This is what Jenner told Rick!!!

[Deaddudewalking]

Think, zombies, dead walking and attacking, less people each day, what could possibly be worse? In the case of infectious disease there is one thing that scares every single scientist in the world...so Jenner said! "Rick there will be a time you regret this (the decision to leave), we stripped and profiled the disease's DNA and learned it's only a matter of time before it's "AIRBORNE" as a pathogen, there's no cure, there's no hope"! NOTE to READERS: This would mean all you would have to do is breathe the morning air and your now a zombie, it would pass most filters as well in buildings, it's an ELE for human kind (extinction level event)!:barf:

[bassman]

Shouldn't this thread be titled "This is what I THINK Jenner told Rick"?

While they could always change it for the tv series, I subscribe to the Romero school of zombies(as does Robert Kirkman) - It's never clearly labeled as a virus.

[AcesandEights]

Shouldn't this thread be titled "This is what I THINK Jenner told Rick"?

While they could always change it for the tv series, I subscribe to the Romero school of zombies(as does Robert Kirkman) - It's never clearly labeled as a virus.


Though in some respects I think Deaddudewalking is correct in that I still feel the big reveal is going to be:

"We are the walking dead." Even though it's interesting that this was already mentioned in a pop-up bubble in last weeks Talking Dead, so it's not a big spoiler at this point...still, spoiler tagging it out of consideration.

As far as the airborne pathogen that would kill then resurrect as a zombie...well, I think they're hinting at that as a red herring (certainly Mazzara had fun playing coy over it, anyway), though I suspect it's not actually even an intentional red herring, just something people are projecting based on speculation and Mazzara refusing to confirm or deny the possibility. It just wouldn't work within the premise of the tv show...they'd be painting themselves into a narrow, narrow corner.

[Legion2213]

The most horrific thing that could have been said was that a side effect of "the virus" is that it had rendered the human race infertile, that would make survival/living an utterly hopeless prospect (but stupid "Olive Oil" has fucked that up by being up the duff...bitch).

[Thorn]

The most horrific thing that could have been said was that a side effect of "the virus" is that it had rendered the human race infertile, that would make survival/living an utterly hopeless prospect (but stupid "Olive Oil" has fucked that up by being up the duff...bitch).

Harsh?

[Legion2213]

Harsh?

Possibly, but I just dislike her as a character, she annoys me more than Andrea.

And it blows my cool theory out of the water as well...which sucks. :D

[Thorn]

Possibly, but I just dislike her as a character, she annoys me more than Andrea.

And it blows my cool theory out of the water as well...which sucks. :D

ROFL!! Fair enough!

[rightwing401]

"Everyone's infected."

I would bet my bottom dollar that's what he told Rick.

[Thorn]

"Everyone's infected."

I would bet my bottom dollar that's what he told Rick.

This is my guess as well, though why he would keep this from the group is beyond me and as a member of the group this would piss me off.

[rightwing401]

This is my guess as well, though why he would keep this from the group is beyond me and as a member of the group this would piss me off.

Morale reasons. Keep in mind, they've already had several incidents of members losing hope. Example: Lori trying to abort her unborn baby for fear of the life it will have to live/Andrea wanting to 'opt out' and whine about not being able to at several points.

The group's still clinging to this belief that they can find a place where they can hunker down and wait out the living dead. How much hope are any of them going to have, knowing that whenever they, or anyone else they come across, die-for whatever reasons-are going to turn into one of those walking flesh eaters? If you noticed in the last episode, Shane pointed out that the two zombie cops they killed didn't have bites, and Rick immediately jumped to the conclusion that they had to of died from scratches. You can almost see the way Shane looks at him with a bit of scheptisism, but accepts it for the potential fear of what pushing the discussion on Rick would reveal.

Sometimes it's better to live a good lie than to face a nightmarish truth. Until that truth comes around to bite you in the ass.

[Thorn]

Morale reasons. Keep in mind, they've already had several incidents of members losing hope. Example: Lori trying to abort her unborn baby for fear of the life it will have to live/Andrea wanting to 'opt out' and whine about not being able to at several points.

The group's still clinging to this belief that they can find a place where they can hunker down and wait out the living dead. How much hope are any of them going to have, knowing that whenever they, or anyone else they come across, die-for whatever reasons-are going to turn into one of those walking flesh eaters? If you noticed in the last episode, Shane pointed out that the two zombie cops they killed didn't have bites, and Rick immediately jumped to the conclusion that they had to of died from scratches. You can almost see the way Shane looks at him with a bit of scheptisism, but accepts it for the potential fear of what pushing the discussion on Rick would reveal.

