Killing zombies. It has made a lot of people a lot of money.
From authors to movie studios to television series to comic books.
Zombies have been around for decades but the recent downturn in the economy drove them back to the fore again, placed at the front of our collective fears. Hollywood has produced movies like Zombieland and the forthcoming World War Z. The Walking Dead on AMC is one of the most watched television series—and its comic book series is approaching #100 issues. Authors like Max Brooks, Joe Schreiber, Stephen King, Robert Kirkman, H.P. Lovecraft, and Colson Whitehead have written novels on the subject, keeping people awake at night.
But I saw something odd a few days ago on Facebook. I try to keep an eye on what many professionals are doing in their respective spheres of influence, and that includes editors. The post in question was by an editor—who, yes, shall remain nameless. In it, he said in paraphrase:
“I am sitting here, late at night, making my way through the slush pile. And if I come across another zombie novel, I am going to lose it.”
This surprised me but I understand. All things are cyclical in the book industry and the recent boom in zombie fiction and entertainment will subside and give way to something else. I am surprised because I didn’t think an editor would say such things so soon. The zombie phenomenon appears to be going strong. It’s only been going a few years now, leaving what I perceive to be a great deal more undead fans wanting more.
Are there some forms of entertainment that excel at zombie stories? Is writing a unique zombie story difficult? Do readers have an attention span deficiency when it comes to books but not visual media? Is it hard to creatively separate oneself from others who are attempting to write novels in the same genre? Or is there a deeper reason for the editor’s distress?
I don’t have the answer. I’ve never been particularly fond of zombies in the first place. While I enjoyed the first season of The Walking Dead on AMC—enjoyed, but didn’t love like everyone else—the rest of the genre is just boring to me.
Maybe this editor doesn’t like zombies either?
What do you think about the editor’s comments? Are you tired of zombies? Are they truly in their brain-shot death knell? Or do you believe the more the merrier? Let them shamble and eat flesh forever?
I do imagine it’s different for editors. If everyone and their dog thinks they can write a zombie novel (how hard can it be?) then the editor’s going to see a lot of crappy zombies.
I think it is made worse because of the number of successful self-published zombie novels. Such as Wellington’s Monster Nation series.
And thank god you did not mention Brian Keene in that list of authors. A lot of people credit him as part of the zombie renaissance. But his stuff is garbage that breaks the bounds of any reasonable suspension of disbelief.
Zombies, romantic vampires, boy wizards, and courtship dramas featuring titles that promise dragons are never ever ever going to run their course. They will come in waves, and when they are “the last big thing” to saturate our bookshelves and eyeballs it always seems like they have done all they can do. Until they do more.
The zombie genre was played out in 1985 when Romero finished his foray into the land of the dead… but then 20 years later they came back, and felt really fresh and meaty all over again. We always think nobody can ever tell a different and fresh Zombie/vampire/wizard/lawyer/whatever story, until they do, and then it feels like nothing more can be done.
WWZ was amazing, 28 days later was amazing, walking dead is great, Feed was great, and they happened a lifetime after the zombie genre was alreayd played out.
I think that the sheer number of them is not the problem. It’s the quality. It’s hard to find something of the quality that Walking Dead is. For me, I am not interested in anything zombie, except Walking Dead.
I tend to agree with PB Sutherland in many aspects but would like to point out that it’s not the problem of the zombie culture per se. It is more the problem of the internet (meaning everyone can write and be read) and a nonsensical ego driven self help culture which has every wanna-be writer (be it books, comics or other media) do just that… write and want to be published.
I’ve read some zombie stories that made me just cry. Sometimes I feel like it’s little children writing this stuff. But again, it’s not a problem of the zombie genre it’s a problem of the zombification of society.
Also a few quick notes:
Zombies provide an excellent tabula rasa for metaphores, social criticism etc., and are thus appealing to various authors (I’ve even seen gay zombie fiction, vegetarianism spoofs…)
Zombies have been around for nearly 100 years
p.s.
personally… i like it, the more the better… more lousy works means more art works!
Most of the negative comments about zombies are based on assumptions. Romero didn’t invent the model. There have been stories about revenants (risen, malicious corpses) for thousands of years. George Romero’s flick NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD was largely his attempt to do a film version of I AM LEGEND. The vampires of Richard Matheson’s 1954 are sluggish, murderous, mostly-mindless monsters. Romero couldn’t get the film rights, so he changed the ‘vampires’ into ghouls, borrowing them from the legends of the ancient Arabian monster, the alghul.
Since Romero’s film was a hit and was so often copied, there is a tendency to accept his versions of these monsters as cannon. However, even the Romero zombies were not the same in each film. And they’re different than many perceptions. In NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD the zombies run, use basic tools (sticks, rocks), and eat more than human flesh. In DAY OF THE DEAD, a zom is taught to use a phone, speak, and even shoot a pistol. In LAND OF THE DEAD, zombies express grief, use various tools/weapons and even lead an intelligent and effective revolt. In SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD, a zombie rides a horse.
But the tendency of most folks –particularly those who don’t follow the genre, is to assume that all zombies are the same, and all zombie stories are the same. Sure, there are lots of grade-b imitators, but there is also a lot of fascinating literary, scientific, philosophic and creative exploration. Max Brooks’ WORLD WAR Z is a metaphor for how global politics can result in a mishandling of a disease outbreak, leading to a global pandemic. Joe McKinney’s DEAD CITY is an indictment of governmental failures in disasters such as Hurricane Katrina. S.G. Browne’s BREATHERS is biting social commentary. The new anthology coming out next week, 21ST CENTURY DEAD, includes stories by celebrated writers like Orson Scott Card –and each story comes at the genre from a different angle.
The reason good zombe fiction exists, and will continue to exist in fresh and exciting ways, is that the zombie is seldom the focus of the story. With few exceptions, zombies are mindless and are therefore a blank canvas. Once introduced they represent a massive, shared threat that each character in the story must confront (in one way or another). People under stress tend to reveal their true nature, which is why most forms of drama are about people encountering something dire –be that the loss of a love to the loss of life. Or a zombie apocalypse. The end result is that the story is about people.
Look at it from another perspective… people jump to say that ‘vampires’ are so five minutes ago; and ‘zombies’, etc. What about love stories? Mysteries? War stories? Medical dramas? romantic comedies? ANY trope is stale if no one is writing good material, but the thing is…someone is always writing good material. When a trope goes stale it usually means that the next slice of originality merely hasn’t been discovered by the mainstream audience. It doesn’t mean that good writing on that topic or in that genre isn’t out there.
I think we’re simply starting to reach a saturation point. Zombie fiction has gained in popularity in the last decade, and in response, everybody wants to capitalize on it as much as they can, and/or they’ve just been inspired to create their own. But I think we’re definitely reaching zombie overload. I am very much looking forward to the next season of The Walking Dead. I would also love to see a sequel to Zombieland. And I’m really interested in the film adaptation of World War Z (although I fear it will probably suck). But these are all continuations (or adaptations) of previously-established zombie franchises in which I’m already invested. I don’t think I could get interested in yet another new zombie story, even if it’s good.