The Walking Dead returns...
By
2short2care,
Posted on: 2012-01-25 18:27 in Comic and Hero-Villain Culture
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In a world with no other man-made noises happening, a helicopter will cause exactly that. The zombies are drawn to the sounds. It's why they all stopped the second they heard the gunshot and turned as a group, just like a flock of birds. With nothing else to stop them or to attract their attention, they'll just keep going.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
I'll entertain the idea that the helicopter we saw at the beginning of the last episode was in fact the exact same helicopter that Rick saw way back during the first season. It's certainly possible that a -single- appearance of a helicopter like that might have set in motion a multi-week stampede that just by coincidence finally caught back up to Hershel's farm.
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I guess my only "problem" with that idea is what Aett_Thorn said in that the show did not make it 100% clear that these two "appearances" of the helicopter was supposed to have been the same exact helicopter on the same day from two different points of view. The show could have cleared that up by simply throwing up a caption at the bottom of the screen saying something like "4 weeks ago" when showing the "second" helicopter to give us a sense that that shot was supposed to be a flashback to a prior episode. I suppose we'll have to wait until season 3 to get any follow-up on that. 
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They didn't need to hand hold people about this scenario.
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The weak point in this theory of the "single helicopter causing a multi-week stampede" is that it assumes that there was nothing else that might have caught their attention and caused them to eventually brake apart into other random groups over the course of multiple days. After all the Altanta area itself is many square miles in size.|
Originally Posted by Dark One
In a world with no other man-made noises happening, a helicopter will cause exactly that. The zombies are drawn to the sounds. It's why they all stopped the second they heard the gunshot and turned as a group, just like a flock of birds. With nothing else to stop them or to attract their attention, they'll just keep going.
It's only a problem if you didn't actually watch the scenario play out and can't remember Rick being in Atlanta. Small group of zombies in a city that looked much like the city in the first season gradually turns into a larger and larger group over a period of time and appears in different areas. They didn't need to hand hold people about this scenario. |
Of course this also assumes that the single helicopter would be able direct all these zombies in a single direction for days/weeks towards the very spot where the group just happens to be staying at Hershel's farm. If you aren't willing to see how completely contrived that would be just for the purposes of the show then you at least need to be willing to concede that it was an incredible "coincidence" that all the events transpired to create the exact scenario we saw in the final episode. Deus ex Machina anyone?
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What would there be to catch their attention? Most, if not all, the other humans in that area are either dead or smart enough to not make any noise on the ground. Animals could probably smell them before they get close enough to see/hear them. The only other humans we've seen is the small numbers of Randall's group and they are transplants to the area.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
The weak point in this theory of the "single helicopter causing a multi-week stampede" is that it assumes that there was nothing else that might have caught their attention and caused them to eventually brake apart into other random groups over the course of multiple days. After all the Altanta area itself is many square miles in size.
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Zombies are herd animals. Breaking up into smaller groups is probably not going to happen. Remember World War Z? That the herds were visible from space. While one or two may get trapped/fall off a cliff/get stuck in a culvert/etc., the majority will just keep on trucking till something stops them.
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Of course this also assumes that the single helicopter would be able direct all these zombies in a single direction for days/weeks towards the very spot where the group just happens to be staying at Hershel's farm. If you aren't willing to see how completely contrived that would be just for the purposes of the show then you at least need to be willing to concede that it was an incredible "coincidence" that all the events transpired to create the exact scenario we saw in the final episode. Deus ex Machina anyone?
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The only thing that got them to go to the farm was Carl shooting Shane. They would've passed completely on by otherwise.
It's nothing more than a coincedence, the same as Randall's group finding that specific town or Glenn finding Rick. Dumb luck works both ways, good and bad.
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I will grant you that it's entirely contrived, and wasn't shown well enough to really get across the point that it was trying to. And yes, there is a lot of coincidence in there that the helicopter happened to fly in the exact direction of Herschel's farm (even a 1 degree difference would have meant that the zombies passed several miles away from the farm). Intervening buildings or sounds along the way make it even more unlikely. And if Atlanta is like most cities and not based on an exact grid, it would basically be impossible for them to follow the helicopter for very long anyways, at which point they should stop at any minor nearby noise.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
The weak point in this theory of the "single helicopter causing a multi-week stampede" is that it assumes that there was nothing else that might have caught their attention and caused them to eventually brake apart into other random groups over the course of multiple days. After all the Altanta area itself is many square miles in size.
