The BBC recently ran a 5-part horror/comedy-type series about Zombies called “Dead Set.” The series has been well-received and also go lots of critical acclaim. I haven’t seen it, but I still enjoyed the piece Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead) penned for the Guardian regarding the fact that the “Dead Set” zombies can run:

I know it is absurd to debate the rules of a reality that does not exist, but this genuinely irks me. You cannot kill a vampire with an MDF stake; werewolves can’t fly; zombies do not run. It’s a misconception, a bastardisation that diminishes a classic movie monster. The best phantasmagoria uses reality to render the inconceivable conceivable. The speedy zombie seems implausible to me, even within the fantastic realm it inhabits. A biological agent, I’ll buy. Some sort of super-virus? Sure, why not. But death? Death is a disability, not a superpower. It’s hard to run with a cold, let alone the most debilitating malady of them all.

More significantly, the fast zombie is bereft of poetic subtlety. As monsters from the id, zombies win out over vampires and werewolves when it comes to the title of Most Potent Metaphorical Monster. Where their pointy-toothed cousins are all about sex and bestial savagery, the zombie trumps all by personifying our deepest fear: death. Zombies are our destiny writ large. Slow and steady in their approach, weak, clumsy, often absurd, the zombie relentlessly closes in, unstoppable, intractable.

Reservoir Carl and a few others in the know recommended some quality Zombie films for my Halloween fest, and I’ve noted the titles for a Thanksgiving marathon.

I always forget to recommend the podcast MailOrderZombie to Carl, so I’ll do it now.