Zombies-'Monster Island'

The Zombie epidemic, not only in literal terms that we read about, or we see in books(or movies) like I Am Legend, or Monster Island, but the obsession we've developed for this genre, has spread like an epidemic.

I remember the first time I saw 'Night of the Living Dead', I was excited since I'd heard so much about it, and how lame it was. Normally I hate horror movies, I get scared really easily, but this time... it was no different. Unfortunately I was still very much terrified. I am a very visual, imaginative person, and when I watch movies or read books I tend to put myself right into the story. Others, I've discovered, have a mechanism where, when things get to their dislike, they can separate themselves from the story and be perfectly fine, with the safe thought of 'that'll never happen to me'. However I cannot do this and am stuck in this horrible and scary experience I just can't ever escape, even when I leave the theater or put down the book. I had nightmares about the zombies from the movie, I saw them in the dark when I tried to go to bed, that fake looking black and white dead person, with it gooey black blood scared the hell out of me. Plus the movie ended, not badly, but sad. I'm a Disney-ist who believes in happy endings and such so I dislike it when there isn't one, and everyone died, no one was saved. Kinda depressing.

So why are people obsessed with it? More recently I've stumbled upon the genre again, particularly during freshman year, when I think the zombie phase was at it's peek or beginnings. I think the appeal is not the zombies or 'living dead' themselves, but the survivors. The first chapter of Monster Island he describes the girls in a hilarious way, with miniskirts and school uniforms, and AK 47s! That sounds like a teenage guys fantasy to me! What guy wouldn't want to be in some epic battle with unlimited resources all around you, guns with which you can kill as many people as possible with, and hot chicks with guns fighting right along side you in all the glorious blood and gut and carnage. The thought that there would be the possibility of that happening, and that you could possibly be a survivor and get to have all that bloody 'fun' is the real appeal, in my opinion.

However in all truth it'd be terrifying, everyone you love die, the world around you fall apart, not knowing when you'll get caught and die, and lose your humanity. The struggle to define humanity was also present in the book I believe. Especially with the zombie-hybrid Gary, he always struggled with himself and the other zombies and the humans. He met a rather sudden and quite terrible end, he gave up his humanity because he eat that girl, he couldn't go back.