The "Zombies" Have Arrived!

I first started researching zombies during my undergraduate years. There was a class on Hong Kong martial arts films taught by a Chinese literature professor as a liberal arts subject, and the assignment was to watch and analyze a film. I went to a rental video shop and was looking at the B-movie action shelf, but the horror section was right next to it, and a zombie's face kept flickering in the corner of my eye (laughs).

Actually, even now, I'm not very good with scary movies.

Is that so? (laughs).

So, at the time, I had never seen a zombie movie, and I wondered why there were so many stories about corpses coming back to life to eat people and go "Aah! Eek!" I tried renting one, and well, it was a terrible low-budget movie (laughs). But conversely, the mystery deepened. I wondered why so many of these were being filmed and who was watching them.

As I started watching various films, I found some quite high-quality zombie movies and encountered ones that considered social issues, so I began enjoying it like a treasure hunt. I never thought I would end up writing a research book about them (laughs).

I'm a film critic, and I started watching a massive amount of movies around 1979. That was exactly when cheesy horror movies like "Halloween" (1978, US) started coming out, and zombie films were among them. George A. Romero's trilogy ("Night of the Living Dead," "Dawn of the Dead," "Day of the Dead") is famous, but after that, as you mentioned, B-movies followed.

Then, zombies appeared in Michael Jackson's "Thriller" (1982) music video and became a hot topic. Later, Sammo Hung released "Mr. Vampire" (1985) in Hong Kong, and in the 2000s, something quite shocking like "28 Days Later" (2002, UK) appeared, featuring running zombies.

They really ran, didn't they?

Things started to change around here. The first "Resident Evil" (Biohazard) film also came out the same year. This was derived from a video game, produced by Hollywood with a massive budget, and it felt like it went mainstream all at once.

There were six films in the "Resident Evil" series (2002–2016). After that came "I Am Legend" (2007, US) starring Will Smith. "Zombieland" (2009, US) was like a horror-comedy, and Brad Pitt starred in "World War Z" (2013, US) as zombie movies were released one after another. Even in Japan, "One Cut of the Dead" (2018) is basically a zombie story.

When talking about zombie movies from the 2000s, "Resident Evil" was definitely a major factor.

That came from a game, and Sony Pictures (Columbia) gave it a huge budget with Milla Jovovich starring in a classic Hollywood-style production.

The game was released in 1996. The fact that it was a hit was significant. It's like the zombie boom took a detour through Japan and then returned to America.

The game apparently sold well in America too. It seems the idea that "it's okay to kill them because they're corpses" played a part.

Also, regarding the so-called uncanny valley—as rendering capabilities improved and became more realistic, they couldn't make them look exactly like humans, but they could manage zombies. I think there might have been such technical constraints.

The awkward movements, right? In recent games, there are many open-world style games where a swarm of zombies comes at you. There are also games where four or five players connect online to fight together, allowing you to experience the world of a zombie movie firsthand.

The "Resident Evil" movies felt like they fit zombies into the framework of American cinema. Usually, the villain is a pharmaceutical company tied to a national conspiracy (laughs).

The Hollywood grammar—the idea that filming with a certain timeline will appeal to the general public—evolved significantly from the late 90s to the early 2010s, and I think "Resident Evil" reflected that.

Recently, I've been on the production side, supervising dramas and writing scripts, and American screenwriting is quite fixed. You introduce all the characters in the first 15 minutes, an incident occurs in the next 15, it worsens at the 30-minute mark, everyone struggles after that, and in the last 10 minutes, it ends and everyone is happy.

That's the so-called Hollywood grammar.

So, someone like Tarantino, who deviates from this, is considered unconventional. In a standard Hollywood pattern, the protagonist usually survives while a close friend meets a tragic end.

For some reason, the protagonist remains almost unscathed. Even Milla Jovovich in "Resident Evil" is running around practically naked, yet she doesn't get a scratch. That part is just for convenience, and since zombies can also be made for convenience, they fit into that mold easily.

Then there's the evolution of CG technology. I suspect "Resident Evil" came out right at the intersection of the technology to show amazing visuals with CG and the evolution of Hollywood grammar.

Since the 90s, there was a shortage of scripts, leading to many remakes. In the 2000s, various types of movies emerged as they tried to bring in new material, and zombie films were likely one of those.

Speaking of CG, "World War Z" was incredible. The way the zombies attacked in a massive wave.

That gave me goosebumps.

The slight unnaturalness of the movement because of the CG... it felt like the visual expression and the existence of zombies were a perfect match.

