For four OU students, dead week is, in fact, dead. Or at least zombies are, anyway.
The students plan to continue their tradition of watching zombie movies and playing zombie video games this week as a way to honor all things “dead” during dead week.
Ryan McMahon, management information systems junior, said the new twist on the week started during last spring’s dead week when he and a few friends in his residence hall decided to get a zombie movie to watch.
“We went to Walmart and they had a lot, so we all just bought like three of them, and we had a collection,” McMahon said.
McMahon said it wasn’t until after they bought the movies they realized they had created a dead week-themed movie collection, so they began associating the tradition with dead week ever since.
Some of their movies include “Night of the Living Dead,” “Day of the Dead,” “Dawn of the Dead” and “Shaun of the Dead,” said Travis Bullard, science education junior.
“Pretty much anything that has zombies in it, we watch it,” Bullard said.
Brett Jones, mechanical engineering junior and McMahon’s roommate, said they usually watch one or two movies each night of the week.
“We watch it and then go to bed, get up, maybe do some studying — maybe — then watch some more,” he said.
Jones said he did not have to log as much study time for finals in the spring, so he was able to devote a significant portion of time to the zombie movies.
“This dead week, I have to study more, but we’ll probably watch quite a few movies,” he said.
The tradition also centers around zombie video games, Bullard said.
“Last year, it was all about ‘Resident Evil 5’ because it just came out,” Bullard said. “Now ‘Left for Dead 2’ has come out, so we’ve been spending a lot of time already playing that. We’ll probably spend a lot more time playing that.”
Bullard said the video games mainly entail killing zombies, the methods of which are based on what each level instructs the player to do.
Jones said, rather than distracting them from studying, the zombie movies and video games simply help him and his friends stay mentally focused for finals.
“In the movies, if you make a mistake, there’s going to be some dire consequences, so whatever you do, you have to execute flawlessly and quickly, and watching those movies all week, we get in that mind set,” Jones said. “Then we get to the final, and that’s just another challenge ... we’re not going to mess up on because then we’ll be a zombie, we’re dead. We just knock out those tests because of the zombie movies.”
Jones said although the group who watches all the movies consists of about four guys, other people often join them throughout the week.
The guys concluded their all-time favorite zombie movies, included “Zombieland” and the remake of “Dawn of the Dead.”
“They’re good movies. I like watching them,” McMahon said. “It’ll help with dead week [to] take a break from studying.”
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mythman 2 years, 5 months ago
I wonder if these guys actually understand the commentary made by Romero's movies, or if they're just in it for the violence and gore.
whatsherface 2 years, 5 months ago
What. The. Hell. Is. This?
First off: let's all remember that The Daily already did a story on these guys. That one about the two guys in the tri-suite who "pimped" out their room or whatever the heck it was? Yeahhh... So who's genius idea was it to do another irrelevant, boring and pointless story about the same group of guys twice?
Secondly: this entire story, from the way it's written to the quotes the writer got, from the pathetic angle The Daily "told" this "feature" story to the nonsensical headline and deck, is a downright embarrassment to journalism and what The Daily is supposed to stand for.
And if anyone forgot, and it seems The Daily has, this college student newspaper should contain well-written contain that's relatable, relevant and interesting to students.
ougal 2 years, 5 months ago
Can anyone actually tell me the point of this story, or did the Daily just think the whole Dead Week-zombie connection was cute?
Regardless, apparently someone slept through all those lectures about newsworthiness and relevance. That's the only explanation for this (non)story making it on A1.
bigstinky 2 years, 5 months ago
Wow, the daily needs to get some new material. No one cares what these guys are doing during dead week, and it certainly isn't worth a front page story. But hey, what else are you going to read when you're taking a dump?