early episodes! Yeah, they tossed rocks, and one of them (Morgan’s undead wife) seemed to retain the ability to use a doorknob. Yeah, some of those just might have had the brainpower and ability to get out of a parked car. Then they got a lot dumber in the ensuing seasons.
I was just rewatching the earlier seasons, and there is an episode where the Governor goes to a nursing home to score oxygen tanks for Tara’s dad; there was a wheelchair bound ‘Walker’… would she be called a ‘roller’?
