Before 1968, "zombies" were typically portrayed as mindless servants controlled by voodoo or scientific experimentation. Romero introduced the : a reanimated corpse driven by a singular, primal hunger for human meat. By removing the "master" and making the threat a mindless, unstoppable force of nature, Romero shifted the horror from external villains to the breakdown of human society. 2. A Mirror to 1960s America
Without this film, we wouldn't have The Walking Dead , Resident Evil , or the "zombie apocalypse" trope as we know it. It proved that horror could be more than just monsters in the dark; it could be a psychological pressure cooker that examines how humans turn on one another when the world falls apart. Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Shot for roughly $114,000 using black-and-white 16mm film, its grainy, documentary-style aesthetic made the violence feel uncomfortably real. Before 1968, "zombies" were typically portrayed as mindless