Zombie Talk: Gruesome, Gory and Grabby

[ghoulina]

Yea, I always wondered about Penny's food and leaned towards thinking the Guv would kill people and bring her fresh meat. 

[CletusMusashi]

It might not even have been human, as long as it was fresh.

A cute puppy looks like it might become more popular than the Governor? Zombie food.

A chicken is discovered not to have a framed picture of the Governor in its coop? Zombie food.

There's even movement stimulus involved, since she'd see the food being carried to her.

Herschel's family had to use live food because it's easier to just drop in and still have it be palatable. But they were dealing with an entire barn full of (mostly) adult Walkers. Doing it up close and personal like the Gov would have resulted in immediate disaster.

Edited December 30, 2014 by CletusMusashi

[kikismom]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2865792/The-science-ZOMBIES-Neuroscientists-reveal-anatomy-undead-s-brain-avoid-dinner.html

 

Sighntisstz explain zombies.

[Bongo Fury]

Maybe he heated her food up for her a little bit. Or, maybe it was freshly cut from somebody who he thought was was plotting against him. We don't really know how many secret dungeons the Gov actually had.

 

In the comics, the Governor

cut Rick's hand off and fed it to Penny.

[CletusMusashi]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2865792/The-science-ZOMBIES-Neuroscientists-reveal-anatomy-undead-s-brain-avoid-dinner.html

 

Sighntisstz explain zombies.

It's a psychology article, so I'm fine with suspending disbelief about why, say, destroying the heart and lungs doesn't bother them. But what does bother me is that, while it acknowledges how bad they are at recognizing people, empathizing with people, or social cues... they still seem to have this solid idea in their head that anybody who acts like they do must be a zombie friend. WTF?

[AngelaHunter]

they still seem to have this solid idea in their head that anybody who acts like they do must be a zombie friend. WTF?

 

I thought they ignored anyone who smelled like them, and that smearing zombie goo over one's body would be a good camouflage as the smear-ee would smell dead.

 

That doesn't explain why Michonne's "pets" would shield her though. She walked in front of them and that wouldn't stop other zombies from picking up her un-dead scent. It made no sense.

[kikismom]

I thought of another yard-clearing device to prevent the walkers from piling up at fences or surrounding a house.

 

Just get a large cage, above it put a covered rubbermaid trash can filled with water and a little hole at the bottom for water to come out drip by drip. Then next to it hang a trash can full of grain pellets or dog food with an opening that dispenses a few pieces every time a rat pushes a lever in the cage. But fix the lever so that every so often, instead of dropping food, it opens a small hatch at the bottom of the cage and drops a rat or two out. Rats reproduce so fast they would replace their own numbers, and they would stay well fed and lively in the cage. Walkers would surround the cage hanging from a tree, and when they learned that it dropped live animals sometimes, they would stay there. Just like old ladies stay at a slot machine thinking next time is gonna be the jackpot!

[Bruinsfan]

Bwah! Reminds me of this comic!

[kikismom]

Did you watch 28 Days Later? Here is a timed quiz game:

 

http://www.funtrivia.com/html5/index.cfm?qid=153254

[Irishmaple]

I got six right, all of them wild-ass guesses.  I really need to rewatch that movie.  The quiz started and I'm sitting there going "Who's Frank?" 

[kj4ever]

Don't think so - Gimple appears to be specifically alluding to an other-than-human threat.

 

THIS is the path down which my diseased little brain chose to wend. Whether it be through mutation, or accumulation in a host to some "critical mass" or tipping-point level, we've already seen one significant shift in the Zombie Virus since the start of the ZA. If the ZV is that active, perhaps it's overdue for another...?

• ZV1: Virus exists external to host. Only spread through direct exposure (bites/scratches); kills, then activated upon death.
• ZV2: Virus already resident in hosts. Same activation path as ZV1; in addition, host-resident virus activates upon death, even if from natural causes.

So - assuming another mutation, or sufficient ZV virus accumulations in hosts to reach yet another tipping point, what are the possibilities for ZV3?

One really juicy possibility which comes to MY mind is the virus no longer having to wait for death to activate - it could spontaneously go active in a living host, and start changing people to walkers while they're still alive. Perhaps in conjunction with another condition - a cold, flu, or other illness/infection which weakens the host's immune system. Which opens up even MORE possibilities; would the person have to be deathly ill, or could they turn from a hangnail?

Thoughts?

 

My thoughts are you are fucked in the head because if dying and coming back to life wasn't scary enough, for both the person dying and the people around them, imagine how terrifying zombies randomly popping up with no warning would be.

 

i think I love you.

[Nashville]

My thoughts are you are fucked in the head because if dying and coming back to life wasn't scary enough, for both the person dying and the people around them, imagine how terrifying zombies randomly popping up with no warning would be.

 

i think I love you.

In that case, get ready for adoration - because THIS associated possibility just popped into my mind and brought me scurrying back over to this thread:

If the ZV could take over the host prior to death, and avoid any associated period of brain death, would the new zombie still be able to think?

[kj4ever]

In that case, get ready for adoration - because THIS associated possibility just popped into my mind and brought me scurrying back over to this thread:

If the ZV could take over the host prior to death, and avoid any associated period of brain death, would the new zombie still be able to think?

Perhaps....and the show would be done then because there would just be a bunch of thinkin' zombies running around.  Humans would never survive that.  Remember when they were trying to escape from Atlanta and that Zombie hopped the fence, and the other zombie was using a brick to smash the window?  I think they figured out early on that they couldn't let them do things like that.

[Nashville]

Perhaps....and the show would be done then because there would just be a bunch of thinkin' zombies running around.  Humans would never survive that.  Remember when they were trying to escape from Atlanta and that Zombie hopped the fence, and the other zombie was using a brick to smash the window?  I think they figured out early on that they couldn't let them do things like that.

