Member-only story
Zombies, Corona and Fear of Death
From “The Walking Dead” to “Black Mirror” to “The Handmaid’s Tale”, our appetite for all things dystopian seems to know no limits. Drawn to every imaginable dark possibility for humanity seems to have found rich soil in our collective imagination. It’s not unprecedented, to be sure. Our fascination with our shared demise has long been part of our social fabric but we have literally made it an art-form in recent years.
I have to acknowledge my own fascination with the genre. Even a decade in (and despite understandably waning ratings), I never miss an episode of the AMC’s “The Walking Dead”. Still drawing over 3 million viewers a week, it has created loyal viewers from well beyond the typical horror fan-base. I am not a fan of horror and while not squeamish, don’t enjoy gore. Yet I am fascinated by this ongoing story of humans fighting to live under impossibly deadly circumstances.
What fascinates me most is how quickly shows like this shift with respect to who or what the threat really is. No long-time fan of “The Walking Dead”, for example, would argue that zombies are the central threat. Sure, they are dangerous and central to how life is inevitably organized but, in truth, they have become the accepted norm. The real threat- the one that has grown by degrees since the first season- is other people.