Quoted from Jeremiah Johnson That's what I was thinking.  Like a Planet of the Apes type thing where the Zombies are the dominate species and Man comes along and screws it up.  The Zombies, now more "tame" and "civilized" (they play Chess, play golf, in politics, etc.), remember that Mankind "drives them crazy" and they go back to being "normal" Zombies.

There's only so much you can change about a zombie before it's no longer a zombie.  Making them runners was a good move.  Giving them faint personality traits from their former lives can work.

Making them intelligent... doesn't work.  Zombies are supposed to be mindless creatures with a hunger for human flesh.  Giving them intelligence is like allowing vampires to move around in sunlight.

If you want to do something with this genre, make it more than just the humans fighting for survival in a zombie-infested world.  And do more than coming up with an unused location for the humans to make their last stand.


Phil

Quoted from dogglebe There's only so much you can change about a zombie before it's no longer a zombie.  Making them runners was a good move.  Giving them faint personality traits from their former lives can work. Making them intelligent... doesn't work.  Zombies are supposed to be mindless creatures with a hunger for human flesh.  Giving them intelligence is like allowing vampires to move around in sunlight. If you want to do something with this genre, make it more than just the humans fighting for survival in a zombie-infested world.  And do more than coming up with an unused location for the humans to make their last stand. Phil

Agree.  Just trying to think outside the zombie box!  Though, I do work around some "zombies" who claim to be "intelligent"... just saying.

I think that an intelligent zombie is getting too close to vampires.

My two cents.


Phil

I'm a sucker for zombie flicks but as far as originality goes, it's a tough one.  You can tweak the traits of the zombie species but I doubt it'll make a difference in terms of setting the story apart from the pack.

It really comes down to creating unique and interesting characters.  Perhaps someone who's had a crappy life before the whole apocalypse and sees it as a blessing.  I know that people fight for survival but few for fun.

I'm sure it's been done before but making it a bit more psychological than just hack and slash may be a route worth exploring.  A world of killing and hunting versus a world of TV dinners and payment extensions?  No more car payments, no more obese boss barking in your face, no more b****y girlfriend to deal with, just zombies to kill?  Just a thought Tyler.  Best of luck.

I've been trying to write a few zombie projects myself.
I agree you can't alter the zombie too much, or purists will hate you.  The key, IMHO, is how interesting you make your humans and how real you can make the situation and surroundings.
Also, you have to be pretty adept t at writing action sequences.

Thank you all for your input, and I've taken it all on board.

There's one sort of setting that I want to explore; and that is how a government (specifically, POTUS) would attempt to rebuild the nation after such an event. Starting from the ordinary, then perhaps being trapped somewhere (another state) and then trying to get back to the White House and from there begin operations and what not.

It's kind of funny, Just the other day another peer gave me crap for not showing the "zombie outbreak" in my script Rancorium (where a group of zombies are partially cured and  form a 'Dirty Dozen' like unit to get the final antidote from a group of paranoid human survivors) and it wasn't the first time I heard that, even if that outbreak is part of the mystery and mostly backstory.

I actually considered giving at least a page to it even if betrays everything in the script. Until today where I
read this article

Quoted Text [Walking Dead] comic creator and series executive producer Robert Kirkman says he won't be covering the actual outbreak. "I don't find that to be interesting at all," he tells TVGuide.com. "In zombie fiction, you see the outbreak, you see the first days and the craziness in almost every other story told in this realm. I'm very proud of the fact that, for the most part, The Walking Dead has skipped over that part."

It just hit me---the series hasn't really done that, explain how it all the Walker outbreak started, or go into deep flashbacks of what characters were doing before the epidemic. The next question I'm asking is this:  is seeing such an event really needed for the story itself? The answer is no. And nobody has an issue with it.

A fresh take would be plants versus zombies maybe

Have you played that game???

It's quite possibly the best zombie game.

I could see a story in there:
"They laughed at me when I told them zombies were coming...they laughed at me when I started planting sunflowers and potatoes all over my front yard...well who's laughing NOW!!!"

I love that game haha

Zombies are coming!

I grunt sometimes like that newspaper zombie him and the bowlegged pogo stick ones are my favs