The Undead and Us
John Feffer
"All this leaves the unanswered question: why? Yes, I know, we've been fascinated with vampires and ghosts and aliens and the Loch Ness monster for ages. But why zombies, and why now? Here are some conventional explanations:
1) Success sells: It doesn't matter what the "it" is; if people want some, they must want more. If suddenly philately became hot, George Clooney would star in Going Postal and there'd be a graphic novel series called Sense and Sensibility and Stamp Collecting. Aristotle said: everything in moderation. But who listens to Aristotle any more? Certainly not Hollywood.
2) It's all about the apocalypse: We've been worried about the world ending ever since the Mayans and the Book of Revelations. Nuclear holocaust has faded from the collective unconscious, and zombies are the new blackout.
3) Freud reminded us, as if we needed such a reminder, that it's all about sex and death. Vampires satisfy the former fixation, zombies the latter. We knock back a shot of eros from Anne Rice and the Twilight series, and then we follow it up with a chaser of thanatos from Max Brooks and The Returned."
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