I wouldn't expect them to still be high-functioning; a bunch of zombies throwing around hypotheses on non-Euclidean geometry would be duller than watching dogshit dry. Remember, though: in the early days of the ZA, the freshly turned still retained a limited degree of memory and/or higher cognitive function - Morgan's wife seemed to stay in continual orbit around her house, for example, and she retained some trace memory of how doorknobs work. It wouldn't have to be much; maybe an increased degree of instinctual cunning, or developing the ability to hunt in coordinated packs. SOMETHING just enough to elevate them from their current status of deadly-but-predictable annoyance.

[kj4ever]

I wouldn't expect them to still be high-functioning; a bunch of zombies throwing around hypotheses on non-Euclidean geometry would be duller than watching dogshit dry. Remember, though: in the early days of the ZA, the freshly turned still retained a limited degree of memory and/or higher cognitive function - Morgan's wife seemed to stay in continual orbit around her house, for example, and she retained some trace memory of how doorknobs work. It wouldn't have to be much; maybe an increased degree of instinctual cunning, or developing the ability to hunt in coordinated packs. SOMETHING just enough to elevate them from their current status of deadly-but-predictable annoyance.

Morgan's wife is still the creepiest zombie I've seen on the show.  I thought it bought into the whole instinct part of the brain.  Women are programmed to hear their children cry, and when Dwayne started crying she came to the door, whether she actively knew why or not.  It just gave me the heebie jeebies.

[iRarelyWatchTV36]

• So, after the S5 finale, I learned that metal chains and zombie skulls do. not. mix.

 

• Like others, I don't like the 'script inconsistencies' given to what walkers can and can not do, in any given situation.  Take, for instance, the walker that Rick decided to wear the inside of its cranium to the meeting.  It looked like Rick had to seriously work to keep it from biting him and then forcing the gun through the bottom of its face.  How is a decaying body still able to produce the strength/force to make a strong living person need to use all their strength to defeat it?  Another thing about that whole 'fight', if bones (skulls) soften right away, why did Rick have to work so hard to force the gun through decaying flesh??

 

• Based off that last point, when needed, some walkers are strong and some aren't.  I can't help but (morbidly) laugh at how easily the walkers pulled Noah, both out of the door and out of Glenn's grasp.  Even if there were a few pulling at the same time, where's the strength coming from?  And why not bite right away??  They didn't do any biting or eating until he was fully pulled back into the building and somehow tore away enough from them to plaster himself to the door so Glenn got the full "In Your Face, in technicolor" experience out of it.

 

Morgan's wife is still the creepiest zombie I've seen on the show.  I thought it bought into the whole instinct part of the brain.  Women are programmed to hear their children cry, and when Dwayne started crying she came to the door, whether she actively knew why or not.  It just gave me the heebie jeebies.

 

I honestly don't think that scene with Rick and Z!Jenny doing the stare-down through the peephole will ever be eclipsed in terms of just straight up creepiness on this show.  I mean, c'mon, a zombie is actually trying to use a doorknob to open a door and then getting a super-closeuip of its dead face and eye(s)??  *still shivers thinking about that scene, and its burned into memory*

 

 

If you had a septic wound that was infecting your blood stream, would you pass that infection through sex? No. So…having sex with someone after they’ve been bitten…much like eating a living human’s flesh after they’ve been bitten (show reference…to a thing that happened years ago in the comic) has no effect on you.

 

Eugene needs to learn this fact, stat!  He can get laid with the chicks who get bit and won't survive.  "I'm so sorry this has happened to you..... would you like some help in going out with a bang?  Just say the word;  I'm here for you."

Edited April 3, 2015 by iRarelyWatchTV36

[Nashville]

Quote reference: Conquer thread

Zomblog made a very reasonable argument for the half-zombies ("creepers") being even more dangerous than the full-sized kind:

• They're very low-profile, therefore much more unobtrusive/less detectable.
• In a world which hasn't heard the sound of a lawnmower firing up in the last couple of years, they're an excellent ambush predator in high grass or snow; you won't know they're there until you step on them, or one starts noshing on your ankle.
• Many types of fencing would be worthless against them; while their vertical cousins would be bunching up against a standard wooden cow fence, for example, the creepers would simply crawl under. Same with split-rail. Same with barbed wire. Any type of fencing, actually, which doesn't go down significantly below ground level. Chain link or wood planked fencing which skirts the ground would be effective at slowing their progress, but given time I expect their repeated attempts at forward progress would result in digging out a rut underneath the fence - and they got nothing BUT time.

The walkers HAVE to both see and hear to some degree - we know they respond to light and sound, even from a distance. They may possibly even retain some sense of touch; although I expect most of their response to motion is also visually connected, we can't yet discount the possibility at least part of their response is tied to feeling vibrations from movement.

Which brings up another question: anyone ever see a walker shit? Their entire existence is centered around consumption, after all. Where does it go? And how does the walker's body process it/use it? We've seen way too many mobile disemboweled walkers to accept the notion energy is being extracted from -ah- consumables through a "normal" digestive process.

[Bongo Fury]

Which brings up another question: anyone ever see a walker shit? Their entire existence is centered around consumption, after all. Where does it go? And how does the walker's body process it/use it? We've seen way too many mobile disemboweled walkers to accept the notion energy is being extracted from -ah- consumables through a "normal" digestive process.

 

 

Lori turds?

[Nashville]

Also brought over from Conquer - posted by Boofish

Season 3 Milton noted walkers do eventually starve (which slows them down) it just takes a lot longer than it would for a living being. Can't remember his exact words but it came up when they were examining the ones Michonne had been dragging around as pets. The Governor noted the jaw was missing so how could they "eat"

Walkers could see, run, climb fences, get up from naps, pick up teddy bears, remember where they lived, turn doorknobs etc back in Season 1. Guess they had to retool them over the seasons so it could make more sense. Well, as much sense a show about people coming back from the dead could make sense

ETA: attribution

Edited April 10, 2015 by Nashville

[Nashville]

Season 3 Milton noted walkers do eventually starve (which slows them down) it just takes a lot longer than it would for a living being. Can't remember his exact words but it came up when they were examining the ones Michonne had been dragging around as pets. The Governor noted the jaw was missing so how could they "eat"

Walkers could see, run, climb fences, get up from naps, pick up teddy bears, remember where they lived, turn doorknobs etc back in Season 1. Guess they had to retool them over the seasons so it could make more sense. Well, as much sense a show about people coming back from the dead could make sense

Personally, I think Season 3 Uncle Miltie was full of suppositional horseshit. Milt definitely could have observed starving a walker slows it down, sure. As to saying they could starve to (re-)death? That could be little more than unsupported conjecture on his part, because walkers hadn't yet been around long enough to observe full-term starvation .