Sometimes it's better to live a good lie than to face a nightmarish truth. Until that truth comes around to bite you in the ass.

Yeah it makes sense I just would have a hard time justifying it as a member of the group, that is a key bit of information I would want to know. Rick as the leader of the group certainly is making decisions right now for the good of the group but as an individual any information about a world threatening plague I want in front of me asap especially if it keeps people safe.

Scenario: I become separated from the group, I run across elderly people or terminally ill people. I do not view them as a threat because they are not bitten. They die in the night, they reanimate and kill members of the group I am with. Lives lost that could have been saved had Rick not kept this to himself.

[Wyldwraith]

A spin-off of the "Infertility Theory"...
Newborns, absent developed immune systems exposed gradually to minute amounts of the whatever-it-is making corpses into zombies, promptly go into severe Anaphylactic Shock within minutes of being born. NOT saying this IS so, or even SHOULD be so...just that physically, it's a more viable/believable circumstance than the PHENOMENAL COINCIDENCE of the SAME pathogen/microbe/whatever that creates zombies ALSO destroying some key aspect of the conception/pregnancy process. Besides, children are already more susceptible (at least temporarily) to a wider array of potential allergens than teens/adults.

This was a worry that was depicted very effectively in The Stand. (Though in that case it was a matter of the offspring of the immune not necessarily inheriting said immunity.)

The other problem with the "Everyone's A Carrier" plot device is that, logically speaking, if a microbe/other single-celled life form is responsible for causing the dead to rise...and assuming everyone is a carrier of said microbe, a % of individuals would be naturally immune and ANOTHER % of individuals would remain asymptomatic carriers (though quite possibly infectious carriers, as the "Typhoid Mary" case demonstrates.)

Of course the Walkers, having eaten a large % of humanity, would (logically speaking) have unknowingly consumed a proportionate % of the Immune and Permanent/Semi-Permanent Asymptomatic Carriers. (Which COULD neatly explain the corpses which have remained corpses.)

Whatever one favors theory-wise, if they're going to depict corpses that show no sign of ever having reanimated post-death on a regular basis it would be GREAT if they went ahead and introduced an explanation for such corpses.

Incidentally, regarding the image of TS-21's (Jenner's late wife) reanimation: Wouldn't the CDC's earliest investigative efforts have been able to determine a) The GENERAL nature of the "Mystery Agent" responsible for the reactivation of the brain-stem (If any)? I mean, the worst epidemiologist ever hired by the CDC couldn't HELP but determine if the brain-stem was being somehow altered by a chemical process or non-native cellular construct present and somehow active in the brain-stem during a reactivation occurring so swiftly it could be displayed happening in real-time, right? Not talking so much about Jenner's single-man efforts so much as the initial researching done while the CDC was still fully staffed, with access to the entire medical community. It would seem to be little more than a high-tech round of "Which of these things do not belong?"

[rightwing401]

I think if was more of a problem of timing rather than having the facilities. It probably would have taken at least two days before people started realizing that this wasn't some kind of mass act of violence and was the result of some kind of epidemic. How long it took the scientists to accept that these people are really 'dead' is another matter. Judging by how long that would take would determine how long it would be before they started to push in the right direction. Then there's also the matter of getting the right specimens that can reveal exactly what the hell's happening.

Keep in mind, the timeline states that in just about 2 1/2 weeks everything was going to hell. So with that stated, it stands to reason a lot of the staff, if their families weren't already transported to the CDC, wouldn't be really focused on their jobs while the world falls apart outside. I'm sure a lot would have bugged out to find their families before choosing to stay on and work for a 'greater good'.

[Wyldwraith]

All right,
However, if the "No Comprehensible Cause" school of thought concerning why the dead are reanimating and attacking the living is right, then random (or at least seemingly random) corpses would've reanimated wherever freshly dead bodies could be found. Ie: Morgues, Mortuaries and ERs. The nature of the locations, and the now-undead bodies in question would've blown the doors off the old standby theories of Mob Violence & Mass Hysteria. For there to be initial denial about whether the "deranged attackers" were alive or dead, early reports would have been coming in from here, there, and everywhere.