Of course this also assumes that the single helicopter would be able direct all these zombies in a single direction for days/weeks towards the very spot where the group just happens to be staying at Hershel's farm. If you aren't willing to see how completely contrived that would be just for the purposes of the show then you at least need to be willing to concede that it was an incredible "coincidence" that all the events transpired to create the exact scenario we saw in the final episode. Deus ex Machina anyone? |
So, while I still believe that the show was trying to show the same helicopter that Rick saw, I think it did a pretty bad job of showing that. Having a pretty non-nondescript helicopter performing no actions other than flying in a straight line is even worse (i.e., if it had been taking off when Rick saw it, and you saw that again in the last episode, or if it closed a door or something, that would've made it more clear).
Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
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"I was just the one with the most unsolicited sombrero." - Traegus
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Right we are just talking "dumb luck" here. That's exactly why there's absolutely no reason to hand-wave an elaborate theory that zombie herds move inertially without being able to be diverted once started -just- to have a mob of zombies randomly exist nearby when Carl shot Shane. Why couldn't that herd of zombies just BE there without the show trying (badly) to make us think that zombies will move as uniformly as you describe?|
Originally Posted by Dark One
What would there be to catch their attention? Most, if not all, the other humans in that area are either dead or smart enough to not make any noise on the ground. Animals could probably smell them before they get close enough to see/hear them. The only other humans we've seen is the small numbers of Randall's group and they are transplants to the area.
Zombies are herd animals. Breaking up into smaller groups is probably not going to happen. Remember World War Z? That the herds were visible from space. While one or two may get trapped/fall off a cliff/get stuck in a culvert/etc., the majority will just keep on trucking till something stops them. Straight line movement. The helicopter isn't directing them anywhere. The helicopter was going in one direction, the zombies followed it. The helicopter may move in a different direction once out of sight/hearing range of the zombies. The only thing that got them to go to the farm was Carl shooting Shane. They would've passed completely on by otherwise. It's nothing more than a coincedence, the same as Randall's group finding that specific town or Glenn finding Rick. Dumb luck works both ways, good and bad. |
It seems the show went out of its way to be unnecessarily convoluted with a barely plausible scenario when it could have just stuck to the basics and had a zombie horde swarm out of thin air. What purpose did it serve for the show to try (and fail) to be cute about it?
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I will agree with most of this as well. Basically, in a situation where you don't have all the facts, it's never ALWAYS best to stay away from the major cities, and never ALWAYS best to stay away from them.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
I simply believe you guys may be over-thinking this from the point of view of having "audience/genre knowledge" that might not actually apply to the unique situation in this particular story. Besides I'm not really sure you can count on having "general zombie apocalypse" guidelines that are going to work during -every- zombie apocalypse that turns up anyway. We aren't talking about something that's strictly predictable like a hurricane might be. I'm pretty sure that if a ZA ever happened IRL the particular circumstances behind it would be absolutely unique and unprecedented.
For instance why exactly would you ALWAYS want to stay away from high population areas? What rule in the rulebook states that there could -never- be major cities that have managed to remain intact against the zombies? Even looking at what happened in the comic we see that a small group of survivors managed to wall off the town that the Governor was controlling. Why couldn't the Army have managed to do that to other towns that Mr. Philadelphia and his cohorts never saw in their travels? Bottomline is that no one in this story has any real idea about what's happening in most of the rest of the world. Sure it might initially seem smart to run off to somewhere out in the middle of Texas to "ride it out" but for all you know there might be a hundred random towns in Florida or Maine that are completely safe and secure that you might never hear about if you do that. Again the idea of "just heading east" might not make much sense all by itself. But it would seem to me that the opposite concept of "just finding a hole to live in for the rest of your life" is probably an equally dumb plan for your long term future in such a hopeless environment. |
Still, I would say that going into a more populated area increases the chances of finding people and walkers. and those people might be good and might be bad. With dwindling ammo supplies and group size, heading into the city is likely not a good idea. Sure, you might run into a good group of people and restart a civilization there, but more likely you'll find either a) that walkers have overrun the area, or b) hostile groups of people who are trying to protect their own dwindling resource pool.
There was a show on in the past few years called The Colony which showed that even people who KNEW they were on a TV show, when put into a situation where they began to believe that they were in a post-apocalyptic society began to act very tribalish in just a few weeks, trying to protect what little they have at all costs. Imagine if that was real.
Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
"I was just the one with the most unsolicited sombrero." - Traegus
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What is sooooooooo elaborate about the herd being on the move? They saw the helicopter, they followed the helicopter. They'll move uniformly like that BECAUSE WE'VE ALREADY SEEN IT HAPPEN. Namely, the herd that Rick's group encountered on the highway. They were, for lack of a better word, migrating.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
Right we are just talking "dumb luck" here. That's exactly why there's absolutely no reason to hand-wave an elaborate theory that zombie herds move inertially without being able to be diverted once started -just- to have a mob of zombies randomly exist nearby when Carl shot Shane. Why couldn't that herd of zombies just BE there without the show trying (badly) to make us think that zombies will move as uniformly as you describe?
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That herd couldn't just "be" there or show up out of nowhere, since inevitably you would come back with, "How did they miss that giant group of zombies just off their doorstep when they've been tramping around the woods all this time?". Face it, you are just looking for stuff to hate on in this show, IMO.
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| It seems the show went out of its way to be unnecessarily convoluted with a barely plausible scenario when it could have just stuck to the basics and had a zombie horde swarm out of thin air. What purpose did it serve for the show to try (and fail) to be cute about it? |
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The Colony was a scary show. It was a reality show where the contestants were engineers and scientists tasked with building a colony after the fall of civilization. But even though the people knew they were on a TV show things got out of hand. There were several occasions when I thought they were going to kill somebody. I'm not surprised they didn't get a second season; there's nowhere else they could have gone without bloodshed, which in reality shows is generally frowned upon.|
Originally Posted by Aett_Thorn
There was a show on in the past few years called The Colony which showed that even people who KNEW they were on a TV show, when put into a situation where they began to believe that they were in a post-apocalyptic society began to act very tribalish in just a few weeks, trying to protect what little they have at all costs. Imagine if that was real.
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On the other hand, from scraps the engineers built a working solar array, a water collection and filtration unit, and a wood-fueled truck. If I was in any kind of apocalypse I'd want those dudes on my side.
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The formation of the horde and its migration was pretty much dead on with how it's described in the comic. One sees/hears/gets distracted by something, and starts moving in a direction. Other zombies notice this, following the lead. Others eventually join, forming larger and larger hordes. They keep moving simply because they are moving; there is no reason to stop.
Was it convenient for the show that a herd happened to be in hearing range of Carl's gunshot? Of course. By its definition, it is a deux ex machina; the Kirkman heard the pleas of his faithful story-writers and granted them this boon. It happens all the time in television and film, and requires a certain suspension of disbelief to enjoy it. You see evidence in this in regards to their ammo, as well as their ability to find just the right item at the right time.
I have to wonder why they didn't start coming after the first shot, the one Shane shot when Rick came at him with the knife. It was a good several minutes in between that and Carl's shot. Then again, with very little noise being made at night in the ZA, it's reasonable to believe that the sound could travel several miles to wherever the zombies happened to be. If they were indeed reacting to the first gunshot, then they could have been a distance away and just took time to get there.
I find your lack of signature disturbing.
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Everything has to happen at just the right time, otherwise the show is a bunch of people sitting around playing cards waiting to die. A truck has to break down, a guard has to go take a leak, the clip runs out of ammo, those are all things that just happen at the right time to advance the story.
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Originally Posted by Frost Warden
Was it convenient for the show that a herd happened to be in hearing range of Carl's gunshot? Of course. By its definition, it is a deux ex machina; the Kirkman heard the pleas of his faithful story-writers and granted them this boon. It happens all the time in television and film, and requires a certain suspension of disbelief to enjoy it. You see evidence in this in regards to their ammo, as well as their ability to find just the right item at the right time.
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There was a 2nd season and there are rumors about a third in the works (maybe to capitalize on the ZA/TWD popularity).
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Originally Posted by RemusShepherd
The Colony was a scary show. It was a reality show where the contestants were engineers and scientists tasked with building a colony after the fall of civilization. But even though the people knew they were on a TV show things got out of hand. There were several occasions when I thought they were going to kill somebody. I'm not surprised they didn't get a second season; there's nowhere else they could have gone without bloodshed, which in reality shows is generally frowned upon.
