Dead straight | Sean Bent

Sean Bent considers the moral and philosophical implications of The Walking Dead’s zombie apocalypse.

We’re several weeks into the third season of The Walking Dead, and anyone frustrated with the snail’s pace of the second series will be pleased with the explosive allegro of the new addition. Thankfully, this step up in gory goodness coincides with fascinating developments in the survivors of this post-apocalyptic, zombie-ravaged nightmare.Season three begins several months after series two, when the cast escaped from an over-run farm. The group has been split, giving rise to two distinct story arcs. In one we witness Rick, a former sheriff’s deputy, his family and a motley crew of other survivors take refuge in an abandoned prison. In the other we follow Andrea, initially part of Rick’s group, and her newly found ally Michonne, a mysterious figure with exceptional swordsmanship skills, as they discover a substantial community of humans living in Woodbury, Georgia.Following Rick’s group, we see humans trying to create a new beginning for themselves while clinging to elements of their old lives that may or may not be relevant or even desirable in this new existence. This is the challenge of old-world versus new-world; old values versus new realities.For example, Rick and company soon discover a band of prisoners locked within the prison’s confines. Some immediately wish to join Rick’s group. But they are treated with distrust and open hostility because of their criminal pasts, like the undesirables and vermin of society they were assumed to be in the old world. These men could genuinely prove to be useful to the survival of the species, but for that to happen the group must put aside their old-world prejudices and accept them for what they are in the present instead. Drug dealing and car theft may be criteria for prison in our world but can this moral paradigm realistically survive in a world where death (and worse) is one bite away?Through following Andrea and Michonne adapting to life in Woodbury, we witness an altogether different problem; the repetition of the mistakes of the past. In this case, that involves allowing disorder and uncertainty to foster political extremism.Practically all power in the town trickles down from a new character, known as ‘The Governor’. The Governor is quickly built up as the central figure in the new community, the pillar upon which all activity and order rests. It soon emerges that he is keeping secrets from the rest, bloody acts. This secrecy is accepted by the general population as a necessary prerequisite to peace and wellbeing for all. The Governor stresses early on that men are the breadwinners of this community. Men defend the walls, men protect the community, and men return the spoils. Up to the point when this article was written, other women besides Andrea and Michonne, when they are seen, are occupied with nurturing roles like nursing, or as bottom rungs of power without any real say in how the town is run. The people of Woodbury have allowed themselves to be subjected to a heavily patriarchal dictatorship as a price for a false peace and they worship their oppressor for it.This all has to make one think. Sure, a zombie apocalypse seems pretty unlikely (have your axe ready just in case), but what about a world ravaged by nuclear warfare? Could survivors be their own worst enemy?  Having failed to prevent the mistakes of the past from happening again, like the people of Woodbury, could we overcome this and create a fairer society? Would we be adaptable enough to recognise that, in other contexts, we could no longer judge each other in old-world terms, like Rick’s group may have to? Perhaps a tentative answer can be found in this new season.