The Walking Dead

[Pavonis]

Yes, entropy would still be functioning in the Walking Dead universe, unless all the laws of physics were thrown out the window. Fresh corpses should be more threatening than barely active ones.

Intelligent walkers would be a serious threat. I'm not sure what else they could introduce to make walkers more dangerous. Disease from the rotting corpses, perhaps? More walkers-as-weapons, the way the Governor used them?

 

[Trekker4747]

That's what I would say.

As for the "memories" thing I'm still not sure calling them memories is entirely accurate. I don't think Morgan's wife said, "This place looks familiar! Morgan and Duane must be in there for me to munch on their brains. Think I'll try the door."

I think it's more like, well, sleepwalking. Where things seem familiar but you can't quite grasp all of the right information to use it (and I've dealt with a sleep walker before, it's a fascinating experience.) It's like door... door looks familiar... I think this is how you open it... Which is pretty much what a sleep walker does even if the door isn't really something familiar. (Again, something I've dealt with.)

I don't feel there's any active "remembering" going on just a basic sense of "familiarity" only at the most basic level.

 

[DarthTom]

Intelligent walkers would be a serious threat. I'm not sure what else they could introduce to make walkers more dangerous. Disease from the rotting corpses, perhaps? More walkers-as-weapons, the way the Governor used them?

In this regard the show has been some what inconsistent. In early episodes we saw zombies actually climbing over fences. e.g. when Rick and Glen go looking for the truck to save the group form the building.

In later episodes they don't seem to have this ability any longer.

And as someone noted in order to get into the clothing store a zombie wielded a stone to crack the glass.

 

[Sindatur]

Intelligent walkers would be a serious threat. I'm not sure what else they could introduce to make walkers more dangerous. Disease from the rotting corpses, perhaps? More walkers-as-weapons, the way the Governor used them?

In this regard the show has been some what inconsistent. In early episodes we saw zombies actually climbing over fences. e.g. when Rick and Glen go looking for the truck to save the group form the building.

In later episodes they don't seem to have this ability any longer.

And as someone noted in order to get into the clothing store a zombie wielded a stone to crack the glass.

On the fences, though, weren't they just "monkey see, monkey do", following someone who climbed a fence? The rock and the glass, yea, that's a consistency problem

 

[Pavonis]

Tool using mightn't be a consistency problem as much as a general degradation of the walker's abilities and mobility. Fresh zombies are more spry and lively than older ones. If the brain keeps rotting after reanimation, the zombies should get dumber. And it looks like they have.

 

[sojourner]

The most inconsistent scene for me is the little girl zombie that picks up her doll.

 

[Pavonis]

What is it inconsistent with, though?

The little girl was fresh, as was Jones' wife, and the rock-toting walker in Atlanta. So, too, were all the fence-climbing walkers...so what is "inconsistent"? That more decayed walkers aren't using tools or grabbing beloved toys?

 

[sojourner]

I don't know, it just seemed off to me.

 

[Trekker4747]

It's perhaps a "bit" inconsistent but the zombies also seem to have a flare for the dramatic. The little girl zombie obviously new she was in the teaser for a TV series and needed to act normal in order for the tension hook to work as the scene progressed.

 

[Dream]

It's perhaps a "bit" inconsistent but the zombies also seem to have a flare for the dramatic. The little girl zombie obviously new she was in the teaser for a TV series and needed to act normal in order for the tension hook to work as the scene progressed.

Rick sure loves shooting Zombie little girls in the head, doesn't he?

 

[Trekker4747]

It's perhaps a "bit" inconsistent but the zombies also seem to have a flare for the dramatic. The little girl zombie obviously new she was in the teaser for a TV series and needed to act normal in order for the tension hook to work as the scene progressed.

Rick sure loves shooting Zombie little girls in the head, doesn't he?

I'm surprised he was easily fooled by the "little girl" even that early in his "experience" with the Walkers you'd think he would know better than to automatically assume that this little girl was walking around an abandoned gas station parking lot in her pajamas.

 

[the G-man]

All dead bodies that were found in cars that did not reanimate probably suffered head trauma, preventing reanimation...

Other theories:

Those walkers couldn't get out of the cars and the heat in the cars essentially mummified them.