The characteristics of a zombie are that it's a corpse, unconscious, attacks people, and if it bites you, you become a zombie too. They move slowly, and for some reason, they die if you shoot them in the head. In more recent times, stories have shifted to viral pandemics, they move faster, and even animals become zombies.

There are movies like "Zombeavers" (2014, US), after all.

The best thing about zombie movies is that, fundamentally, they are B-movies that don't overthink things.

Jiangshi (Chinese hopping vampires) were established in 18th-century China. The word is written with characters meaning "stiff corpse." In other words, when a body suddenly moves its arms due to rigor mortis, people thought it was a monster—that's the Jiangshi.

Why didn't Chinese people notice the phenomenon of rigor mortis until the 18th century? It's because cremation had become widespread early on. However, when the Manchu Qing Dynasty took over, they reinstated burial as described in old Confucian texts to avoid resentment from the people they ruled. Because of that, Chinese people noticed rigor mortis for the first time in the 18th century. That's where the Jiangshi originated.

However, literature from that time doesn't say a single word about "becoming a Jiangshi if bitten by one." I suspect that Hong Kong and Taiwanese films in the 1980s superimposed the rules of Western zombie movies onto the Jiangshi.

Zombies also didn't originally have the "infectious if bitten" trait back when they were part of "Voodoo" (the Haitian religion considered the origin of zombies).

Even in Romero's films, you don't turn immediately after being bitten.

I think the image of the vampire has also been mixed in.

That's right. From a religious studies perspective, vampires, Jiangshi, zombies, and werewolves probably share the same origin, with rabies being one of the roots. When someone has rabies, they dislike strong smells and wander at night.

Also, with rigor mortis, while the limbs might move, blood can also come out of the eyes and mouth. Seeing that, people might have thought, "Oh, it's been sucking blood."

I see. So plague and rigor mortis appear in various places in different forms.

I believe that serves as the base for them becoming Jiangshi or zombies.

I think rental video stores played a huge role in why zombies became this widespread.

Instead of going to a theater, you could rent them and watch at home. And because titles would run out quickly, even B-movies were rapidly released on home video.

Also, isn't there the factor of late-night anime? Several zombie-themed anime are coming out late at night now. I think it's a result of needing many titles, just like the old video rental stores.

Recently, there was "Zombie Land Saga" (2018).

That was interesting, wasn't it?

It's a regional promotion anime featuring zombies. Since I was originally researching anime pilgrimage (sacred site tourism), I was shocked.

Two trends merged (laughs).

I felt like it was made just for me (laughs). The "Saga" in "Zombie Land Saga" refers to Saga Prefecture.

Zombie girls are resurrected and active as a group. And in Saga, of all places (laughs).

It's a comedy series, so it's not about a pandemic spreading; it's about them wearing human-like makeup so people don't realize they're zombies, and trying to revitalize Saga Prefecture through idol activities.

The fact that such loose concepts are possible is what's great about zombie movies.

Yes. There's a high degree of freedom. Even in Western films, there are many bizarre concepts. It's usually either shark movies or zombie movies that are the most challenging.

Like "Sharknado" (2013, US) (laughs).

Americans really love sharks.

In Japan, I think the live-action film "I Am a Hero" (2016) was a solid zombie movie made with a considerable budget.

That came out the same year as "Shin Godzilla" and "Your Name.", so it was somewhat overshadowed, but it was a very good movie.

There were many powerful scenes that were quite shocking. I saw high school students in the audience crying.

"I Am a Hero" was probably influenced by "I Am Legend" (2007, US).

Right, it's a play on that title. The original source for "I Am Legend" is Richard Matheson's novel "I Am Legend" (1954), which was the complete inspiration for Romero, so in a way, it's come full circle. But in the novel, they are vampires, not zombies, so it clearly slid over from vampires.

The vampires in the novel aren't like Count Dracula at all; they feel more like ordinary people wandering around.

The image of the vampire from Bram Stoker's "Dracula" (1897) is actually quite fake and strange compared to the reality of vampire folklore, but before we knew it, "vampire" became synonymous with "Dracula."

There are also differences from the original book. The Dracula in the novel is by no means slicked-back with a cape; he's a balding middle-aged man. It was the 1920s stage version that gave him the cape and slicked-back hair. Movies have inherited that ever since, so we think that's what Dracula looks like.

That's true. Even in movies, Murnau's "Nosferatu" (1922) is just a bald old guy (laughs).

That one was scary too, wasn't it?

That one is truly terrifying.

In Eastern Europe, places like Count Dracula's castle have become tourist attractions, but I suppose those are afterthoughts as well.

Yes. It follows a complex history, but historically, it originates from "Vlad the Impaler" (Vlad III) of the Transylvania region in Romania.