According to the wiki timeline, Milt was making his "observations" at around day 330 ZA - less than a year into this mess. We've seen walkers older than that - presumably infected the First Wave of infections, when everybody was jumping in their cars and trying to get the hell out of Dodge/Atlanta/wherever - trapped in the cars on the highway and still viable. Viable enough to be scratching at the windows or rattling around in the trunk, at least. Don't forget Kidnap Girl. No access to food, water, or anything else. Just bound, gagged, and locked in a car trunk to bake in the Atlanta summer heat for weeks - months - years, maybe. And she was STILL functional.

I can guess where Milt came up with his starvation hypothesis. Starve a walker for a few weeks or months, and they are affected - i.e., they slow down. It would seem a logical extension of that, then, to assume if you starve them long enough, then at some point they'll slow down to the point of stopping altogether - cessation of function altogether - a "re-death". Perfectly logical, except for one little thing: in terms of strict logic, functional walkers shouldn't exist in the first place. A decapitated head - separated from all biological systems of respiration, circulation, waste removal, etc., should not be able to continue the biological actions/reactions necessary to process sensory input, or make facial and jaw muscles move - but it does anyway.

Sorry Milt - but it seems like walkers don't play by your rules. :)

Edited April 10, 2015 by Nashville

[nobody30]

First of all, I know that on a show where dead people resurrect, to turn into flesh eating "walkers", there have to be some natural limits to logic and realism. So let's start with the obvious set backs for every zombie genre that really don't count that much to me.

 

It is indeed possible that a virus turns somebody into an raged filled and violent "monster", like a mutated version of the rabies virus could do for example in my opinion. It is also possible that a fungus or virus takes control over the human brain, and turns you into some kind of zombie, like observed with ants in the real world for example. It is even possible that such viruses, parasites or fungi have the potential to create hallucinations, that make you want to eat human flesh in my opinion (just think of the case of the drug addict that was eating off that poor guy's face on the news).

 

The only thing definetly under no circumstances possible is to resurrect the human body after death, because when the organism breaks down entirely, all cells that need ogxygen supply (like brain cells) die within minutes, all others within hours, once dead, they cannot be "reactivated", no virus can do that.

 

But we have to put that aside, because that's the general limit to the logic of all zombie movies or series, so I'm totally fine with it.

 

What rather bothers me is the "virus" itself.

 

First of all even after half a year of research, with scans und samples, a CDC-guy can't tell if it's a virus, a fungus, or a microbe. I mean I get that they don't have a cure, but come on, they would figure that out within 48 hours maximum.

 

Then, to keep the story going, the virus seems to mutate al loooot, but after seeing the first episode of "Fear The Walking Dead" it's getting even more confusing to me. At first, many people got infected with the virus and developed a fever that killed them, and turned them into walkers, but some peolpe seemed to be immune to that form, so the walkers spread the virus by biting other people.

 

At least so it seemed, because if the virus  had spread only on the basis of bites, there is noy way it would have spread that fast, it's just not possible. Question was, why do the others get infected by bites, when they seem immune to the virus' original form?

 

Then it turned out everybody was "infected" and carried the virus, so everybody that died became a walker. Seemed like a mutation, but only until ep. 1 of "Fear The Walking Dead", when the dealer becomes one of the first walkers after getting shot instantly, so it was that way all along? And if so, why did nobody notice until 1 year into apocalypse? People died all the time. And why do they still develop a fever when getting bit, that kills them, when they all already carry the virus within them?

 

So there are so many inconsistencies that I'm really getting confused here.

 

What bothers me too, are the "walkers".

 

The explanation they came up with, thus the parts of the brain activated, would suggest walkers that were blind, deaf and not able to moove coordinated at all.

 

But besides that what bothers me the most is walker-density and -decomposition.

 

We are about 2 years into apocalypse, yet still there are walkers in pretty good shape behind every corner, hords of hundreds and thousands everywhere, even in the forest in the middle of nowhere.

 

From what we know, and from how few people there are left, we can conclude that I'd say at least 95% of the population died from the virus. Most of them in the first few weeks. We also know that they do rott quite well (I mean they are dead bodies exposed to sunlight and weather, remember S1 ep.1 in the park?), unless they get fresh flesh to eat, as they don't eat themselves.

 

But most of the walkers won't get a meal for most of the time, because there are alomst no humans left, most pets probably died quickly after apocalypse, and wild animals a pretty damn hard to catch, as they don't get close to humans and could smell walkers from miles away. So 95% of the walkers should be rotten to bones by now, not hiking through the woods.

 

And as for the rest of them, if just one survivor kills an average of one walker per week (our group does much better), so 52 a year, and there'd be 1 million survivors in the US left at least (seems realistic), that makes 52 Million kills per year.

 

So to make it short, there shouldn't be many walkers left anymore, and after 3-4 years into apocalypse the number should be close to zero, you would just have to sit it out.

 

Even the fact that everybody who dies now turns into a walker doesn't change that, because everybody knows by know they just have to stab their brains to prevent it.

 

So what do you think?

 

Are there any parts I got wrong, or you see differently? Any explanations that would make sense? Did I miss something?

 

And do the further episodes of "Fear The Walking Dead" shed some lights on these issues (I have only watched ep 1. by now)?

[Bongo Fury]

Are there any parts I got wrong, or you see differently? Any explanations that would make sense? Did I miss something?

