Being someone who isn't fond of the Spirit Box, I must admit that I'm a late comer to AMC's hit series, The Walking Dead. But I began watching it, and like a zombie I sat glued to the screen and finished all three seasons in about nine days.
Every zombie movie I've seen has been totally (no pun intended) brainless and a cheap way to exploit guts and gore to overcompensate for mediocre acting and shitty special effects. Keep in mind, that I am not really a fan of the horror genre, for all the aforesaid reasons; but this show is vastly different and does not get the proper analysis it deserves--
The Walking Dead uses the concept of "walkers" as a vehicle to explore vast philosophical questions like suicide, abortion, gun rights, utilitarianism, self-sacrifice, active/passive euthanasia, just to name a few. Not to mention Dale's rad allusion to William Faulkner, themes such as good cop vs. bad Darwin's theory of evolution (of course), the ongoing metaphor for the mindless walking consumers our society has produced, excellent archetypes and more that we will explore as this blog progresses.
What makes this show more compelling than most is that the characters are faced with the same daily moral questions they would otherwise have in their lives except they now deal with hyperized versions of them and with each of their moral dilemmas, the way they react forces them to choose to preserve the humanity they knew (or never knew?) by using human attributes we revere: bravery, honestly, loyalty, integrity, mercy, etc. or they must choose to digress their species by using attributes we dislike: selfishness, aggression, disloyalty, dishonesty etc. Each of their decisions controls the outcome of their species and who humanity is as a whole.
This blog will explore this thesis and many other themes, archetypes, symbols, and more. I will provide some (but probably not all) insight into each episode as I rewatch an episode every week. If you want to add anything, by all means, comment.
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