As of the publication of The Eyes of the Dead, I’ve lived in the Corpse Fauna world for twenty-five years. If you define the modern zombie as walking dead ghouls who feast on the flesh of the living versus traditional voodoo zombies and place their birth in 1968 with the release of The Night of the Living Dead, that’s just short of half the lifespan of this most popular of 20th-century monsters. Back in 1997, when I conceived the first story in what grew into the Corpse Fauna cycle, a dedicated fan could have, with a little effort, seen all the modern zombie movies—certainly all the ones worth seeing—and read all the modern zombie books and comics. There were no TV shows. That last fact is hard to fathom today when there are, as of this writing, three series about a world plagued by modern zombies currently on the air, more announced to come soon, and several more available through streaming services. More remarkable is the unfettered torrent of zombie movies that shamble forth on a regular basis from all over the world.
With all this attention from creators and audiences, though, does the modern zombie still matter?
The godfather of the living dead, George Romero, imbued his tales of flesh-eating ghouls with social commentary, using reanimated corpses to weave satire and pointed observations into his movies. Many people once considered that element an essential ingredient of the modern zombie mythos, yet, that aspect has faded with time. Just as Bram Stoker’s commentary on Victorian sexual mores in Dracula has faded from vampire stories. Even as Mary Shelley’s themes of humanity’s relationship with its creations and discoveries have faded from adaptations and retellings of Frankenstein. In many ways, the modern zombie now stands with werewolves, mummies, and slashers as merely one more menacing figure in the pantheon of horror tropes and cliches.
With all due respect to the many excellent stories of modern zombies told since 2005, it’s tempting to declare the modern zombie complete and fully formed as of the release of Land of the Dead, George Romero’s fourth and final film in the original Dead series. He followed it with two more movies, Diary of the Dead (2007) and Survival of the Dead (2009), and even continued to build on his ideas in various comic book series, such as Toe Tags and Empire of the Dead; an anthology, with Jonathan Maberry, Nights of the Living Dead; and a novel, with Daniel Kraus, The Living Dead. All of those explored ideas and possibilities in the world of the living dead, but few of them added substantially to the idea of the modern zombie or to its full realization as a true classic monster. That George accomplished in Land of the Dead.
The classic monsters, as defined in film and fiction, include ghosts, Frankenstein’s monster, mummies, werewolves, vampires, and even the Creature from the Black Lagoon. What they have in common and what makes them classic is how they not only represent universal fears but that they exist as fully rounded characters, monstrous and frightening, true, but also sympathetic and imbued with humanity. We regard them with more than fear, with perhaps even sympathy and compassion. Consider the romance of Dracula; or the tragedy of Frankenstein’s monster, shunned by his maker; or the vibrant, charming Lawrence Talbot afflicted by a beast within him beyond his control; or the Creature, a lonely prehistoric throwback upon whose tranquil home eager scientists intrude. We find something in these monsters to love or, at least, with which to empathize, an aspect, characteristic, or circumstance that makes them as interesting to audiences and readers as the human characters who confront them. In some of those classic stories, the most monstrous character isn’t the creature but the humans around it.
Most of the classic monsters possessed those elements from their introduction. They sprang to dark life fully formed in their debut novels or films. For modern zombies, though, it took four movies made over a span of more than twenty-five years to get there. In Night of the Living Dead, the “ghouls” acted as little more than assassins. Random. Inexplicable. Single-minded. Blind appetites driven by mindless hunger. A mob overwhelming resistance from the living through thoughtless persistence and sheer numbers. With Dawn of the Dead (1978), they evolved into mute stand-ins for the worst traits in modern humanity. Consumerism. Materialism. Mindless adherence to convention. Then in Day of the Dead (1985), they exhibited the first signs of consciousness surviving death—or perhaps new consciousness emerging after death. As though resurrection of the body catalyzed a rebirth into which a new consciousness entered. All fascinating stuff in a sense of monster and world-building, shedding pure monstrosity for something more meaningful—but not yet on a par with the classic monsters that came before.