 

Kirkman has said repeatedly that he has zero interest in delving into any of the questions that you ask or exploring a cause or a morphology in any way, shape or form. Therefore it is best if you forget about viruses, microbes and fungi, instead accept that it is magic that causes the zombies (FEAR only reinforces this as we have been given next to nothing regarding a cause or an origin). Then you will be at peace and free to explore the other plot holes and sloppy writing so evident in the series' and pick them apart and laugh.

[rab01]

1) The only thing definetly under no circumstances possible is to resurrect the human body after death, because when the organism breaks down entirely, all cells that need ogxygen supply (like brain cells) die within minutes, all others within hours, once dead, they cannot be "reactivated", no virus can do that.

 

But we have to put that aside, because that's the general limit to the logic of all zombie movies or series, so I'm totally fine with it.

 

What rather bothers me is the "virus" itself.

 

2) First of all even after half a year of research, with scans und samples, a CDC-guy can't tell if it's a virus, a fungus, or a microbe. I mean I get that they don't have a cure, but come on, they would figure that out within 48 hours maximum.

 

3) Then, to keep the story going, the virus seems to mutate al loooot, but after seeing the first episode of "Fear The Walking Dead" it's getting even more confusing to me. At first, many people got infected with the virus and developed a fever that killed them, and turned them into walkers, but some peolpe seemed to be immune to that form, so the walkers spread the virus by biting other people.

 

At least so it seemed, because if the virus  had spread only on the basis of bites, there is noy way it would have spread that fast, it's just not possible. Question was, why do the others get infected by bites, when they seem immune to the virus' original form?

 

Then it turned out everybody was "infected" and carried the virus, so everybody that died became a walker. Seemed like a mutation, but only until ep. 1 of "Fear The Walking Dead", when the dealer becomes one of the first walkers after getting shot instantly, so it was that way all along? And if so, why did nobody notice until 1 year into apocalypse? People died all the time. And why do they still develop a fever when getting bit, that kills them, when they all already carry the virus within them?

 

So there are so many inconsistencies that I'm really getting confused here.

 

What bothers me too, are the "walkers".

 

The explanation they came up with, thus the parts of the brain activated, would suggest walkers that were blind, deaf and not able to moove coordinated at all.

 

But besides that what bothers me the most is walker-density and -decomposition.

 

4) We are about 2 years into apocalypse, yet still there are walkers in pretty good shape behind every corner, hords of hundreds and thousands everywhere, even in the forest in the middle of nowhere.

 

From what we know, and from how few people there are left, we can conclude that I'd say at least 95% of the population died from the virus. Most of them in the first few weeks. We also know that they do rott quite well (I mean they are dead bodies exposed to sunlight and weather, remember S1 ep.1 in the park?), unless they get fresh flesh to eat, as they don't eat themselves.

 

5) But most of the walkers won't get a meal for most of the time, because there are alomst no humans left, most pets probably died quickly after apocalypse, and wild animals a pretty damn hard to catch, as they don't get close to humans and could smell walkers from miles away. So 95% of the walkers should be rotten to bones by now, not hiking through the woods.

 

6) And as for the rest of them, if just one survivor kills an average of one walker per week (our group does much better), so 52 a year, and there'd be 1 million survivors in the US left at least (seems realistic), that makes 52 Million kills per year.

 

So to make it short, there shouldn't be many walkers left anymore, and after 3-4 years into apocalypse the number should be close to zero, you would just have to sit it out.

 

Even the fact that everybody who dies now turns into a walker doesn't change that, because everybody knows by know they just have to stab their brains to prevent it.

 

So what do you think?

 

Are there any parts I got wrong, or you see differently? Any explanations that would make sense? Did I miss something?

 

And do the further episodes of "Fear The Walking Dead" shed some lights on these issues (I have only watched ep 1. by now)?

Fascinating set of questions and the creators have on intentions of answering them (honestly, that's OK; I'd rather the show and comic focus on the people alive than on the "mystery" of how it happened) so let me fanwank some answers (I added some numbers to your post for cross-referencing) :

1) I think that's right and that is why we shouldn't be treated to a scene of an entire cemetery rising up:

2) Maybe the CDC spotted thousands of differences in the bacteria, viruses and fungii populating the healthy and zombie body but hadn't yet figured out which were the cause ... yeah, kind of weak - I'd think they should have at least been able to rule out fungii and bacteria by then...

3) I don't think the virus (if it's a virus) is mutating. I think the easier solution is that it has different effects in different people. The flu bug that makes me sick will kill an elderly person, and so on. Most people who could be killed by its flu symptoms died in the opening rounds of the epidemic and for others, we see differing levels injuries that zombify them.  (That said, there's nothing to keep it from mutating in the future.  I just don't think we have to assume it has mutated already.)

4) We see a lot of more and less rotted zombies but we don't know for sure that it is related to their eating habits. It can just be the progression of the disease, which can again vary victim by victim - like, all of them rot over time but some rot more slowly than others.

5) Yeah, there isn't enough food to meet their energy expenditure needs so I'm gonna go crazy here and say that the virus/mold/bacteria has a photosynthetic feature and that all the walkers are now actually lichens, rather than pure animals.  Eating people is a "desire", not a necessity.

6) As to their numbers -- we don't know how many people survived the initial outbreak.  In an area spread over three states, we've met fewer than a thousand initial survivors in five seasons (and some of those took out no walkers before dying themselves).  What if there were only a hundred thousand initial survivors in the country? If so, even 52 kills each per year would only have taken out 10 million walkers by now - leaving another 290 million to avoid ...

 

How'd I do ;)

[nobody30]

Fascinating set of questions and the creators have on intentions of answering them (honestly, that's OK; I'd rather the show and comic focus on the people alive than on the "mystery" of how it happened) so let me fanwank some answers (I added some numbers to your post for cross-referencing) :

1) I think that's right and that is why we shouldn't be treated to a scene of an entire cemetery rising up:

2) Maybe the CDC spotted thousands of differences in the bacteria, viruses and fungii populating the healthy and zombie body but hadn't yet figured out which were the cause ... yeah, kind of weak - I'd think they should have at least been able to rule out fungii and bacteria by then...