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I could be wrong, but I thought they showed the original, helicopter-spotting zombies noshing on a horse at the beginning of the episode. I took that to be the horse Rick rode in on and assumed that was their way of showing us that it was a flashback to early in Season 1.|
Originally Posted by Aett_Thorn
So, while I still believe that the show was trying to show the same helicopter that Rick saw, I think it did a pretty bad job of showing that. Having a pretty non-nondescript helicopter performing no actions other than flying in a straight line is even worse (i.e., if it had been taking off when Rick saw it, and you saw that again in the last episode, or if it closed a door or something, that would've made it more clear).
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As for trying to find other survivors, that's the last thing I'd want to do if I was with a small group of competent, trustworthy survivors during an apocalpyse, zombie or otherwise. It would take a lot more supplies, and strong, perhaps authoritarian, leadership to keep a large group of survivors together. Unless that large group already had a well-established and sustainable infrastructure, and/or a strong but benevolent leader, they would likely see any outsiders as a drain on their supplies and a threat to their own survival. If the large group was just getting by, it's more likely they would kill the small group for any meager supplies/ammo they might have, rather than welcome them.
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It might have been his horse, but looked more like a deer to me. Like one had wandered into the city. If it was the horse, that would make less sense, since didn't Rick see the helicopter when he was riding his horse? Wasn't he following it when he ran into the horde of walkers and had to hide in the tank?|
Originally Posted by mousedroid
I could be wrong, but I thought they showed the original, helicopter-spotting zombies noshing on a horse at the beginning of the episode. I took that to be the horse Rick rode in on and assumed that was their way of showing us that it was a flashback to early in Season 1.
As for trying to find other survivors, that's the last thing I'd want to do if I was with a small group of competent, trustworthy survivors during an apocalpyse, zombie or otherwise. It would take a lot more supplies, and strong, perhaps authoritarian, leadership to keep a large group of survivors together. Unless that large group already had a well-established and sustainable infrastructure, and/or a strong but benevolent leader, they would likely see any outsiders as a drain on their supplies and a threat to their own survival. If the large group was just getting by, it's more likely they would kill the small group for any meager supplies/ammo they might have, rather than welcome them. |
It was a really contrived scene, and I don't think it at all conveyed what the director had hoped to convey.
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"I was just the one with the most unsolicited sombrero." - Traegus
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Looked like a dog to me.|
Originally Posted by mousedroid
I could be wrong, but I thought they showed the original, helicopter-spotting zombies noshing on a horse at the beginning of the episode. I took that to be the horse Rick rode in on and assumed that was their way of showing us that it was a flashback to early in Season 1.
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The horse got swarmed by a massive group, as opposed to the very small group of zombies that was munching on the animal.
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I was thinking that they had something going for a long time before the walkers since Rick was talking to Shane about the troubles they were having.
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Originally Posted by EnigmaBlack
Her reaction to Rick killing Shane makes me wonder if they had something going on beforehand? Rick was in a coma for about a month before he woke up which means not a lot of time passed between the outbreak, him waking up and joining up with the others.
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@Joshua.
The zombies would need some time to walk all that way to the farm. That little group (cuz there were only like 4 or so to start, iirc) saw it, started heading out in the direction it went, and chain swarmed with every deader along the way. They just started walking and kept at it even after the copter was out of sight/hearing. Other zombies noticed them walking and joined up. Had Carl not shot, that herd would've passed on by the farm, possibly.
The copter event was basically a callback to the time that Rick saw it, but simply shown from a different location in Atlanta.
The Talking Dead show did mention that the writers have a set of principles for how the zombies work, and I think that is part of it. The zombies basically follow the last sort of human sound they hear, or follow other undead if they seem like they have a goal.
I am hoping that they do find some other big group, though, as the current characters are getting a bit old. It's the same sort of problem that Lost had. People get bored watching the same 6 people interact all the time. Sometimes, some fresh blood is needed, and killing off people who haven't really even had a line doesn't make us care about them all of a sudden.
I guess my only "problem" with that idea is what Aett_Thorn said in that the show did not make it 100% clear that these two "appearances" of the helicopter was supposed to have been the same exact helicopter on the same day from two different points of view. The show could have cleared that up by simply throwing up a caption at the bottom of the screen saying something like "4 weeks ago" when showing the "second" helicopter to give us a sense that that shot was supposed to be a flashback to a prior episode.
I suppose we'll have to wait until season 3 to get any follow-up on that.
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