Presumably you can also identify the zoombie by the the luminous yellow "go faster" stripes fitted on every model. Also the super-speedy zombie makes me think of bad government stop-look-listen campaigns. In my day it was Tufty the squirrel - soon to be replaced by a ultra-modern Sprinty The Zoombie and his staid buddy Shambles The Zombie. Voiceover: "And why did Sprinty get hit by the car? That's right! Because you should never run when crossing the road, even when you're dead!"

I think you're quite right: the whole point of zombies is that they're dead, and the whole point of being dead is that you're not quite on the tip-top form you used to be. If I wanted to watch slightly unhealthy looking people drool incoherently, wave kitchen implements and get mindlessly aggressive, I would go to Ikea on a Bank Holiday. A zombie without fester is exactly as scary as a vampire without blood. As scary as Count Duckula, in fact. A zombie without the festering stench of mouldering corpse is like a vampire without blood and creepy eroticism, and we know where that leads. Count Duckula, that's where

I suspect the festering stench is still there, it's just you don't notice it because your nose has been ripped off before you get to draw a breath! And while I hate to agree with the movie industry, I have a feeling they may be on vaguely the right track... modern audiences do in many respects seem to have ADD :(

"A zombie without fester is exactly as scary as a vampire without blood."

You know: it occurs to me that movie vampires have been pretty bloodless for quite a long time. Look at /Underworld/: big on tight leather, shiny guns, katanas, inexplicable dudes with whips and slow to-camera walks. Not so much with the red stuff.

Filmmakers seem remarkably good at taking horror archetypes, sucking out all of the horrific elements, and leaving you with a bunch of guys in silly outfits.

I suspect that in Underworld they were trying to go for the "Look! Vampires can be good!", and somehow they got mixed up with the creepy eroticism and decided good == sexy. Hence Kate Beckinsale in tight leather. Mmmm, not so creepy anymore...

"You know: it occurs to me that movie vampires have been pretty bloodless for quite a long time"

Dude, you're forgetting that epitome of British horror, a film so lacking in merit that even Jen can't sit through it - Razor Blade Smile. That has slow-to-camera walks and silly leather costumes out the wazoo AND lashing of fake blood...

PS - I apologise for the fact that every comment I've written today as begun with "Dude" - I don't know why I'm chanelling The Big Lebowski.

Good God, Razor Blade Smile was a shite film. I refuse to knowingly waste my life on such things!

I maintain it has a charm all of its own...