Someone clear this up for me.
It was recently suggested to me that a mummy might attack me, and eat my brains. My initial reaction was “No, that would be a zombie.” But then I sat for a spell and thought about it, and now I am bitterly confused.
I have not seen The Mummy, nor the latest Resident Evil thing, but I’ve seen Shaun Of The Dead and I Am Legend, so my bias seems to lie with zombies. (I don’t even think those things in I Am Legend even count as zombies; I’m pretty sure they were vampires.)
From my observation, mummies seem to have a vague sense of self. When they attack they’re usually saying something like “YOU HAVE DISTURBED MY SLUMBER” and something about how they were a king once, something. There’s something mystical involved in waking up a zombie, something about how they were prepared for the afterlife when they died, and you somehow messed that up, and now they’re going to put the kybosh on you. They attack with purpose, and with indignation.
Zombies, on the other hand, (1) wake up for no reason, (2) are instead awoken in hulking droves, rather than the one scary individual zombie, and (3) they don’t seem to have any self-awareness, no personality. They kind of lumber towards you, sometimes groaning “Braaaaains”, but it’s nothing personal. You’ve done nothing to personally wrong this one zombie, you’re just the nearest succulent brain, and for that they must kill you. All they want to do is eat your brains, they’re not unreasonable.
Again, this is speaking from my lack of experience with mummies. What do mummies do when they catch you? Well, they kill you, obviously, but how? Do they eat your brains? Do they poach your liver with fava beans and Chianti? Do they tie you to the railroad tracks? Do they bust a cap up your punk ass?
Is this a strange prejudice we hold against the undead? We just assume “Oh, dude’s undead, he must want my brains.” But Frankenstein’s monster was undead, and all he wanted was companionship and understanding. I think we underestimate the depth of our undead.
I guess it boils down to this:
Are mummies simply zombies wrapped in gauze?
Hey, I wrote a long comment about the zombie mummie issue but then internet screwed it up.
It came down to this: Mummies have been in captivity so long. If they are hungry they would take anything.
So if you are attacked by a mummie or multiple ones provide them with other food then your brain and theyll be satisfied. But when zombies attack, RUN or cap that punk ass!
Greetings from Holland
Bas den Bode
All I know is you are hot and probably taken.
I agree with you. Zombies are completely brainless, hence why they want brains. They just shuffle around attacking whatever.
But mummies went through a ceramony and are meant to come back to life in some fashion or another. So I guess they still possess at least a portion of their previous mental and physical prowess.
In times like this I turn to the source of all knowledge… wikipedia.
“A mummy is a corpse whose skin and dried flesh have been preserved by either intentional or incidental exposure to chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air when bodies are submerged in bogs…Mummies are commonly featured in romance genres as an undead creature… [In egypt] The brain, thought to be useless, was pulled out through the nose with hooks, then discarded.”
“A zombie is a reanimated human corpse. …According to the tenets of Voodoo, a dead person can be revived by a bokor or Voodoo sorcerer. Zombies remain under the control of the bokor since they have no will of their own.
…In philosophy of mind, zombies are hypothetical persons who lack full consciousness but have the biology or behavior of a normal human being”
With that being “said” I think a mummy would not be the one dining on grey matter. If this were an Egyptian mummy it would not see value in the brain and would be attacking anyone in there tomb in an effort to get back to their peaceful eternal slumber. Unless a curse of some sort placed on the tomb would say that the mummy won’t rest ’til it owns some noobs brain
A zombie (being the wild card that he is) would be the brain eater for no other reason than to brag to his other zombie buddies how many people brains he’s snacked on. Or not.
But I digress
I like your songs
and encourage you to write more, unless you don’t want to . Which is cool too. You can just blog too I think that would be interesting enough. Again only if it makes you happy.
I’m not entirely impartial in this debate, but it seems to me that mummies have much better taste than zombies.
My personal dream meal is artichoke hearts, a few asparagus spears, a can of herring, three bean salad, and those giant dills they sell at the pyramid snack bar. And for desert, a bag of honey-lemon Halls. Mmmmmm mentho-lyptus….
As researched by Tyler: “[In egypt] The brain, thought to be useless, was pulled out through the nose with hooks, then discarded.”
Surely, if the mummy has kept up-to-date on modern medicine then they know what value the brain has in today’s society. They’re probably bitter over the fact that their own brain was removed without their consent.
“Oh, sure. Take my brain but leave my pancreas why don’t you…”
From here, I see two likely paths for the discerning mummy.
1) They try to get a new brain so that they may blend in better with today’s brain-loving society. You’re in danger if you’re the one who disturbs the mummy, but after he’s had one brain, he’s satisfied and, hopefully, a more sentient, understanding mummy.
2) They decide to spread their wrath on the human race, eating any brain it finds just to spite us. If they can’t have a brain, no-one can.
If they go down path 2, then yes. They’re absolutely zombies in disguise. But following path 1 (which I believe to be more likely), they’re not zombies. They’re just misunderstood.
I have very little time for mummies to be honest. In my opinion they are just extravagant zombies trying to justify their lust for violence.
But then again I am extremely undeadist (its a word, look it up….)
There exist some specialist literature that covers this problem in special …
The Zen of Zombie: Better Living Through the Undead
The Zen of Zombie: Better Living Through the Undead (Zen of Zombie Series)
I’m rather surprised no-one’s said this yet.
Zombies. They’re not unreasonable. They’re not going to eat your eyes.
As for the shuffling, have you seen that Dawn Of The Dead remake? No shuffling in that one. They’re just about as fast as rabid squirrels!
BTW hi, love your videos, love your music, etc.
Actually, its quite simple
you see zombies are live people that got some type of bite or disease that took over their brains and bodies so they are always hungry because they no longer have that stomach – brain connection. If the zombies are in the US then the brains is really the only edible part of the average American body because of a whole nother debate about MCDONALDS and its impact on people.
Mummies are people who have been DEAD for a long time and them wake up because somebody stole their treasure or something. They chase u around because they think u are their servants and they are hungry and they want their treasure back … they couldn’t care less about how delicious or not your brains were.
thats what my brain thinks about that so yeah
later
Ok. So i completly agree with you on the mummies vs. Zombies thing. I just wanted to drop in a reading suggestion.
There is an AMAZING book called “World War Z” that if you haven’t read is quite amazing. It is all about a Zombie war that destroys a heck of a lot of Earth. It is writtne by the same guy who wrote the Zombie Survival guide. You should check it out.
Also a difference that I have noticed is that Zombies pass on the undeadness. They bite and create more zombies. Mummies however are a solo creature and can not produce.
Sounds like the start of a song! “nearest succulent brain” sounds like a great background vocal repeat, for more inspiration don’t forget The Hooters “all you zombies” maybe you’ll write the theme song for paperlillies internet zombie movie, and really the undead are people too, they wanted to treated as individuals, do ukulele players like to be compared to accordion players? Do all uke players have unreasonable amounts of cats and wear trashy hawaiian shirts? hmm, how do you like it?!?
I don’t think mummies are even hungry – they’re just pissed that you woke them up. The last mummy I encountered was actually a pretty nice guy when I explained to him what had happened and it was an accident that I woke him. After we talked things out, I just hummed “hush little baby,” shut his tomb quietly and was on my way.
No way, zombies and mummies are completely different. Duh.
P.S. You are too awesome for words.
Zombies and mummies doesn’t go on one another, so I think they’re different.. But I know a zombie who loves a mummy and then they broke up.. The mummy eats the zombie brain, they’re smart dammit!
However, great songs, I love them!