3) I don't think the virus (if it's a virus) is mutating. I think the easier solution is that it has different effects in different people. The flu bug that makes me sick will kill an elderly person, and so on. Most people who could be killed by its flu symptoms died in the opening rounds of the epidemic and for others, we see differing levels injuries that zombify them.  (That said, there's nothing to keep it from mutating in the future.  I just don't think we have to assume it has mutated already.)

4) We see a lot of more and less rotted zombies but we don't know for sure that it is related to their eating habits. It can just be the progression of the disease, which can again vary victim by victim - like, all of them rot over time but some rot more slowly than others.

5) Yeah, there isn't enough food to meet their energy expenditure needs so I'm gonna go crazy here and say that the virus/mold/bacteria has a photosynthetic feature and that all the walkers are now actually lichens, rather than pure animals.  Eating people is a "desire", not a necessity.

6) As to their numbers -- we don't know how many people survived the initial outbreak.  In an area spread over three states, we've met fewer than a thousand initial survivors in five seasons (and some of those took out no walkers before dying themselves).  What if there were only a hundred thousand initial survivors in the country? If so, even 52 kills each per year would only have taken out 10 million walkers by now - leaving another 290 million to avoid ...

 

How'd I do ;)

 

You did great, thank you for your reply. :)

 

In fact the details don't bother me most of the time on TWD, and it's true that we don't have to know them all, because the show's focus lies on the survivors (which is great).

 

What I can't accept that easily though is that FOTWD doesn't even cover the most basic questions, like how this thing spreads, which in fact would be a key to the plot, because it influences the response, actions and descisions of everybody. So for me it's rather a FOTWD issue now than a TWD issue, as I thought we at least would get some answers there, but that's rather a topic for the FOTWD discussion.

[crowswork]

 Yeah, there isn't enough food to meet their energy expenditure needs so I'm gonna go crazy here and say that the virus/mold/bacteria has a photosynthetic feature and that all the walkers are now actually lichens, rather than pure animals.  Eating people is a "desire", not a necessity

Very interesting. This actually makes sense, if the walkers were essentially flesh, most of the muscle and connective tissue would be gone after a certain period of time.

I did read a really creepy report that said because people eat so much food with so very much preservative in it, that we don't decompose like we use to. In olden times, it was really necessary to get a person into the ground in a day or two. Now we stay preserved for a much longer period of time. Creepeee.

I wondered, if an area with an aggressive freeze/thaw cycle wouldn't be hardest on the zombies. Even large animals weighing hundreds of pounds basically turn into hide covered bags of goo after being frozen and thawed half-dozen times. So maybe they should get out of Georgia and moved to West Virginia or Pennsylvania.

On a strictly cosmetic make up trailer note: on the latest episode they showed a vast herd of walkers in varying states of decay. But the women walkers with long hair looked like Breck girls. Bones jutting, flesh decaying, innards dangling yes but most of their hair was glossy and clean. Not a twig or some mud. Long hair would get snagged and pull off chunks of scalp and basically pick up everything but men and money.

[Nashville]

Pulled from another thread:

Doesn't really matter, they're all infected. 

 

I believe it's only walker saliva that kills you - ala the fever and all that.

  

They're all infected but anyone whos been bitten has had a quickened death as a result. This certainly asks a question about getting blood, etc in your blood.

Ok, there are two well-documented ways to go grotesque in the TWD reality:

• Simply die, for whatever reason. After human-normal biochemical activity has ceased, the dormant Z virus will activate (previously suppressed by the human-normal immune system, maybe?) and initiate the zombification process.
• Zombie bite. Bites have proven almost universally fatal; the only exceptions seen TO DATE have been if (a) the bite occurred toward the far end of an extremity, and (b) the bitten extremity is immediately amputated quickly enough and high enough up the extremity to prevent any infecting agent from the bite from entering the victim's bloodstream.

My focus at this time is on #2 - more specifically, the nature of the infecting agent introduced by a Zbite. What, exactly, is introduced which results in a speedy death?

• The Z virus itself? Unlikely; the Z virus is already present in every exposed human. You can't infect someone who is already infected. Even if some "tipping point" were involved involving quantity of ZV in the system, (a) it's unlikely a single bite could introduce enough additional virus quantity to "tip", and (b) normal variations in individual human biochemistry and immune response would necessarily dictate some people would "tip" spontaneously, without additional ZV introduction.
• A ZV activating agent? More possible; however, you would expect any "active" (I.e., already died and re-animated) zombies to be totally perfused with the activating agent throughout all body tissue. If this were the case, exposure to perfused zombie tissue and/or body fluids through any opportunistic vector (eyes, mouth, open cuts, etc.) should be all that would be required to introduce the activating agent into a previously un-activated system and start the activation process - and that's not what has been shown us. As one example, think back to Rick's hand-to-hand with the zombies FPP's inattention let enter the ASZ - specifically, the last zombie. Rick ended up positively AWASH in that zombie's blood, gore and brain matter - in his eyes, in his mouth, and all over open cuts on his face from his fight with Pete - yet Rick never showed any signs of spontaneously turning, then or now. IMHO this more than anything else would point to a specific Ztooth-to-flesh causation.
• A simple infectious or toxic agent? Very possible; a toxin or sufficiently severe infection could result in death, which would then open the door for the normal, already-established "turn" process. And while the actual toxin or infectious agent production would be a byproduct of the zombification process - normal human bites usually don't kill people, after all - the infection/toxin mechanism would not have to be associated with the Z virus. Anything lethal would work. This is also supported by the apparent singularity of a bite being the sole killing stroke (other than ripping out your intestines and letting you bleed to death, that is). The human body already produces enzymes which are saliva-specific; turn one of these toxic, or insert a botulism-like infection which lives only in saliva, and it would fit everything we've seen/heard about about the lethality of Z bites.

Discuss...?

