On the Difficulties of Creating a Zombie Taxonomy

Any approach to classifying different types or kinds of zombies is already working in the realm of meta-fiction. This is to say that comparing two different kinds of zombies requires comparing two different ideas created by two different people. Therefore, internal consistencies will the greatest challenge to establishing a robust taxonomy. Perhaps one way to mitigate this challenge is to base a zombie taxonomy not on the zombie creator but on the zombie consumer. What does the consumer know a zombie to be, and how does a consumer choose one kind of zombie as more “authentic” than another?

For example, consider the first popularization of zombies, in George Romero’s classic Night of the Living Dead. The original consumer would have come to the film without any context besides other horror films, and may have considered these zombies “vampiric.” And now consider the recent update of The Omega Man, called I Am Legend. In this movie, the vampires have all the appearance of zombies, and this is how many people refer to them.

This is because, due to the ongoing popularization of zombies, the modern consumer comes to a film or other zombie entertainment vehicle already equipped with a full collection of zombie tropes. The zombie consumer classifies the zombies by what she already knows, adjusting only as much as is required by the films’ adherence to revelation and consistency.

Zombies in Romero’s film eat only brains. In The Walking Dead, they eat human flesh. In World War Z, zombies bite, but they do not consume flesh or brains. Are these aspects of the zombie integral to the overall horror felt by the consumer? If so, she may classify zombies by what they eat.

In World War Z, 28 Days Later, and the video game Left 4 Dead, zombies run at top speed. In The Walking Dead and Shaun of the Dead, the zombies are slow shufflers. Whether or not zombies “should” be able to run quickly is a hot topic for debate among fans of zombie consumption, so the zombie consumer will certainly classify zombies by their ambulatory agility.

And how are zombies made? By chemicals in Return of the Living Dead. A bite resulting in death will make a zombie in Night of the Living Dead. Just a single bite will do the trick in World War Z. And while we don’t know why, in The Walking Dead, anyone who dies comes back as a zombie, no matter what the cause of death.

These three axes alone make zombie classification difficult enough. But other creative choices by zombie makers further complicate the issue. Some zombie vehicles include sentimental or even sentient zombies (Shaun of the Dead, Fido, Warm Bodies). Do zombies eventually rot away to nothing, or can they “grow” (as in David Wellington’s novel Monster Island)? And just what do we do with super-heroes turned undead in Marvel Zombies?

I began this essay as an introduction to creating my own zombie taxonomy, but I’m afraid my brains have been consumed by all of these different zombie types. Like a horde descending upon me, I’m succumbing to the realization that no single taxonomy will ever do justice to understanding zombies.