Zombies of the future

It appears that evolution has not escaped our zombie friends; recently they seem to have been blessed with the ability to run which, of course, makes life a hell of a lot easier for them but, it's a bit of a frightening concept for the rest of us.

Ok, so zombies aren't real but, they are so set into our consumption of modern horror that I can't help but pick up on how much they have changed.

The traditional notion of the zombie (as seen in the likes of Romero’s ‘Night of the Living Dead’) is of an un-dead moaning corpse with a bit of a fetish for flesh and/or brains. They drag themselves along looking for their next victim and fleshy feast but, they never pick up great speed in their quest which has always made them pretty easy to get away from.

Now they have this new tendency to break into a swift run in pursuit of their victims which turns them into a whole new and more foreboding enemy. Admittedly they are still a bit stupid (I’m sure we would all be if we found ourselves in their predicament) but, they’re altogether not so comical now that they can give chase.

This idea has got me musing about what else they might have hidden up their blood-stained sleeves for their race to evolve…perhaps they will start climbing, swimming or driving zombie vehicles. Maybe they could even learn to fly, use a gun or invent some new piece of technology especially for them to eliminate the living (but, I suppose that would spoil their flesh-eating fun).

It seems that I’m not the only one who has noticed this sudden change in the speed and dexterity of the un-dead, actor Simon Pegg has today written an article for the Guardian after seeing Channel 4’s Dead Set with its sprinting corpses. Take a look at his article here.

Although zombies running in Dead Set and in films like 28 Weeks Later (they aren’t technically traditional zombies as they are infected but, they are very zombie-like nonetheless) moves us away from the conventions of the horror genre and causes avid fans to moan, I must admit that this new breed of flesh-eating threat does add a lot of excitement and edge for the viewer. It could entice a whole new audience into watching zombie flicks because they know it's going to be more frightening for them.

It seems to me that the zombies of the future will most certainly be a force to be reckoned with.