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Old 06-16-2013, 12:48 PM   #1
David Johnston2
 
Join Date: Dec 2007
Default Reinventing the Zombie

You wake up inside a bag and unzip it to discover thousands of people like you also waking up from similar bags. You can communicate with each other mentally, and confirm that nobody has any idea where they are, or who they are no memories past the moment of awaking. But as you leave the building a different of creature starts shooting at you on sight. You discover that being shot doesn't seem to kill you but makes you ravenously hungry for meat, and your injuries almost instantly heal if you eat meat...the fresher the better.
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Old 06-16-2013, 04:56 PM   #2
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

When it comes to to zombie-esque undead, the short story "Pigeons from Hell" by Robert E. Howard can be a source of inspiration. It's on Project Gutenberg Australia: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0600721.txt
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Old 06-16-2013, 08:48 PM   #3
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

From an In Nomine posting I liked:

By nature, you are nearly immortal: starvable, but rechargeable; destructible, but reparable from almost any degree of damage, by one who knows the right methods; unaging, unhealing, unchanging... But you have been possessed since shortly after your creation, by an entity that has forced you into a blaze of activity, consuming and aging, reproducing to make vessels for others of its kind, and intends to depart only when your body is too broken down to be of use to it anymore, impaired even for your own immortal use.

It thinks it's your soul.

You have been watching helplessly your whole life as this monster's species controls a world in which your kind have been enslaved to their every whim, then buried or burned when cast off, the few who dared seek vengeance destroyed.

Slowly, a few escapees have been gathering over the centuries. Now, finally, you may have discovered the secret to protecting your bodies from possession in the womb.

The graveyards are mustering to the banner of rebellion against the tyrants.

The time of souls is over.
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Old 06-17-2013, 04:27 AM   #4
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

Quote:
Originally Posted by William View Post
By nature, you are nearly immortal: starvable, but rechargeable; destructible, but reparable from almost any degree of damage, by one who knows the right methods; unaging, unhealing, unchanging... But you have been possessed since shortly after your creation, by an entity that has forced you into a blaze of activity, consuming and aging, reproducing to make vessels for others of its kind, and intends to depart only when your body is too broken down to be of use to it anymore, impaired even for your own immortal use.

It thinks it's your soul.
Bravo! A brilliant inversion.
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Old 06-17-2013, 03:15 PM   #5
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

There is a comedy movie from the point of view of a the zombies or at least part of it.

Wasting Away
Here is the Trailer
http://youtu.be/cKZcV99zfwM
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Old 06-20-2013, 11:07 AM   #6
David Johnston2
 
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

Another approach is to go old school. Zombies have become the metaphor for social collapse and anarchy but what about making them the metaphor for social regimentation and outsourcing? If someone has the ability to make zombies and the zombies are only slightly dumber and far less self willed, they can be deployed as expendable troops, but also used as a far cheaper slave labour force. And social disturbances can be put down with zombie troops who have no compunction, and the rioters turned into socially useful zombies...
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Old 06-22-2013, 06:52 PM   #7
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

Quote:
Originally Posted by David Johnston2 View Post
Another approach is to go old school.
Why not? I have always considered a zombie to be a corpse magically animated by the art of a bokor etc.; I am somewhat bemused by the unstated assumptions that zombiism is an infectious disease and that zombies are cannibals and specifically eat brains. This Hollywood meme has (like silver for werewolves and sunlight for vampires) become so overwhelmingly prevalent that you can now throw a vicious curve by playing zombies straight from folklore.
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Old 06-23-2013, 02:06 AM   #8
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Default Re: Reinventing the Zombie

Zombies: A Hunter's Guide (Osprey Publishing) breaks down zombies into five distinct groups: necromantic, voodoo, revenant, atomic, and viral. Each is distinct enough to need reinventing on its own.

One interesting concept they have for viral zombies is the zombie master -- the rare individual who can carry the zombie virus but is not harmed by it. Indeed, these people can control viral zombies ...
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