Simon Pegg, star of the movies Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, has a great interview on NPR this week. The topic of Zombies came up (via his Sean of the Dead fame).

============ As for the raging genre war over whether zombies should be slow or fast, Pegg falls solidly on the side of slow-moving zombies. "It is sort of a schism in the church of the undead," Pegg explains. "I personally don't like fast zombies because, A) it's fun to get annoyed about something so trivial and B) I think it removes their appeal." In popular film history, zombies have become known as pathetic, tragic figures; Audiences can feel sorry for them, Pegg says. "They don't have any agenda. They just do what they do, which is eat flesh. And when they start running around screaming like Velociraptors, you just don't care about them anymore, you just think: go away, you noisy speed demon." ===========

What makes a zombie good or memborable? Empathy. Feeling for the tragic figure the zombie has become...remembering who they used to be (a friend, a neighbor...someone that was familiar at some level). Oy, vay. The story's hero now needs to shoot this former person that's slowly making their way toward him/her.

This is a powerful, and emotional, bond they form with the audience watching a story unfold.

Fast zombies simply aren't memorable---a throng of fast, dead, and rotting, ninjas end up focusing all the attention on the hero (e.g. Resident Evil games/movies). It's fast and the special effects are fun. But fast zombies don't reach as deep, and stay as long, in your memory.

And from a customer experience point of view, creating lasting memories often means a lot. Plus, isn't just the fact we're having a conversation about Zombies as way to talk about customer experience kinda fun?

The full interview with Simon Pegg can be found here--I recommend it :)

http://www.npr.org/2011/06/21/137299643/nerd-do-well-simon-pegg-on-becoming-a-big-kid