# Why did the pet cemetary turn dead things evil?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [February 13, 2006, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187 "2006-02-13T00:29:35Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 5
### Author:  [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/81 "2006-02-15T04:36:10Z")
> [@Scylla](#):
>
> In all fairness, that’s because it wasn’t in there when the movie was new. It was only after the movie was panned that Verrhoeven took it and buried it in the Pet Sematary that people realized something evil was going on.
>
> What came back was **Showgirls: The Directors Cut DVD**
>
> I’m… sorry. I tried not to. I really did.
I don’t care who you are, that’s funny.
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### Author:  [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/82 "2006-02-15T05:31:47Z")
:::: Moderator grumbles ::::
HEY!! This thread is about Stephen King. Didn’t I just say that? … maybe an answer to the OP is that zombies are like some posters, they can’t hear well.
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### Author:  [@Sleel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleel)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/83 "2006-02-15T14:34:29Z")
> [@Snickers](#):
>
> It’s been a while since I read the book as well, but it seems to me (and I doubt this is supported at all by the text; it’s really just my impression) that intelligence mattered.
That was my take on it too. Where my interpretation is slightly different from yours is that I saw the bodies as a tool that the wendigo (sp?) used. Giving it humans to work with was giving it too good of a tool. Too much of it was able to manifest itself. I don’t think Gage, the cat, or the dog _wanted_ to or _intended_ to do harm–I think there was nothing left of them from the moment they died–I think it was the wendigo using their left-over bodies like waldoes.
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### Author:  [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/84 "2006-02-15T16:41:06Z")
> [@C K Dexter Haven](#):
>
> :::: Moderator grumbles ::::
>
> HEY!! This thread is about Stephen King. Didn’t I just say that? … maybe an answer to the OP is that zombies are like some posters, they can’t hear well.
Lord, I apologize…
Please feed the starving pygmies in New Guinea.
From what I remember (over 10 years ago, at least), **Sleel** has hit the jackpot. Plus, I must add: it seems like the reanimating force/demon/whatever is somewhat moody, making the windigos sometimes extremely violent, othertimes making them simply odd and disgusting.
I like Butters.
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/85 "2006-02-15T19:23:47Z")
> [@NoClueBoy](#):
>
> I like Butters.
It . . . must . . . FEED!
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### Author:  [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/86 "2006-02-15T21:10:26Z")
Why did the pet sematary turn resurrected corpses evil? Well, that’s just what you get when you go around ressurecting corpses. It doesn’t matter much why or how, there’s no good way to do it. The zombies from Pet Sematary are evil for the same reason the resurrected dead from Herbert West ReAnimator are evil–someone peppered in God’s lo mein. You do that, you better expect a heaping helping of evil. It doesn’t matter whether you bring them back using an ancient indian burial ground or long distance electrodes shot into the pituitary and pineal glands of the recent dead, you bring back the dead they they’re gonna be evil.
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### Author:  [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/87 "2006-02-15T21:26:41Z")
**Lemur86** You disgust me. Ignorant, uninformed, opinions like yours are exactly what holds back science.
‘But, Og, we have always lived in caves. This hut you plan can only bring trouble.’
‘We have stone and bone and copper. Your foolish plan to make bronze will doom us all.’
‘By the gods, we have bronze! If you attempt to make steel, you will surely destroy us all!’
‘Chocolate has always been a liquid. Your theories about powdered cocoa are the ravings of a lunatic!’
‘You can’t take the heart of a deadman and sew it into a living body! You call it a transplant. I call it the mad science of Frankenstein!’
‘Fools! Detonate the atomic bomb, and it will burn away the atmosphere of the earth!’
‘No machine can be made to think or calculate. This blasphemous idea is doomed to failure.’
Well, **Lemur86** , you can cower in your cave whimpering that scientists are doomed. Some of us are busy learning, experimenting, testing, and building a better future. You can tell yourself that there are some things man was not meant to know. I’ll keep working on a world of Dymaxion houses, hover cars, and friendly robots.
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### Author:  [@Try\_As\_I\_Might](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Try_As_I_Might)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/88 "2006-02-15T21:40:23Z")
> [@DocCathode](#):
>
> Well, **Lemur86** , you can cower in your cave whimpering that scientists are doomed. Some of us are busy learning, experimenting, testing, and building a better future. You can tell yourself that there are some things man was not meant to know. I’ll keep working on a world of Dymaxion houses, hover cars, and friendly robots.
Yeah, but you also know that ALLL robots are inherently evil and will kill us if we give them any loophole. This is well documented.
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### Author:  [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/89 "2006-02-15T21:42:42Z")
> [@Try As I Might...](#):
>
> Yeah, but you also know that ALLL robots are inherently evil and will kill us if we give them any loophole. This is well documented.
That was long considered to be the case. However, Professor Asimov disproved it as thoroughly as Pasteur disproved spontaneous generation.
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### Author:  [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)
#### Post date: [February 15, 2006, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/90 "2006-02-15T21:59:34Z")
> [@Lemur866](#):
>
> someone peppered in God’s lo mein.