Vampire legends belong to the Eastern Orthodox traditions of Eastern Europe; there are no vampires in England or France. According to Catholic doctrine, it's impossible because Purgatory exists after death. However, vampires were resurrected in Bible-focused Protestantism.

Zombies really belong to the world of the Apocalypse, don't they? It's the idea that at the end of the world, the dead rise from their graves with Jesus. But since Japanese people don't share that sensibility, I don't think they quite understand why the dead would come out of their graves at the end of the world.

When we watch Michael Jackson's "Thriller," we don't realize it's a parody of the Apocalypse, but Michael Jackson there is both a parody of and an homage to Jesus, and the corpses rising from the grave is based on descriptions in the Book of Revelation.

When Japanese people accept zombies, they don't understand that most important part, so it ends up being transformed in various ways. I think one result of that is the development of expressions like "kimo-kawaii" (gross-cute).

Exactly. I think the underlying meaning and context were dropped, and only the outward expression was imported. That's why, although there are a fair number of Japanese zombie movies, they haven't really been hits or become films that the general public watches for enjoyment.

I think the reason good zombie movies have started appearing recently is because of viruses. The fear of viral infection is something we can truly feel as a reality.

And it's currently spreading in China right now.

Regarding the "kimo-kawaii" talk in Japan, I think the influence of Halloween is significant. Specifically, zombie makeup using fake blood.

Why Halloween became popular in Japan is a mystery in itself, but it's also strange why zombie makeup is so well-received. However, if I were to stand here in this outfit and say, "I am Count Dracula," people would say, "What are you talking about?" But if I put on some red paint to mimic blood and say I'm a zombie, they'd say, "Well, I guess so" (laughs).

It's easier. To become Dracula, you have to slick your hair back and do all sorts of things.

The image of a zombie isn't fixed, so it's very easy to do.

And you just have to wander around aimlessly.

So, if you asked a girl walking through Shibuya in zombie makeup, "Do you know George A. Romero?" almost 100% of them wouldn't know.

They definitely wouldn't know.

They might not even know "Resident Evil." But a vague image exists, and they can recognize each other as zombies. I think this "looseness" is the key.

Genres that last a long time usually have a certain kind of looseness. People used to say, "If it runs, it's not a zombie," but then everyone accepts it and it keeps expanding. I think this is important for content to continue.

That's true. When I first saw "Thriller," the idea that zombies—who aren't supposed to be able to move properly—could perform a coordinated dance was so impossible that it was funny as a parody. But that feeling has disappeared now.

That dance in "Thriller" is actually taken from India. In Indian movies, like "Muthu" (1995), a superstar is in the center and everyone around them dances in sync. "Thriller" is based on a typical Indian dance style.

There's also an Indian zombie movie called "Go Goa Gone" (2013).

That one is wonderful.

It has an homage to "Thriller" at the beginning.

What's interesting about Indian movies is that they must have dancing. Currently, India produces the most films and Bollywood is famous, but there are actually about four different film-producing regions. While Bollywood is bright, in the southern parts where electricity hasn't reached everywhere, there is still room for ghost-like things to appear, so there are many dark works.

The fear of zombies is complex. Primarily, there's the fear of being attacked. Then, there's the fear that you might become a zombie—a perpetrator—and the fear of what to do if someone you care about becomes a zombie. It's a very multi-layered fear.

Something interesting in recent works is that the number of conscious zombies is increasing.

That's certainly true.

Furthermore, characters are appearing who end up in the "in-between" of zombies and humans. There's a massive hit manga (and anime) called "Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba," where the protagonist's sister becomes a "demon," but she becomes a very delicate existence that doesn't attack humans. While humans try to kill the demon, the protagonist protects her, saying, "No, this girl doesn't eat humans."

In America, there's a movie called "Warm Bodies" (2013) about a romance between a handsome zombie and a human woman. The story is actually based on "Romeo and Juliet," but done as "Zombie & Juliet." In this movie, when you become a zombie, you can't speak much, but the voice inside your head is eloquent and conscious. However, as time passes, they become "Boneys," different beings with no consciousness at all who attack people. The zombies are depicted as beings in the "between" of human and non-human.

Zombies are no longer beings with whom communication is completely impossible; it's more like communication seems possible but isn't. I think representing the "Other" in that way is an interesting recent characteristic.

Talking to a zombie used to be a no-go, didn't it?

Yes. Although "The Return of the Living Dead" (1985, US) depicted it as a gag.

It used to be vampires, but many current American dramas are about zombies, aren't they?

Yes. There's even a ridiculous Russian one where only beautiful women become zombies. How do they judge who's beautiful? (laughs). In that one, they can live and talk normally and are in a state where communication is possible.

