# What's behind the zombie craze? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 12, 2013, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105 "2013-10-12T23:59:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Doug\_K](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5ac83/32.png) [@Doug\_K](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_K)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2013, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/61 "2013-10-13T23:24:00Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > And can you name one movie from that time frame that starred someone as famous as Brad Pitt? None of the movies you named are particularly well known, outside of a small demographic of horror movie fans. They are, without exception, low budget, small release (or no release, once VHS came around), cult films. _Army of Darkness_ has the closest thing to an actual budget out of the whole lot, and that one’s not even a zombie movie. Low budget? Dawn of the Dead had nearly double the budget of Halloween, which was released the same year, and also more than 1980’s Friday the 13th. Return of the Living Dead’s budget was nearly double that of Friday the 13th: A New Beginning the same year. None of the films I named were direct to video, and all of them had at least a fair amount of publicity. Return of the Living Dead introduced the whole “brainssss” concept, fercryinoutloud. Roger Ebert called Dawn of the Dead “one of the best horror films ever made.” I named the ones from the 70s because I remembered all the t.v. and radio ads for them from when they first ran. I graduated in 1978, and grew up in a small town that only had one indoor screen and one outdoor screen. We didn’t get cult films. We didn’t get small releases. We didn’t even get all mainstream films. But we got those. And as for big stars, well it just wasn’t common for “big names” to appear in any horror films, other than a handful of blockbusters. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2013, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/62 "2013-10-13T23:29:38Z")
> [@Came\_in\_like\_a\_Wrecking\_Ball](#): > > You can quibble about the definition of zombie all you want, every description of doom I’ve ever seen (including wikipedia) calls the undead marines zombies. I don’t think it’s a quibble to think that, for something to be a zombie, it at least has to be dead, first. That’s kind of fundamental to the concept. The “zombies” in Doom don’t even _look_ dead - they’ve got glowing eyes, but otherwise resemble normal humans. They’re also not significantly harder to kill than a human, succumbing rather easily to being shot in the chest. Oh, and they use guns. But, yeah, wikipedia calls them “zombies,” so that’s the important thing. > [@](#): > > Second, the fact that the columbine killers were obsessed with doom and even called their victims zombies surely warrants an (admittedly anecdotal) reference. No, I really don’t think that it does. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2013, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/63 "2013-10-13T23:37:39Z")
> [@Doug\_K](#): > > Low budget? Dawn of the Dead had nearly double the budget of Halloween, which was released the same year, and also more than 1980’s Friday the 13th. Return of the Living Dead’s budget was nearly double that of Friday the 13th: A New Beginning the same year. So it had a bigger budget than two other low budget horror movies? I’m not sure what that proves. > [@](#): > > And as for big stars, well it just wasn’t common for “big names” to appear in any horror films, other than a handful of blockbusters. Well, that’s kind of my point. Traditionally, horror’s been a bit of a ghetto, and the zombie movie a small subgenre of that ghetto. Now, we get giant Hollywood budgets and A list stars. Why is that? What changed, and why have zombie movies, of all things, been at the forefront of that change? ---
**Author:** ![the\_diego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2013, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/64 "2013-10-13T23:42:46Z")
It’s just this generation. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2013, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/65 "2013-10-13T23:46:44Z")
I think the facination isn’t so much with the zombies themselves. It’s watching society unravel and collapse because everyone who would normally be doing their job running everyday stuff is instead shambling (or sprinting) around killing or infecting everyone else. FWIW, I include rage-disease films like in 28 Days Later or The Crazies as well as posessed undead films. Personally, I find vampire stuff dull. They are usually about some brooding immortal, his relationship issues with some girl and sometimes having to deal with the stuffy and pretenteous beurocracy of vampire society. > [@Miller](#): > > Bad Ash? Doppelganger. He even comes out of a mirror. “Good. Bad. I’m the guy with the gun.” ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2013, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/66 "2013-10-13T23:50:58Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Not really. For one thing: no actual zombies in _Doom_. Sure there are. The possessed soldiers are officially, per id, known as “zombies.” That being said, just because Harris apparently used the one once means jack shit. No one ever claimed that zombies disappeared from public consciousness after 1985, just that they were less common. I honestly have no idea what you’re getting at, **Came in like a Wrecking Ball**. ---
**Author:** ![Came\_in\_like\_a\_Wrecking\_Ball](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@Came\_in\_like\_a\_Wrecking\_Ball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Came_in_like_a_Wrecking_Ball)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2013, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/67 "2013-10-14T00:18:42Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Sure there are. The possessed soldiers are officially, per id, known as “zombies.” > > That being said, just because Harris apparently used the one once means jack shit. No one ever claimed that zombies disappeared from public consciousness after 1985, just that they were less common. I honestly have no idea what you’re getting at, **Came in like a Wrecking Ball**. One of the debates in this thread is that zombie culture can lead to detachment from other humans and even violence against them. Columbine seems like a perfect example. Sheesh, eat my friggin flesh why dontcha? ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2013, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/68 "2013-10-14T00:21:19Z")
> [@Came\_in\_like\_a\_Wrecking\_Ball](#): > > One of the debates in this thread is that zombie culture can lead to detachment from other humans and even violence against them. Columbine seems like a perfect example. It’s really not. Klebold and Harris had been dead for five years by the time Dawn of the Dead/28 Days Later were released. ---
**Author:** ![dataguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/eada6e/32.png) [@dataguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dataguy)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2013, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105/69 "2013-10-14T00:24:26Z")
> [@Came\_in\_like\_a\_Wrecking\_Ball](#): > > One of the debates in this thread is that zombie culture can lead to detachment from other humans and even violence against them. Columbine seems like a perfect example. > > Sheesh, eat my friggin flesh why dontcha? My original question concerned reasons for the current popularity of zombies in our culture. Are you saying that one of the reasons is Columbine? I’m not really asking about the effects of zombies on the culture–that’s coming at it from the other side. Also, I’m not sure I share your interpretation that someone has argued that zombie culture leads to detachment and violence. I interpret more like detachment and violence can lead to zombie culture. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-behind-the-zombie-craze/671105.md?page=3)