Everyone knows you use soy sauce to season lo mein, not pepper! 😉
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### Author:  [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/91 "2006-02-16T00:24:44Z")
To those that have read _Cell_:
I can’t help but think that _Cell_ is part of the Dark Tower Universe. An origins prequel, maybe? What do you think?
(Not to hijack, but since this is the current King thread…)
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### Author:  [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/92 "2006-02-16T00:39:13Z")
…and _Cell_ has to be part of a series, right? This isn’t the last \*Cell \*book is it? There has got to be a part II?
If not, the ending that King chose as an easy out is unpardonable.
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### Author:  [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/93 "2006-02-16T00:45:50Z")
Sometimes I think he just gets tired of the book and wants to get some sleep. His endings many times suck major nelson.
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### Author:  [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/94 "2006-02-16T01:22:25Z")
They laughed at Galileo when he said the earth revolved around the sun. They laughed at the Wright brothers when they tried to build a flying machine. They laughed at Professor Brutallus when he tried to create an army of unstoppable robotic killing machines. They laughed at Doctor Destroyer when he tried to build a laser capable of blasting the Earth into microscopic dust particles. They laughed at Doctor Cyclops when he attempted to crossbreed humans and orangutans to create a subhuman servitor race. And now they’re laughing at me and my attempts to revive rotting corpses into a shuffling semblance of un-life. Fools, I’ll destroy them all! Seize them! Seize them!
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### Author:  [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/95 "2006-02-16T03:56:23Z")
> [@DocCathode](#):
>
> **Lemur86** You disgust me. Ignorant, uninformed, opinions like yours are exactly what holds back science.
Excuse me? This is Cafe Society, and personal insults are NOT permitted. You’ve been around long enough to know better, **Doc** , you should be ashamed of yourself. You need to do penance: go give some money to charity, and write “I will not cast personal insults in Cafe Society” 10 times on your blackboard. Handwritten, too, no cut-and-paste on the computer.
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### Author:  [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/96 "2006-02-16T04:04:46Z")
> [@C K Dexter Haven](#):
>
> Excuse me? This is Cafe Society, and personal insults are NOT permitted. You’ve been around long enough to know better, **Doc** , you should be ashamed of yourself. You need to do penance: go give some money to charity, and write “I will not cast personal insults in Cafe Society” 10 times on your blackboard. Handwritten, too, no cut-and-paste on the computer.
Either I’ve been whooshed, or I’ve missed a rule change.
If the first, well it won’t be the first time.
If the second, I thought that while actual insults were allowed only in the Pit, insults obviously made in jest and insults comprised of catchphrases from relevant material were allowed in Cafe Society.
Does this mean that when discussing Saturday Night Live, we can no longer post a dissenting opinion starting with “ **Screenname** , you ignorant slut.”?
No more telling other posters in Monty Python threads that their father reeks of elderberries, and that we fart in their general direction?
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### Author:  [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/97 "2006-02-16T04:25:18Z")
> [@DocCathode](#):
>
> Either I’ve been whooshed, or I’ve missed a rule change.
>
> If the first, well it won’t be the first time.
>
> If the second, I thought that while actual insults were allowed only in the Pit, insults obviously made in jest and insults comprised of catchphrases from relevant material were allowed in Cafe Society.
>
> Does this mean that when discussing Saturday Night Live, we can no longer post a dissenting opinion starting with “ **Screenname** , you ignorant slut.”?
>
> No more telling other posters in Monty Python threads that their father reeks of elderberries, and that we fart in their general direction?
Your references are not universal; I was totally whooshed too. Your rant read like pretty serious insults, to me at least. If you’re making an obscure reference that allows you to break a forum rule and call it satire, it would probably be safer to bracket it with [obscure reference]\_\_\_[/obscure reference]. Just a suggestion.
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### Author:  [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/98 "2006-02-16T04:44:53Z")
I dunno. The fact that his whole post was in response to the idea that it’s a bad idea to make zombies was a pretty good clue that **DocCathode** wasn’t being serious. It did take me a second to catch on, though.
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### Author:  [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/99 "2006-02-16T05:16:43Z")
> [@Miller](#):
>
> I dunno. The fact that his whole post was in response to the idea that it’s a bad idea to make zombies was a pretty good clue that **DocCathode** wasn’t being serious. It did take me a second to catch on, though.
I thought that he was A) overreacting, and B) implying an anti-stemcell-research agenda, or something along those lines. But mostly overreacting. I considered the possibility that he was joking, but then I realized that if _I_ had offered up such an extended deadpan insulting-attack-as-satire post, I’d have had my entire ass torn out and handed back to me as a hat. So there’s that.
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### Author:  [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2006, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-the-pet-cemetary-turn-dead-things-evil/344187/100 "2006-02-16T05:26:22Z")
Although, on reflection, I apologize for hijacking; I should’ve just let CK’s post stand and not put my two cents in.
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