Dehydration, if significant enough, causes severe brain damage. That brain damage may have been as significant as the kind of head trauma that normally puts down a walker.​

Intelligent walkers would be a serious threat. I'm not sure what else they could introduce to make walkers more dangerous. Disease from the rotting corpses, perhaps? More walkers-as-weapons, the way the Governor used them?

Yes to both. And perhaps larger herds.

 

[Dorian Thompson]

My vote is either intelligent walkers or just faster walkers.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Perhaps the zombie virus will evolve and the Walkers will begin to heal and regenerate.

 

[Trekker4747]

All dead bodies that were found in cars that did not reanimate probably suffered head trauma, preventing reanimation...

Other theories:

Those walkers couldn't get out of the cars and the heat in the cars essentially mummified them.

Dehydration, if significant enough, causes severe brain damage. That brain damage may have been as significant as the kind of head trauma that normally puts down a walker.​

Yeah, but we've seen and been told unless there's brain trauma the Walkers will still pursue no matter what their injury. We've seen other Walkers attack people when cars or other enclosed areas have been opened up. The bodies in the cars on the highway I just assumed died before the "disease" managed to infect everyone.

 

[DarthTom]

My vote is either intelligent walkers or just faster walkers.

George Romeo's "zombie rules," may imply intelligent zombies are in store which IMO actually would be kewl.

Although initially devoid of both thought and memory, later works of Romero have shown zombies capable of learning through a process of trial and error. Both Day of the Dead and Land of the Dead show zombies using firearms in a limited capacity, while blunt objects as weapons have been used by zombies since Night of the Living Dead. The full extent of the creature's learning abilities is unknown, but the process of discovery for them is not unlike that of a toddler.

 

[Morpheus 02]

All dead bodies that were found in cars that did not reanimate probably suffered head trauma, preventing reanimation. As for starving to death, there may not have been enough time for any walker to do so. And anyway, only active walkers would attack, so the sampling of walker demographics is biased by the dramatic needs of the show.

I always thought those people weren't infected when they died and once dead . . . couldn't be infected. This was in the early stages of the Zombie outbreak before a form of the infection somehow became airborne (or whatever) and infected the living. Yet apparently this strain doesn't turn the living but only reanimates the dead.

Although even describing that idea seems absurd on so many levels . . . but . . . hey . . . its an entertainment show not Bill Nye the Science Guy.

In a previous thread, we speculated there are TWO things going on...the zombie "virus" which reanimates people.

The second is a "bacteria" which kills people quickly, and thus activates the virus.

 

[KGator]

All dead bodies that were found in cars that did not reanimate probably suffered head trauma, preventing reanimation. As for starving to death, there may not have been enough time for any walker to do so. And anyway, only active walkers would attack, so the sampling of walker demographics is biased by the dramatic needs of the show.

I always thought those people weren't infected when they died and once dead . . . couldn't be infected. This was in the early stages of the Zombie outbreak before a form of the infection somehow became airborne (or whatever) and infected the living. Yet apparently this strain doesn't turn the living but only reanimates the dead.

Although even describing that idea seems absurd on so many levels . . . but . . . hey . . . its an entertainment show not Bill Nye the Science Guy.

In a previous thread, we speculated there are TWO things going on...the zombie "virus" which reanimates people.

The second is a "bacteria" which kills people quickly, and thus activates the virus.

An interesting theory. So then the virus could be spread by contact while the bacteria needs bodily fluids (or blood contact).

Although that would also mean that not everyone who dies would turn into a zombie. Just those who have had previous contact with the infected (as most of the series survivors shown could be assumed to have done). In which case future generations could easily return to normality as contact with zombies would be limited as humans rebuilt society. And assuming that certain areas had been "walled off" from the infection it would be a bigger problem for survivors caught and forced to survive (either temporarily or permanently) in the infection zone.

 

[sojourner]

Although that would also mean that not everyone who dies would turn into a zombie.

Why would you think that? If everyone has the virus, then everyone becomes a zombie upon death. The bacteria just explains how a simple zombie bite kills.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Although that would also mean that not everyone who dies would turn into a zombie. Just those who have had previous contact with the infected (as most of the series survivors shown could be assumed to have done).

If by "contact," you mean fluids, bites or a scratch, then that does not apply to Randall--the prisoner Shane murdered, but reanimated after death. As far as we know, Randall never had physical contact with a walker.