Another twenty years passed before Romero took us there in Land of the Dead, which fulfilled the vision the filmmaker had expressed decades before as the ultimate goal of his Dead movies. In Land, the dead show all the signs of having become a rival branch of humanity, a mutant species, fighting for their survival, even for the dignity of their new mode of existence. They become sympathetic like the classic monsters. Humanity must still fear them and cannot coexist with them because, no matter if we might understand their will to live and recognize their undeniable—though inhuman—consciousness, they still want to eat the living and make more of the dead. In Land, the modern zombie becomes the underdog triumphant. Audiences could finally root for these monsters and sympathize with their urge to live their undead existence to its fullest. Thus the modern zombie took its place among the pantheon of the truly classic monsters. As in all of the Dead films, there are far more monstrous humans in the story.
Romero took a long and roundabout path to that point with his creation—but the silver lining came in the form of four incredible horror films made at distinctly different points in history, allowing each to resonate in a different way and reach new audiences. Yet the question remains: Does the modern zombie still matter?
Are all stories of modern zombies since 2005 really about post-modern zombies? The challenge of working in a post-modern mode is to find new perspectives and themes in a thing considered complete and fully rounded. To breathe new life into creations so familiar they no longer evoke much of a reaction in their well-known form. To reinvent them.
What of Corpse Fauna, a series of novellas and stories that spans the modern/post-modern eras?
That has been one of the greatest challenges in writing these stories, publishing and republishing them, spending intense periods of time with these characters, then taking long vacations from them, then back again like a family reunion with your grimmest group of old friends. A strange experience. Some of the initial inspiration for Corpse Fauna seems less compelling to me today than it did when I began this story cycle. Some seem more important than ever. The theme of social authority and control versus individual freedom, identity, and will, which runs through all the stories, resonates even more for me today. So does the notion of an ambiguous power fueled by thousands or millions of trapped souls that watches and strives to control one’s every move, every choice, every thought. And the challenge of simply being left alone to live one’s life in a world where the masses feel entitled—even compelled—to interfere with the lives of people to whom they have no real connection. I leave it to my readers to ascertain what these ideas relate to in the real world.
In this sense, I consider the Corpse Fauna stories modern zombie stories, not post-modern, positioned squarely in the sweet spot Romero left open to those of us who cared to enter it in the zombie drought years between 1985 and 2005. Back when modern zombie stories were expected to be about more than mere survival, and the zombies needed to function as more than a generic threat in stories and movies that fit better into the sub-genre of survival horror than zombie fiction.
Still, does any of this answer the question? Does the modern zombie still matter?
It matters to me. I suspect it matters to my readers. For all the love of movie magic, special effects, and unforgettable characters that have made post-modern zombie stories, movies, and television shows so entertaining, the living dead seem a bit hollow without those essential elements that made them great in the first place. As long as writers seek those greater possibilities in what makes the modern zombie such a fascinating classic monster—and as long as readers and audiences continue supporting it—the modern zombie will continue to matter. And matter more than the post-modern zombie.
Coming to the end of the Corpse Fauna cycle with The Eyes of the Dead, I realize I’ve inadvertently followed even more closely in Romero’s footsteps than I’d ever intended. It’s taken a quarter-century to bring all these stories to publication and complete what I envisioned many years ago. There have been a number of false starts and setbacks not unlike those Romero experienced seeking funding for his Dead films. Yet here I am, having reached the end of the story (or the end for now…) because the Dead truly won’t die—unless we let them.
I owe a tremendous amount of gratitude to all those readers who have followed Corpse Fauna’s winding and circuitous path and its many resurrections. Your interest and support made these books possible. Thanks as well to the wonderfully supportive and professional folks at NeoParadoxa and eSpec Books, who not only provided the opportunity to fully realize what I’d imagined for Corpse Fauna but have gone above and beyond to make it the best it can be. A very special thanks to two artists who have been part of this journey with me: Glen Ostrander and Jason Whitley. I’m finicky about how artists visualize my characters and concepts, but Glen and Jason, apparently, can read my mind. Their interpretations and representations of Corpse Fauna have been pitch-perfect every time, and their enthusiasm has helped keep me going on the long trek from “Prison of the Blind Dead” (read my afterword in The Dead Bear Witness if you don’t know what that is) to The Eyes of the Dead.
Thank you for reading.
—James Chambers
April 2022