5. Out of the Barn: Alternative Families and the Undead

One might compare Nurse’s reading here of The Walking Dead with Cassie Ozog’s (2013) reading of the 2009 film Zombieland, in which “the zombies, who have shattered the long-held traditions of our society, have become emblematic of the changing social tides wherein traditional family spheres have fragmented, allowing for new family shapes and processes to emerge” and the survival of the protagonists requires that they accept “each other as new family and let go of the old world rules which can no longer govern them” (134, 138). I propose this juxtaposition, which points to a recurring concern in zombie narratives, with the caveats that the film’s family shapes are not as radically new as Ozog implies and that they never so much as hint at thinking of including the undead. One might also compare 2004 zombie comedy Shaun of the Dead, which ends with protagonist Shaun forming what could be considered a family with his girlfriend Liz and Shaun’s now undead friend Ed, Liz’s former homosocial rival for Shaun. Bishop (2015) argues that the hero finding “purpose, stability, and social inclusion by establishing a traditional family structure” is the “central defining feature” of zombie comedies (47).

Viewed through the lens of dominant sexual morality, the speed at which Jessie begins a sexual relationship with Rick can be seen as demonstrating a level of neediness (Carol is characterized similarly in the comics) and insufficient adherence to traditional heteronorms.

The fact that Maggie remains behind with Sophia does not necessarily undermine Rick because she does so out of the belief that she and Sophia are not fast enough to make it rather than out of any repudiation of Rick’s statements on progeny.

He does not treat zombies outside his family this well, using them in fights for public entertainment and keeping severed zombie heads in aquariums in his domicile.

Her reaction perhaps also partakes in the American cultural assumption that a lone man with a child must be a pedophile. Canavan (2010) sides with Michonne by referring in passing to the Governor’s “sexualized relationship with a zombified young girl he claims was once his daughter” (444; emphasis mine).

In contrast to Smith’s perception of zombie collectivity, Gordon Coonfield (2013) regards them as “a perfectly dehumanized mass unburdened by either individuality or collectivity” (7). I would suggest a position closer to Scott Kenemore’s (2011), who observes in arguing that the Walking Dead comics demonstrate that humans need to become more like the superior zombies that zombies “naturally work with other zombies around them” and that there may be “no evidence … of a conscious decision to employ teamwork, but it has largely the same effect” (189). While the living dead may not actively cooperate, they also do not place restrictions on other individuals of their kind, including and maybe especially reproductive restrictions.

Cf. Lizzie’s emphasis on names as conferring personhood, discussed in Chap. 4.