[the Walkin Dude]

Don't know where i picked it up from but i have just called them Z's for a long time. I too associate the term zombie with some kind of voodo, Caribbean connotation and do seem to differentiate them with TWD type Z's.

[Varanus]

First time I heard "Zed" was the Zombie Survival Guide by Brooks. That's all I got.

As far as my version of "zombie" for me a zombie is a human that was once living, died and through some magical and/or biological means was brought back to pseudo life. Or undead if you will. All or most of the former human is gone. Perhaps some basic skills remain. Opening a door and a what not. Beyond that they are driven to feed. And that's about it.

From what I have read (limited) on voodoo zombies they seem to have more abilities than our classic walkers.

[EvilFreD]

Hi all!

I'm sorry to barge in like this (if I stick around long enough I may just post something in the old introductions section) and ressurect this thread, but there's just one thing bothering me about this show (and many zombiefilms as a matter of fact).

I like to watch my shows and movies as if they had happened irl, or going to happen irl. I hate this idea that some (many) people  have about movies happening 'in their own universe' just to make up for the fact that they obviously did not happen in real life, because otherwise we would have seen it ourselves or it would've been mentioned in the news or something like that.
To me most movies and tv-shows are set in this world and are ment to be viewed with that perspective in mind. There's no 'Terminator universe', or a 'Die Hard universe'.  
Movies are made up stories that happen in our world. Unless ofcourse it is established in the movie itself that it occurs in another universe (Watchmen, Willow, The Golden Compass, and all Marvel Movies because of the whole Marvel Universe thing)

Well anyway. My whole point to this is that the people from TWD have lived among us and have heared about zombie movies just like we have. Even if they have never seen a zombie movie, they know what a zombie is (or would be). In real life, the common word for walking dead is zombie, simple as that. It doesn't make sense to have people call zombies by a different name.
Same goes for the other way around. If, however unlikely, a zombie outbreak would occur in real life, we wouldn't start to call them Walkers, or stiffs or whatever. We would simply call them zombies, because that is the established term for living dead.

And even when for a minute I assume that a zombie movie or tv-show happens in another universe, there's still the point that that universe is very much like ours. And it has way too many similarities with our universe to convince me that in that universe there wouldn't be movies about undead people called zombies.
The word zombie originates from the Creolic word Zonbi (and West Africa further down the road) and it was William Seabrook that introduced the word in to popular culture with his book 'the Magic Island'. It would be crazy to assume that in a universe that is so much like ours (down to the most basic levels) the establishing of a term for walking dead people would take a different course.
And yes, I am aware of the ftheory that if there are infinite universes, all possible outcomes must occur, otherwise it wouldn't be infinite. But we live in a universe where we call zombies zombies. Why would you ignore that and make up your own term for them?

To me, using another word for zombie is just self-glorification. "Look mom, I didn't have to use and existing word. I made one up! Ain't I smart?".

[Major Tom]

Hmm...I haven't read the entire thread so siap. Geeks is an old carnival term for a guy who performed in a pit. He was made up to look insane or maybe he was insane and he basically made his living by biting the heads off of live chickens.

Zed...I have always figured it was a combination of zombie and dead.

Edited by Major Tom, 12 December 2011 - 09:10 PM.

[moony]

unfortunately, i think the word "nerd" no longer applies to a particular group.  everyone's a nerd these days.  nerd is the new sexy.  which is nice, for those of us who were called that as children, and not in an endearing way.  but also not so nice, as it no longer holds any sort of weight.  sports nerds, music nerds, hell there's probably a group of porn afficianados roaming around calling themselves sex nerds.  LOL  also, i recently rewatched season 1, and i noticed the blatent use of the word geeks too - no other word, "walkers" wasn't even a word for the first few episodes.  they just called them geeks.  who started calling them walkers anyway?

[gracie lou]

 Major Tom, on 12 December 2011 - 09:09 PM, said:

Hmm...I haven't read the entire thread so siap. Geeks is an old carnival term for a guy who performed in a pit. He was made up to look insane or maybe he was insane and he basically made his living by biting the heads off of live chickens.

Zed...I have always figured it was a combination of zombie and dead.

Zed = Z, just pronounced differently


Z is pronounced zee by Americans, but Canadians (and I'm sure others - French for sure) pronounce Z as zed.

[DisrupTer911]

If I remember correctly, I remember hearing Glenn call them Zombies in the show when originally they said the characters of the show didn't know what zombies were as it wasn't part of their worlds culture vs real life for us.

But in the comics its always Zombies, never geeks. I think TV people just wanted to be a little more off from the comics and changed that too...

i prefer Zombies.

[auximenes]

 gracie lou, on 30 December 2011 - 08:38 PM, said:

Zed = Z, just pronounced differently
Z is pronounced zee by Americans, but Canadians (and I'm sure others - French for sure) pronounce Z as zed.

'Zed' is the pronunciation used in England as well.

http://www.straightd...he-letter-z-zed

[gracie lou]

 auximenes, on 02 January 2012 - 02:28 PM, said:

'Zed' is the pronunciation used in England as well.

http://www.straightd...he-letter-z-zed

Interesting and humorous article.  Thanks.

[p-dizzle]

Z's were known to "go after the brains" in older Z movies. "BRAAIIIINNNS...."
Just like Geeks and Nerds go for or are attracted to "Brains"

[Not_Undead]

'Return of the Living Dead' popularized the desire for brains.