Many zombie movies depict human relationships—whether to exclude the other, whether you can get along, or if there's a third way. On one hand, they develop as attraction movies with powerful visuals that fuel the fear of panic, while on the other hand, there are those that carefully describe individual relationships, so it never gets boring.

For attraction-style American movies, the rival is Disneyland. It's a matter of "Are we going to the movies, or are we going to Disneyland?"

There are things called "Real Escape Games," and zombies can be seen everywhere within the popularity of those puzzle-solving games.

In the first place, even in Romero's "Dawn of the Dead" (1978), the point is escaping from the shopping center. It's the same with "I Am Legend"; the idea of escape feels Christian. Escaping at the end to go to a sacred land that was still left behind.

I see. Like Moses, then.

Watching "Dawn of the Dead" as a kid was quite a shock. A shopping center filled with zombies, then a biker gang shows up and starts trashing the place—you wonder what on earth is going on (laughs).

It was really scary back then, but when I rewatched it a few years ago, it wasn't so bad (laughs).

The ones who survive at the end are a Black man and a pregnant woman. They were people who hadn't been protagonists in American movies until then.

Romero seems to have been quite conscious of racial issues; "Night of the Living Dead" (1968), where a Black man is attacked by white people, was also called a "reverse side of the Black Power movement." I feel like he did it consciously from then on.

He didn't seem very conscious of it in "Night of the Living Dead," but he probably thought about it afterward. So, I feel like he calculated that the final scene of "Dawn of the Dead" would likely be read with that kind of message.

But the fact that he's not doing it just because he wants to is what's a bit wicked about Romero (laughs).

True. With Romero, the work "Land of the Dead" (2005) has quite congested values and isn't highly rated among his works, but I actually quite like it. Though I like "Day of the Dead" (1985) too.

The leading figure, Romero, has passed away now.

It's been about three years now. There's a story that he was filming a work called "Road of the Dead" at the end.

Now that "Resident Evil" has concluded and covered all the mainstream bases, and the TV drama "The Walking Dead" (2010–, US) feels like it's packed in all the elements so far, does it feel like the mainstream path is becoming difficult for movies?

Yes. Recently, many works have a twist or two. There's a musical zombie movie called "Anna and the Apocalypse" (2017, UK). It's about a high school girl who feels frustrated in a small town and wants to get out; zombies appear, and in the end, she survives and leaves. It's a full musical and very interesting. In Japan, there's "Murder at Shijinso" (2019). A murder occurs in a Western-style mansion where people are barricaded after a zombie outbreak. You'd think they wouldn't need to do that in such an emergency (laughs), but it uses tricks that are only possible because they are surrounded by zombies.

There's also a story set in a world after a zombie virus has spread called "Mayhem" (2017, US). After the panic subsides, someone contaminates the water in one section of a corporate building with the virus, and only that company is infected. That zombie virus is one that releases rage; while they remain conscious, they lose their reason, and it's a story about subordinates going to kill their bosses (laughs).

Certainly, nowadays, if it's too much of a template, it's boring.

It does feel like zombie movies have exhausted all possibilities. There was even one where they eventually turn into trees.

That's the work "The Girl with All the Gifts" (2016, UK). That's a novel zombie too.

This movie uses fungi instead of a virus as the setting. It's based on Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, a real type of mushroom that parasitizes and controls ants. This actually exists in the world; it enters the ant's body and multiplies by controlling its behavior. The setting is that it started parasitizing humans. That's why they eventually become trees. It considers things like the ecosystem, which is very interesting.

Recently, the mutation into a zombie is incredibly fast. Once bitten, it happens in about ten-odd seconds.

In the old days, it was "shoot them when they get up" after they were bitten and died.

That's quite idyllic, thinking about it now.

In "Resident Evil," zombies appeared with the setting of "biological weapons that weren't adjusted very well," so as the series progressed, they were adjusted and gradually became less zombie-like.

Flying through the sky and so on—they're like some kind of ordinary monster (laughs). I suppose they created various variations for the sake of the games. By porting those to film, all sorts of zombie variations probably emerged.

Aren't they conscious of stages unique to games? Like, if you break through here, you can go to the next stage.

That's true. Zombies are probably easy to combine with various things. There's a certain looseness where you can just stick anything onto them for the time being.

When a single genre spreads, it stops being a genre and becomes an element—that's a phenomenon that happens in many places. Sci-fi movies used to have a core form of "this is what a sci-fi movie is," but as they became generally accepted, sci-fi became just an element, and various variations appeared. It's likely the same phenomenon. That's why you can do anything, like zombie romance or zombie historical pieces.

