Why zombies are the coldest comfort

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/01/zombies-wes-craven

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One of the upsides of getting older is learning to appreciate the undead. Just as the palate adjusts to anchovies and early nights, so too zombies become enjoyable. Twenty years ago they would have worried me, a decade ago bored me. Now I find them reassuring as old friends. A couple of weeks ago the pilot episode of Fear the Walking Dead set records worldwide. Viewing figures in the US caused the network AMC’s stock to rocket. The trick was repeated in almost every territory where the pilot aired.

Having recently become fond of the original show, I now see why it’s so infectious. Zombies are a threat it’s easy to rationalise. They are unlikely. For this reason, plus issues with speed and intelligence, they are not especially scary. They are essentially a pest control problem with metaphor potential. Even squirrels run quicker.

So their presence as a backdrop in a soap such as The Walking Dead provides just the right boost in tension for viewers to convince themselves they’re a long way from Emmerdale (or whatever the Mexican equivalent might be). The Walking Dead is a show that – like Pret a Manger – innovates exactly the right amount within a set formula. You can tinker with pre-title sequences and shock with mortality spikes (see the last few shows of season two – an absolute bloodbath) but you still have the reassuring knock and rattle of strangers dribbling at the door. They are a constant. And, therefore, a consolation – of sorts.

Related: Wes Craven: Hollywood pays tribute to horror maestro

I once read that horror was the one genre veteran directors tired of drama kept watching for pleasure. I hope that’s true. This is the type of cinema with the greatest symbiosis between maker and punter. Both parties speak the same language, share the same conventions. Each understands the other’s expectations. More even than with comedy, the director encourages the audience into a specific response; if they don’t elicit it, they have failed. So those who are best at scaring us also make us feel we’re in a safe pair of hands.

That’s why the outpouring of warmth at the passing of Wes Craven – with his grisly back catalogue – does not feel incongruous. Here was a man who, like the producers of The Walking Dead and its spinoffs, had his viewers’ best interests in mind.

Life is frightening. Horror works because it gives us something quantifiable to battle: you know where you are with a zombie.

Space is the place

I’m writing this at 30,000ft, on the way to Los Angeles. Air rage seems contained so far: there have been no aggressive lowerings of seat backs, or pointed elbow incidents. Yet one’s territory on a plane is much more clearly defined than on other modes of transport. A fortnight ago we squeezed on to a crazily overloaded train in Devon. When we were on, and the train was off, it became clear there was actually loads of space – it was just a case of budging up. The same thing happens on the London tube every day. Why is it that people are so selfish when their possession of space lasts just a couple of stops? Soon they will be back on the other side, confounded by the stubbornness of others.

More than a dash of humbug

On the menu is “Portuguese-style crispy chicken with a nice citrus hint” – which takes me back to watching No Escape, a thriller out in the UK on Friday, in which Pierce Brosnan feeds Owen Wilson’s children barbecued dog billed as chicken raised on a diet of sultanas. The fruity flavour, he says, just sneaks through.

Whenever there’s the promise of anything just suggesting itself – a dash of this, a top note of that – I can’t help but feel suspicious. Which bit? What if I miss the hint? In Torquay, 40 years after Fawlty Towers, even quite posh hotels promise “a touch of luxury”. If anything says humbug on the pillow, it’s this.