"Why didn't they...?" #2 (Dawn of the Dead)

[hseiken]

I agree with the holes in the truck roofs,but it doesn't seem as if any tools capable of creating such an 'escape hatch' was in their inventory. Would it require something quite industrial strenght, say, a welding torch? At any rate, it didn't seem like they prepared much as far as organization for any kind of invasion of their utopia. Steven was just a news traffic report pilot, fran also a non-combat type (program director?)...hell, they probably didn't even have a plan for escaping a fire either. The biker invasion wouldve been handled a lot better, reguardless of their resource setups, had they had some kind of plan other than Peter telling everyone what to do when he thought of something or saw something. Of course, then there's Steven, who ended up being the wild card anyway, to which no planning would've helped them against the bikers.

[jim102016]

I'll have to sit down and re-visit the original Dawn, it's been a while. But, as I recall, when Roger gets bit, only two of the trucks had been delivered to two of the four entrances. And, as I recall, was there even a truck blocking the loading dock doors when the bikers arrived? Remember the bikers were going to move the truck, when one guy said something to the effect of "Forget the truck, Mouse can open the doors with the machine gun" (the mexican biker. My point is....did they even finish getting all the entrances blocked after Roger was bit? There is no further proof, verbal from the characters or seen in the movie that the entrances were all blocked up. I think those loading docks must have been locked before the helicopter landed...probably only used to bring cars in for displays anyhow? Someone help me on this one... Also, by painting the glass or wall papering it, I think I would be worried about not being able to see what the dead were up to. What if there was a crack forming in the glass? Were those old 70s alarms designed to go off with smashed glass or just when the doors were opened? Still, I would have rather had something capable of blocking out both the dead and the living, at least temporarlily to buy myself some time. Brick walls? Some sort of steel walls made from scavenged materials? I suppose it would come down how much time they were willing to spend on it, materials available and skill levels. I think day after day of shooting the dead in the parking lot would attract a lot of unwanted attention. Might even get something worse than bikers or zombies. Its bad enough they have a helicopter on the roof, 18 wheelers in front of JCPenny's doors, and hundreds (later thousand) of the undead waiting for the mall to reopen its doors so they can continue their shopping. Perhaps they can start shooting them in the head with arrows?

[Philly_SWAT]

I think that you have to assume that they did block all the entrances. Regardless of the actual layout of the mall, we have to go by what was said in the movie. They say that there are "four entrances" that need to be blocked off. Yes, we only see two blocked when Roger gets bit, but he says "there's a lot to get done before you can afford to lose me!" I think we have to assume that they went back and got two other trucks and blocked the other two entrances. Also, Peter mentions how the plan is not foolproof, but that he thought the zombies couldnt get any leverage with the amount of space there was between the trucks and the zeds. You can see the zeds still against the glass trying to get in. At the loading docks, there may have been more space between the truck and the doors than the other entrances, and the zombies had left that space to try to eat the bikers, therefore they just shot the door and, opened it and started driving in.

[Monrozombi]

Their plan was good, flawed but good. Reading some of the suggestions of barricading the door from the inside, to me, is counterproductive. What if some other group of four, non threating survivors needed to get in, and fast, how would they have done without letting the horde back inside the mall. I'm using the argument that they dont' want to use the chopper because its low on fuel. also if something happens to the chopper, mechanically i mean, they might need to use the trucks to escape.

[Angry312]

1.) Use the trucks as improvised weapons on the zeds in the parking lot. Its cheaper than using the finite ammo, does the job in one hit and you can do crowd control with almost no effort. 2.) Chain the doors. With a little work, those doors could have at least been sealed with chains and padlocks -- put the keys on a lanyard hanging from a wall inside and anyone outside is out of luck, and those inside can always access the keys. 3.) Give Fran a damned radio. When she was on the roof playing Lee Harvey Oswald on the zeds downstairs, she probably could have benefited from a communications device. Ditto for Flyboy, while we're at it. How was he supposed to communicate "Hey, Roger, you got a friend" to him? Apparently, by gesturing with his face/head to Peter in the truck, fifty feet off the ground. Huh? 4.) Drag the heavier shelves not being used into the primary corridors, to add weight to the doors, preventing the barricades from falling under biker-related pressures, like gunfire from Squeak's Thompson. 5.) Throw out the old produce in the supermarket. You know that place had to stink to high heaven when that stuff started expiring. Maybe use it as a basis for fertilizer in the gardening section, I dunno. I got nothing. 6.) Keep the trucks *really* close to each other when they were out getting them in the first place. With Peter on Neptune and poor dumb Roger a full hundred feet away for reasons best left unexplored, it does kind of make sense to have Peter be the lookout, but with no way to communicate with his partner, you don't gain anything from distance from fire support. Angry312; "... and I'd also make hot monkey love to Fran."

[axlish]

I agree with the holes in the truck roofs,but it doesn't seem as if any tools capable of creating such an 'escape hatch' was in their inventory. Would it require something quite industrial strenght, say, a welding torch? Wasn't that a welding torch that Stephen was using when they blocked the entrances from the inside? "One of those propane jobs"

[Danny]

yeah i think so...

[Angry312]

They don't get hot enough to weld with; the model shown is a fairly basic model, which while it can melt lead, so could a couple of matches, if the lead is in small enough increments. But, they could probably rig something up; they are, after all, SWAT troopers, right? Angry312; "Look around. Can you form some sort of rudimentary lathe?"

[hseiken]

that was a welding torch? Looked more like something someone might use to get a bbq pit ignited.

[Danny]

yeah that one was the one were i was knda "okay that would never work...too spoofy man!"