That's certainly true. Individual works come first, and once a collective image matures in everyone's minds to some extent, a stage arrives where people feel, "Okay, it's fine to treat this as just an element now."

In the past, stories would progress while explaining that "zombies are this kind of thing," but now everyone already knows. Content created with this premise is increasing significantly.

I think "Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba" is truly at the forefront of zombie films, and the nature of the "ma" (pause/interval) is also diversifying. Also, what's interesting about this work is that when a demon is about to die, the protagonist treats them kindly, which makes them remember things like their memories from when they were alive, allowing them to find closure and pass away peacefully. It's a very gentle story.

So, while it's zombie-like, I think it's a story where elements of ghost tales have found their way in.

Indeed. Also, while they are called "demons" (oni) in this work, for example, in the anime "Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress" (2016), they don't say "zombie," they say "Kabane."

They're Japanese-style zombies, aren't they?

Yes, Japanese-style. If you just call them "zombies" at that point, it becomes boring. For example, even in "The Walking Dead," they're "Walkers." They probably use different terms because calling them zombies directly would be uninteresting.

However, by using a different term, the image of the word adopted there flows back into the concept.

I see. Speaking of things unique to Japan, I find the capsule toy (gacha-gacha) culture interesting. There's a series called "Fruit Zombie" featuring characters like "a pineapple that became a zombie" (laughs).

They become "cute" so quickly, don't they? Jiangshi (hopping vampires) also became cute things in no time.

Shukuwa: At first, they were black-and-white and scary, weren't they?

The Hong Kong film "Mr. Vampire" was scary, but the protagonist of the Taiwanese film "Hello Dracula" (1986)—which was essentially a knock-off—was a cute girl named Ten-Ten. She became popular with children and was even featured in "CoroCoro Comic."

I feel that when scary things are accepted, "scary" and "cute" are probably not that far apart.

That's true. In Professor Tatsuhiko Yomota's "The Theory of 'Kawaii'," he wrote about how cute things and grotesque things actually coexist. So, you could say that "kimo-kawa" (creepy-cute), "guro-kawa" (grotesque-cute), or recently "kowa-kawa" (scary-cute) actually share the same elements.

Zombies lack consciousness or hope, don't they? They're beings that just wander around and bite people when they see them. I have some concerns because I feel that somehow reflects current social trends.

They don't want to become anything; they just want things to stay as they are. They don't need to get a job at a good company, and they don't need to get married. If they say, "My hope is to just keep spending time with my friends like this," as a professor, I want to say, "Work hard in the world and become someone of consequence" (laughs).

It does feel like Japan is becoming a bit "zombified" right now. China feels very lively, even if they have various problems.

They are very aggressive, aren't they?

In Romero's "Dawn of the Dead," zombies wander around a shopping mall. American critics often said that Romero was depicting a situation where everyone was wandering in what was then America's mass-consumption society.

I think it's debatable how conscious Romero himself was of that, but you can certainly look at it that way. The current situation in Japan that Mr. Shukuwa mentioned might be similar to that.

I created a field of study called "Cinema Economics" and registered it as a trademark, and Japan has quite a few "zombie companies" as well.

By the way, in Chinese, they are called "Jiangshi companies."

Is that so? I thought as much. Recently, there are also "smartphone zombies." People who walk while fiddling with their phones, not looking around, and bumping into others. That is certainly zombie-like.

I understand what Mr. Shukuwa feels, but on the other hand, when I talk to students, I also feel that they are living in a quite cutthroat, "Battle Royale"-esque world. While there are parts that look like a desire to maintain the status quo, I feel they are constantly fearing the idea of falling behind. They seem to be playing it safe, wondering how to live securely in a world where you don't know what others are thinking. I feel that is perhaps the flip side of a lack of ambition.

I think such a situation is one reason for the popularity of works like "Demon Slayer," which delve into subtle human relationships within a cruel world. With zombie stories, you can make the plot about conflict between humans or zombies versus humans. If you give zombies personalities, you can even depict relationships between zombies. I think it's a very effective tool for allegorically depicting the complex situation of today's world.

That's certainly true.

Also, this relates to my other specialty, tourism, but Japan is currently saying, "Foreigners, please keep coming." In that context, if the negative effects of things like overtourism start being discussed, it could inevitably lead to a psychology of exclusion.

Like closing the door and saying, "Zombies, please do not enter."

Yes. I think Japanese people today, including regarding foreigners, have become sensitive about how to interact with the "others" close to them. In such a situation, I think zombie stories function very effectively as a kind of educational material.

It seems we could say that zombie content reflects various aspects of our society.