[Irishmaple]

I lean towards the bite causing a massive infection that overwhelms the host's immune system and brings a quick death. Given what zombies eat, their teeth are probably awash with contaminants. The guy's shoulder bite was inflamed and Michonne looked concerned by the look of it. It didn't look like a regular human on human bite (I work with kids, I've seen more than a few!) The infection looked nasty. Amputation spared Herschel because Rick didn't hesitate and the infection didn't get a chance to travel. Upper back? Guy was screwed. Can't amputate and not that far from major organs. I do like that he accepted his fate, gritted his teeth and carried on, hoping to contribute (contrasting his attitude with that of a character on the sibling show) He knew he was going to die, just not at that very moment. Too bad his luck was worse than he ever suspected.

How the hell are these stealthy single zombies getting so close to the Alexandrites? Nothing gets that close to me on a regular day. Out in zombie infested woods? My paranoia would be off the scale. Nothing would be sneaking up on my twitchy ass.

[morgankobi]

To be honest, I think Z-bites kill on this show because they normally do in Z-mythology. I'm not sure we can come up with an explanation that covers all the different things we've seen at this point. I am curious for them to run into a proper (sober) doctor who knows enough about the blood pathology to test Judith. Curious if Captain Tripps has passed her by.

 

Why are the dumpster zombies able to dig into Nicolas's flesh(yes, I said Nick!) so easily. I get the strength of the jaw when biting, but using only hands on unopened flesh, through at least one shirt even, they just tear into like it was tissue paper. Is that consistent with anything we've seen so far?

Edited October 28, 2015 by morgankobi

[mandolin]

They tore into Dale like that.

Captain Tripps. :)

[rab01]

Nashville - I think it would have to be something like that; it's the only thing that meshes with everyone already being infected. I don't think it fits well with some stuff from the comic book but I wouldn't try to fanwank that part unless they try to incorporate it into the show.

 

Possibly unpopular theory alert - zombies are stronger and more resilient than regular people, not weaker.  ** I know, I know, we've seen their heads explode like melons and our main characters plow threw them like paper dolls but hear me out ... **  Have you ever watched a lumberjack competition where they they are chopping wood with an axe? All of them can get through a solid piece of oak faster than I can split a thin branch.  Similarly, the people from CDB that we follow are VERY experienced at killing walkers. None of them would have lived unless they were unusually talented at killing them. I'm sure Michonne sharpens her katana every day and that her life has depended on her being very good at slicing through heads with it. In other words, we're watching the equivalent of olympic-caliber walker killers so everything looks easier than it is. And yes, we've seen zombies leave bits of themselves behind (e.g. when they squeezed through the trucks at the quarry or bounced off the wall) but we haven't seen how much force they used in those impacts. The walkers may not move quickly but that doesn't mean they are weak.  Actually, everything we've seen on the show requires Walkers to be stronger than normal people. (Whenever Mythbusters tests zombie myths, normal people can't push hard enough to do what walkers do.)  So what that means is that walkers are slow, uncoordinated, strong, persistent, impervious to pain, chomping machines that could easily tear open a human body if they got a good grip first. 

Edited October 28, 2015 by rab01

[Bongo Fury]

Discuss...?

 

Magic zombie teeth. If you think too much about zombie physiology and zombie morphology none of it makes any sense. So it's best to just chalk it up to magic and be able to sleep at night instead of thinking about it. Listen to Arthur C Clarke:

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

[Nashville]

Possibly unpopular theory alert - zombies are stronger and more resilient than regular people, not weaker.  ** I know, I know, we've seen their heads explode like melons and our main characters plow threw them like paper dolls but hear me out ... **  Have you ever watched a lumberjack competition where they they are chopping wood with an axe? All of them can get through a solid piece of oak faster than I can split a thin branch.  Similarly, the people from CDB that we follow are VERY experienced at killing walkers. None of them would have lived unless they were unusually talented at killing them. I'm sure Michonne sharpens her katana every day and that her life has depended on her being very good at slicing through heads with it. In other words, we're watching the equivalent of olympic-caliber walker killers so everything looks easier than it is. And yes, we've seen zombies leave bits of themselves behind (e.g. when they squeezed through the trucks at the quarry or bounced off the wall) but we haven't seen how much force they used in those impacts. The walkers may not move quickly but that doesn't mean they are weak.  Actually, everything we've seen on the show requires Walkers to be stronger than normal people. (Whenever Mythbusters tests zombie myths, normal people can't push hard enough to do what walkers do.)  So what that means is that walkers are slow, uncoordinated, strong, persistent, impervious to pain, chomping machines that could easily tear open a human body if they got a good grip first. 

 

Two good points here I'd like to address:

 

#1 - The "zombies are stronger and more resilient than regular people, not weaker" hypothesis: I don't exactly agree with it, but I think you've struck on something that is pretty close to the truth, in a peculiar way.  When I read that first line, it jarred recollection of a long-forgotten memory of a real-life account of certain circumstances which I believe parallels your thought process.  I found a reference to my memory on-line; read this and see if it makes the same suggestion to you as it did to me:

 

On one occasion he tried to open the door of a little storeroom but a rusty padlock would not yield. A patient, an undersized malnourished ten-year-old approached him smiling, "Let me try, Sahib Doctor," he offered and reached for the key. With a quick jerk of his hand, he turned the key in the rusty lock. Brand was dumbfounded. How could this weak youngster show more strength than him? His eyes caught a tell-tale clue. Was that a drop of blood on the floor? Upon examining the boy's fingers, Brand discovered the act of turning the key had gashed the finger open to the bone. Skin, fat and joint were all exposed yet the boy was completely unaware of it.

 

"Brand" was Dr. Paul Brand, and the boy was a Hansen's Disease (aka leprosy) patient in India.  For centuries people had thought leprosy was a disease which caused ulcers to form (primarily on the hands and feet) which eventually led to tissue necrosis and the eventual loss of extremities.  Brand's research showed the true mechanism of HD was simply the death of nerve endings - including those in the skin, and the resultant loss of tactile sensation.  Patients lost the ability to physically feel anything with their hands, their feet, and eventually their entire skin.  The ulcers and tissue rot weren't part of the disease.  The HD-infected simply lacked the ability to feel pain - so if/when they injured themselves they didn't know it, the injuries went untreated, and various "normal" infections would set in and do the damage previously associated with the disease.

