[medymed]

Zombie physiology also seems a stretch—-how do organisms with so many open and often bleeding dirt-covered wounds maintain hemodynamic stability in the face of inevitable septic shock and/or blood loss? A movie where a virus just makes infected people seem normal and very friendly but want to furtively bite other people to spread disease and then have delayed onset terminal sickness, like a subtle version of rabies, would be terrifying and more plausible.

[gwd]

In "World War Z" (the book), the scientific "questions" regarding how the zombies work are brought up but not answered. For instance, in the book, the zombies freeze solid in winter and when spring comes thaw and just start going again. The fact that ice crystals normally rupture cell membranes is brought up as a question of how this is possible; but no attempt is made to answer the question, because that's not the point of the book.

[cainxinth]

Wood frogs can survive freezing solid. Their liver produces glucose to flood all cells, prevent cell freezing, and protect against dehydration. Ice forms around cells and organs but not inside them, preventing lethal damage.

https://www.nps.gov/gaar/learn/nature/wood-frog-page-2.htm

[gwd]

And if the book was about how such a "virus" might work, the author could have brought that up. But since the book is actually exploring how different cultures or people groups might react to the same event, going down that road would be a trap, and only invite more intense scrutiny from pedants. Explicitly "lampshading", as a sibling commenter put it, is the better way to achieve the author's goals.

[Terr_]

In other words, the problem is "lampshaded": The author indicates to the audience that they are well-aware something doesn't make sense, in a way that encourages the reader to ignore it going forward.

[IAmBroom]

In Demon, the third in John Varley's Gaia trilogy of sci fi books, the (alien-manufactured) "zombies" were animated by colonies of worms that fed on the soft tissues of the corpse, and simply replaced the actions of the lifeless muscles. They thus had very human outlines, and if anything, far more horrifying looks than half-rotted corpses.

They also didn't last very long; they were meant as disposable remote-controlled troops.

[jhbadger]

The "original" (in the non-Vodoo sense) zombies shown in George Romero's "living dead" movies made no claims that the undead were scientifically explainable -- it was later movies like 28 Days Later that tried to rationalize them as infected, living people, to their detriment, I think.

[gherkinnn]

In 28 Days Later the infected starve to death, I can't remember them being overly supernatural.

It is The Walking Dead in which the zombies are basically immortal but useless. Unless the plot requires otherwise. After Season 1 it is a terribly written show. Don't get me started.

[goatlover]

28 Days Later is scarier because the infected, living humans can chase you down, climb and open doors, and the infection spreads much faster. I always wondered what The Walking Dead would have been like if the survivors couldn't clear out a prison full of zombies with hand to hand weapons. 28 Years Later is coming out this year, and they going to show what happens to humanity stuck in the UK that's been overrun by the Rage virus and presumably quarantined all this time by the rest of the world.

[jhbadger]

To me that makes it more boring though. The interesting part about the Romero movies is that the survivors underestimate both the zombies and their fellow survivors. They think because they can deal with individual zombies that they are safe. But they forget that zombies in mass are dangerous and that even more than that, their fellow survivors might be not be friendly.

[dhosek]

There is a passing mention of a radioactive satellite falling to earth in the movie, so there is an attempt at providing some explanation.