Walking Dead Research Paper

Jessica Bogie

3/29/13

Response Paper 3

Before our class started analyzing the Walking Dead I never viewed the show. Therefore, when it came time to write this paper I believed that the Walking Dead obsession was connected to our economic anxieties. However, to be fair to the series I decided to watch season one before making this blind assumption. And only after viewing season one’s six episode series, and particularly episode six, I realized that my opinion now swayed from the economic frustration to the fact that zombies do remind people of themselves as the creepy transformed flesh eating other. Therefore, I believe that people are infatuated with the Walking Dead because they can relate to the zombies and the characters, and because to some degree they believe that something like a zombie infestation could happen.

First of all, people can relate to the characters and the zombies. The Walking Dead is a soap opera of real emotions of how humans would survive and form/sustain relationships in a fallen world. This is why this idea tends to attract more than just the zombie lover fan base. As the creator of the Walking Dead said in the article by Lazar “It's very much about the fall of civilization and people banding together in order to survive. The theme jibes with many people's fears,” (Lazar 1). Therefore, it’s really not about the zombies but really about the people. Which is why many fans now make the assumption that the term “walking dead” doesn’t mean the zombies, but rather the living survivors who’s normal lives have ended and fates are decided for them.

Not only can people relate, but they also fear the real possibility of a zombie infestation. Now I don’t mean that people think the dead will walk the earth but maybe some advanced form of rabies will infect humans and cause them to run around like rabid animals. It sounds ridicules, but in the sixth episode of season one they explain that when bitten the human brain gets attacked by a disease that...