 

The boy was by no means stronger than the doctor, but the doctor had an inhibitor the boy lacked - a pain warning system.  The doctor would turn the key as hard as he could, but he (and any other healthy person) would stop long before exerting even a fraction of his total strength because pain in his fingers would tell his body to stop before tissue was damaged.  The boy felt no pain, so he was free to apply all the strength he had until the lock broke free - and mangle his hands in the process.

 

In this sense, a zombie has much in common with a leper.  It's not that they are actually stronger - quite probably the opposite, in fact, due to tissue rot - but they can exert 100% of their strength on a task with no regard to the effect on their bodies.

 

#2 - the ease with which CDB can put a knife or other melee weapon through the skull of a walker.  This is probably simply due to practice, and finding out what works - and if you're going to try putting a knife blade through a human skull, the pterion is the thinnest part of the skull, and probably your best bet for a one-shot/one kill option.

[Nashville]

Magic zombie teeth. If you think too much about zombie physiology and zombie morphology none of it makes any sense. So it's best to just chalk it up to magic and be able to sleep at night instead of thinking about it. Listen to Arthur C Clarke:

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

 

Liked this simply because you quoted from one of my ABCs of great literature - Asimov, Bradbury, and Clarke.  :>

[morgankobi]

Two good points here I'd like to address:

 

#1 - The "zombies are stronger and more resilient than regular people, not weaker" hypothesis: I don't exactly agree with it, but I think you've struck on something that is pretty close to the truth, in a peculiar way.  When I read that first line, it jarred recollection of a long-forgotten memory of a real-life account of certain circumstances which I believe parallels your thought process.  I found a reference to my memory on-line; read this and see if it makes the same suggestion to you as it did to me:

 

 

Nashville, are you currently dreaming of electric sheep?

Your back-up process is clearly superior to mine.

[Bongo Fury]

Liked this simply because you quoted from one of my ABCs of great literature - Asimov, Bradbury, and Clarke.  :>

 

I prefer Heinlein, Niven and Farmer. But your ABC's are good too.

[AngelaHunter]

I lean towards the bite causing a massive infection that overwhelms the host's immune system and brings a quick death.

 

Even bites from healthy living humans are dangerous due to the risk of infection. I liken zombie bites to those of Komodo Dragons. Their bites don't kill, but their saliva has toxic levels of bacteria so the resulting massive infection does kill their prey.

[Mindymoo]

Even bites from healthy living humans are dangerous due to the risk of infection. I liken zombie bites to those of Komodo Dragons. Their bites don't kill, but their saliva has toxic levels of bacteria so the resulting massive infection does kill their prey.

My fiancee's mom's partner who I barely consider human bit her when she was drunk and fighting with my fiancee, and my fiancee's hand got so badly infected that she nearly needed to have it amputated. Human mouths are filthy, especially the mouths of crack smoking alcoholics that don't brush their teeth more once every other lunar cycle.

[RustbeltWriter]

You know what would be really useful for these people? Less psycopaths. Watching this show you'd think a year of hard time is all it would take to turn the majority of us into cannibals and murdery wolves. And when they do find nice folks they have to be naive (Herschel), incompetent but lucky (Alexandria) or unlucky (Eastman). It's just damned odd that the only people thriving among the walkers are lunatics and people who were just waiting for the ZA to bring out their inner bastard.

Edited November 5, 2015 by RustbeltWriter

[nodorothyparker]

The show does sometimes feel like a very nihilistic version of Darwinism where instead of the absolute fittest surviving it's the most psychotic and most assholish rising to the top.  Although maybe that is the same thing.

 

I've been fascinated with the show's attempts to explore what happens to people when society with its laws and conventions to keep us in check goes away and the survivors are left to scramble for ever dwindling resources.  But I'm mostly left to fanwank at this point that everyone who is left is probably somewhere on the sliding scale of crazy after living this long in a world that's become one giant graveyard complete with flesh-eating ambulatory corpses.  If we want to play the reality in the zombie apocalypse game though I can't help but imagine there would probably be more pockets of people like Tara's family, well meaning enough and holed up just trying to get through the day to day while waiting for something to happen.  But that doesn't make for good TV, I suppose, compared to murderous dictators and hipster cannibals.

[rab01]

Yeah, it's weird how rarely we see groups of people who seem like they can survive without being totally psycho. I think it relates a bit to another problem with the show -- what the hell supposedly happened to all the animal life. If this were the Northeast where I live, there would be deer everywhere and food would not be an issue for any group with Daryl's crossbow. Since it's Georgia, is the equivalent wild hogs? In any event, wildlife should be flourishing with so few people around so humans should not have to essentially prey on each other for food.

 

In the Governor's backstory, we saw two examples of not awful survivor groups (the camp he eventually took over and the camp they scouted but did not attack). In both cases, evil people wiped out what seemed to be workable groups.  I think Thomas Hobbes would say that the show's version of the effects of "might makes right" is believable but I say it does get depressing sometimes.

[Soobs]

The show does sometimes feel like a very nihilistic version of Darwinism where instead of the absolute fittest surviving it's the most psychotic and most assholish rising to the top.  Although maybe that is the same thing.

 

I've been fascinated with the show's attempts to explore what happens to people when society with its laws and conventions to keep us in check goes away and the survivors are left to scramble for ever dwindling resources.  But I'm mostly left to fanwank at this point that everyone who is left is probably somewhere on the sliding scale of crazy after living this long in a world that's become one giant graveyard complete with flesh-eating ambulatory corpses.  If we want to play the reality in the zombie apocalypse game though I can't help but imagine there would probably be more pockets of people like Tara's family, well meaning enough and holed up just trying to get through the day to day while waiting for something to happen.  But that doesn't make for good TV, I suppose, compared to murderous dictators and hipster cannibals.

