Zombies have been slowly decaying for a while and it seems like the craze is finally starting to die down. So in the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse, what new monster threat will invade the public consciousness?
Please note that this article is mostly from my own observations and speculations and I could be completely off base.
Monsters have gone in and out of style over the years. Before there was zombies, we had vampires, with Buffy, Twilight, and True Blood. Of course, none of these trends have ever died completely. Nothing can kill a monster.
Vampires in the 90's and 2000's weren't seen as things to be feared, but creatures to be understood and even loved, becoming less of a horror trope and more of a general paranormal or even romantic trope.
During that time, subcultures that were often seen as creepy or disturbing such as emos and nerds began to enter the pop culture limelight.
Vampires share a lot in common with these subcultures – introverted, strange habits and way of dressing, feeling out of place in society, preferring nighttime to daytime. It's no wonder a lot of teenagers identified with them.
On the other hand, the zombie trend comes from a very different place. Apart from Warm Bodies, zombies in media are irredeemable. They are obstacles that must be killed. They represent our eventual mortality and the degradation of society.
Zombies have eclipsed vampires in popular culture starting in the late 2000's and continuing to this day, coinciding with a political climate that has become increasingly divisive.
The zombie virus turns normal people into mindless, man-eating monsters, and allusions can be made to "going viral" on the Internet.
Some have compared our increasing dependence on social media to the zombie apocalypse, and while this is techno-phobic, there is a kernel of truth to this analysis. Success depends on drawing a crowd.
And what's scary about zombies is not the strength of any individual zombie, but the horde's ability to slowly break down defenses.
YA dystopia and superhero movies are the antithesis of the zombie apocalypse. One individual, or a small group of individuals, is capable of saving the world because they stand above the rest. They are the more optimistic or escapist side of pop culture's response to the cultural changes.
However, trends in media can only last so long, and people are getting sick of both zombies and superheroes. I predict that within the next few years, they will start to fade significantly from the spotlight, with zombies going first. But what will replace them?
Political tensions continue to rise as awareness of marginalization and discrimination spreads.
Millennials and Generation Z are becoming less tolerant of injustice and inequality, and more comfortable with using technology and navigating in virtual spaces.
Movies that focus on representation are becoming more popular: Black Panther; Love, Simon; Crazy Rich Asians. Meanwhile, dystopia has made a comeback as television shows that are more slow-burn and less hopeful: "Handmaid's Tale," "Black Mirror," "Westworld."
With sci-fi becoming more popular, I think we will see a return of aliens. Creatures who live by their own rules and whose interactions with average humans usually end very poorly for the human and can even ruin that human's life (or just straight up kill them).
The alien metaphor is handy for describing the government/the establishment and its corruption and secrecy. And since aliens don't act human, there's a lot of potential for horror as our expectations can be subverted in many creative ways.
The fantasy equivalent would be the non-Disney version of fairies. Tricksters who thrive on chaos and may even find joy in screwing with humans. They live in a world of their own, separate from humans, and live by their own rules.
1979's Alien is a prime example of how aliens can be used to symbolize corporate greed. District 9 uses aliens as an allegory for a refugee crisis (though in this case the government are the real monsters, but that's still a direction this trend could go). And with conspiracy theories becoming more popular, we could see a return of something like The X Files.
I think zombies still have a bit of life left in them so it may be a while before we see another monster. What do you think? What monster from the past do you think (or hope) will make a comeback?
