Killing Zombies -- Not As Easy As You May Think

My contribution to zombie lore is that it should be much harder to kill zombies than it is on TV and in movies. 

The ease with killing zombies is why zombies have had to adapt in the genre to becoming either "rage" zombies (which may or may not be alive -- 28 Days Later they seem to be alive but irrational; World War Z suggests that they are dead but still operate along the lines of the rage zombies), or fast moving zombies (i. e. Dawn of the Dead remake).

The 80s zombie resurgence of the Return of the Living Dead movies raised the threat level by requiring the entire zombie to be destroyed. The brain was not enough, the entire physical body had to be stopped. Why? Because the zombie is dead; therefore, destroying the brain of a dead thing does not make it more dead.

George Romero has a character explain in the opening moments of Diary of the Dead why zombies are slow moving, and why they must be slow moving -- "How many times have I told you? Dead things don't move fast. You're a corpse, for Christ's sakes. If you run that fast, your ankles are gonna snap off." This, of course, does not apply to the rage zombies. The remake of Night of the Living Dead also has a character express one of the main problems with the Romero genre of Zombies -- "They're so slow. We could walk right past them." And then later she more or less does. 

The Walking Dead has done a good job maintaining the Romero zombie vision, even including the point that anyone who dies becomes a zombie even though it initially was some sort of infection ala the Dawn of the Dead remake and other more contemporary zombie films. It even has the Romero solution of destroying, or more accurately, impairing the brain to permanently stop the zombie. But in that show, they have raised the risk by either having an unexpected zombie appear out of nowhere, or by zombies in large groups. 

Here is the problem as I see it: The Walking Dead established in its opening episodes that whatever causes the dead to reanimate does so by restarting portions of the brain. It does not restart the entire brain, but merely the portions of the brain that control motion and motor skills. If it restarted the entire brain, then the zombie would retain memories and reasoning skills and emotion -- all of which appear to be absent from the zombies. Therefore, destroying or impairing most of the brain should not stop zombies.

The portion that controls the motor functions -- that is, the ability to get up and walk around and maintain balance and bite people -- is the cerebellum. The cerebellum is located at the back of the brain, just above the brain stem. It is part of the older brain -- brain stem, hypothalamus, cerebellum -- and it controls stuff we do not have to think about. The hypothalamus controls breathing and heartbeats, freeing our brains from having to have to make ourselves breathe and our hearts beat. 

Since the zombie virus (or whatever it is) restarts the cerebellum, allowing the corpse to move and attack the living, then the only way to stop the zombie is by taking out the cerebellum. This raises the threat level of even the slow-moving zombies because the part of the brain that must be destroyed is in the back, and if you are fighting a zombie in a hand to hand combat situation, the part of the zombie's brain that you must destroy is behind the part that is in front trying to bite you -- and one small bite is all it takes.

A rocket or a gun that will explode the entire head or create a huge exit wound at the back of the head may do the trick. But an arrow, or a knife, or a sword, or a machete, must find its way to the back of the brain above the brain stem.

Reviews

[Scott Davis]

Good points throughout. Ive taken a different approach to zombie lore in my books which might explain why runing from one or two zombies turns in to being cornered by dozens. Some say it freaks them out more, lol.