 

Since Herschel's farm, every group they've met is either clueless or crazy and evil. I wish there were more normal people and a little more hope for forming a larger, functioning group of capable, determined, stable people. It's starting to become too depressing for me to watch. It seems like it's always going to be that they barely survive while slowly going crazy while they are picked off one by one. I'm increasingly feeling like this show isn't for me.

[RustbeltWriter]

Since Herschel's farm, every group they've met is either clueless or crazy and evil. I wish there were more normal people and a little more hope for forming a larger, functioning group of capable, determined, stable people. It's starting to become too depressing for me to watch. It seems like it's always going to be that they barely survive while slowly going crazy while they are picked off one by one. I'm increasingly feeling like this show isn't for me.

 

The show needs hope and it has none. Rick & Co. need to have a grander plan than simply surviving. The generation that had formal education is dying off and leaving behind a world full of danger even if the walkers and dangerous survivors are excluded. There's no sense that anything will be built or preserved. The showrunners are just giving us one demented group of survivors to fight against after another.

[JBody]

Yup. And another thing, this idea that once the constraints of society are gone (laws etc) it devolves into dog-eat-dog (psycho-eat-psycho?) world: where do they think laws come from in the first place? People. So don't tell me there's no group out there trying to rebuild who aren't totally evil (not counting the ASZhats who knew next to nothing about the state of the world). But maybe there hasn't been enough time lapsed in show time. They have chosen, however, to not show us thus far, six seasons in.

[rab01]

JBody - is that fair?  Most of the groups they've met haven't been totally evil - Woodbury wasn't evil; the governor was evil (and most of the citizens didn't know it); the same for the second group he conned. Grady was not totally evil (messed up, yes but no more off the rails than a feudal manor might have been).  The only Eeeeevil communities have been Terminus, whoever brutalized Terminus, and the Wolves.

 

I honestly thought that one of the nice parts of the first half of the Woodbury storyline is that is was so easy to see CDB as a violent army if you were a Woodbury resident.  If no large group had intersected with Woodbury, maybe the governor would never have been driven completely insane and society would have been reborn from that community (while all the while the governor and a few cronies secretly looted and killed whoever posed any hint of danger to the community -- hey, does that sound like recent Rick? Yeah, I know the Rick/Governor comparisons are really tired but the Governor before his zombie daughter was put down was plausible as both villain and hero.).

 

Slightly off-topic musing -- I think everyone notices that the show likes to bend all of its characters to repeating the same choices repeatedly and that positions previously taken by villains like Shane and the Governor are later seemingly put in the mouths of heroes. So, is the difference between villains and heroes a questions of who we happen to have been following? Or, how quickly someone adapted/devolved in the ZA? I think there is still one thing that separates the villains from the heroes on this show and in this world --- do you risk your life for others? Are you willing to lay your life down to help someone who needs it?

1) Shane was always about not risking anything to help others - villain.

2) The Governor never risked anything to save anybody except maybe when he was in the building with Tara's family - villain who was given a chance by fate to redeem himself and blew it

3) Rick is always risking himself to save others, from Merle to Sofia and onward - hero

4) Glen was literally risking his life to save Rick before we even saw him onscreen - hero

5) Morgan - saved Daryl and Aaron - hero

6) Carol - saved CDB and all of Alexandria - hero

7) Eugene - comedic villain until the end of last season

8) Abraham saving the woman at the construction site showed that he was a hero and most of the ASZhats were villains.

You can be ruthless, you can do or say awful things (e.g., Carol talking to Sam last season) but if you are willing to risk your life for others, you're a hero in this world.

Edited November 5, 2015 by rab01

[Soobs]

The show needs hope and it has none. Rick & Co. need to have a grander plan than simply surviving. The generation that had formal education is dying off and leaving behind a world full of danger even if the walkers and dangerous survivors are excluded. There's no sense that anything will be built or preserved. The showrunners are just giving us one demented group of survivors to fight against after another.

 

Not only does the show need hope but it needs a little levity. Breaking Bad introduced Saul Goodman because the show got too dark to be fun. Part of the fun of TWD is seeing how people survive but it's also fun to see a little light hearted comradery and every season there is less and less of that.

[Nashville]

Not only does the show need hope but it needs a little levity. Breaking Bad introduced Saul Goodman because the show got too dark to be fun. Part of the fun of TWD is seeing how people survive but it's also fun to see a little light hearted comradery and every season there is less and less of that.

That was Daryl - until his writers went out to grab a pizza or something and never came back.

[nodorothyparker]

But we have Eugene.  And Tara with her yo-yo.

 

 I wish there were more normal people and a little more hope for forming a larger, functioning group of capable, determined, stable people. It's starting to become too depressing for me to watch. It seems like it's always going to be that they barely survive while slowly going crazy while they are picked off one by one. I'm increasingly feeling like this show isn't for me.

 

I love dystopian/apocalypse fiction a lot, so I'll hang in there for a lot.  But as much as I've mostly liked this season so far, I'm starting to come to that point too.  I don't read the comics, so I don't know how any of our current stories play out.  I am however coming to realize that if this whole evil Wolves/pacifist Morgan is pacifist and gets everybody killed storyline concludes with everything destroyed and our hapless survivors back on the move again wandering in circles around trees living off of worms and dogs that I may just be done.  There's only so many times you can lather rinse and repeat on that one without something more to hope for than waiting for the next psychopath to show up and start the cycle again.

[JBody]

I will chime in with agreed. I watch it now a little less engaged than I used to be because otherwise it's just exhausting. Rab01 you make some fair points and if I weren't on my stupidphone I would reply in more depth. I think I'd like to see real community building going on, not the false front of Woodbury or Grady --although Show seemed to be blaming psycho leadership in those instances.

[truelovekiss]

That was Daryl - until his writers went out to grab a pizza or something and never came back.

A moment of silence for fun Daryl that actually made ::gasp:: JOKES. Now all he does is grunt and brood.

[Nashville]

A moment of silence for fun Daryl that actually made ::gasp:: JOKES. Now all he does is grunt and brood.

That's what happens when you try to cut costs by hiring a bunch of emo kids for your writing staff.