INSTEAD, at sometime BEFORE (or at best VERY SHORTLY thereafter) Shane fled the hospital because soldiers were shooting everything moving or in a hospital bed as Walkers overwhelmed said hospital, SOMEONE chained the doors to the Morgue, because in their mind they had good reason to chain said doors and spraypaint: "DON'T OPEN! DEAD INSIDE!

Combined with Rick being greeted by neat rows of shrouded corpses, all with bloodstains indicative of systematically-perpetrated penetrating head trauma...it's clear that the hospital staff, police or military personnel stationed there were QUITE CLEAR on the nature of the Infected...and that was small town Georgia during one of our earliest looks at the Zombie Apocalypse.

[rickgrimesbig]

I think its that everyone who dies becomes a walker weather they were bitten or not. Thats why Rick shot the fat guy in the bar in the head even though he was already dead. He wanted to stop him from becomming a walker.

[rightwing401]

Bingo! I was thinking the same thing. Why would Rick pop both of those clowns in the head when it was pretty obvious that they were worm food if he didn't already think/know something that he was hiding from the rest of the group.

To WyldWraith...

I think the "DON'T OPEN! DEAD INSIDE!" was more of something that was done in the final days of the hospital. Judging by the amount of abandoned equipment Rick stumbled on outside the building, it's likely that there was a military presence there no greater than that of a company's worth of men. And they were likely struggling for weeks to maintain order with thousands upon thousands of people flooding into the area in flight of the big cities (the endless river of vehicles leaving Atlanta), while at the same time trying to prevent corpses from rising/putting down ones that were already up. I'm very sure that towards the end, when their ammuntion started to run low, and it was beginning to look like they weren't going to be getting anymore resupplies anytime soon, the military probably made the decision to simply toss dead bodies into secure rooms rather than waste the ammunition needed to keep them down. It was likely figured by whoever was in charge that they could just seal them off and deal with them later once more resources came.

Believing that the infection was airborne would go a long way to explaining why all the military personel were in standard bioligical protective gear.

I'm kinda suprised Shane hasn't put two and two together after he saw the soldier systematically putting a pistol round into the heads of the hospital staff they had just gunned down.

[Wyldwraith]

Here's a glaring hole in what Rick might know being "Everyone who dies reanimates as a Walker"
This last episode, Rick was both at one point preparing and discussing the option of HANGING Randall. Shane points out it would be relatively painless as his neck would be snapped cleanly.

Based on THESE actions and statements, why would Rick choose a manner of execution that would STILL REQUIRE a bullet/other penetrating head trauma to finish the job? Now, some of you might point out his statement which seemed to be a change of heart concerning use of a noose "I was thinking shooting would be more humane." However, if this statement was intended as a continuation of a cover-up of this supposedly demoralizing knowledge Rick received from Jenner, why was he a) Considering hanging in the first place, and b) Going far enough with the idea as to actually fashion a noose?

See what I mean? I think Rick double-tapped the bar-raiders, particularly the big one...out of concern that one of them might come to with a last gasp and shoot one of them. Remember, Rick ended up shot because, after a bullet struck his vest, he relaxed his guard thinking the shootout was over after his fellow officers had returned fire. That would make Rick hyper-aware of the fact that the most fatally terrible of injuries, if they do not disconnect the central nervous system, in no ways preclude someone who's been gunned down who seems dead/dying from experiencing a 5-10 second resurgence of consciousness due to a massive adrenaline spike + endorphin/dopamine release and killing someone with their dying breath.

With each man on opposite sides of the room Rick couldn't very well kick their guns away quickly enough to conclusively rule out the possibility of what happened to him happening to Herschel or Glenn (or himself, again). Brings an old saying to mind: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

[bassman]

"I don't always drink beer, but when I do.....I prefer dos equis."

[AcesandEights]

Here's a glaring hole in what Rick might know being "Everyone who dies reanimates as a Walker"


I know! I was thinking of you guys while that was happening :)

[bungi43]

Simple change from

"everyone who dies comes back"

to

"you don't have to be bitten or scratched to come back as a walker"

solves that problem

also, nice to be here, enjoyed lurking the last few weeks.

[Eat Flesh]

Here's a glaring hole in what Rick might know being "Everyone who dies reanimates as a Walker"
This last episode, Rick was both at one point preparing and discussing the option of HANGING Randall. Shane points out it would be relatively painless as his neck would be snapped cleanly.

Based on THESE actions and statements, why would Rick choose a manner of execution that would STILL REQUIRE a bullet/other penetrating head trauma to finish the job? Now, some of you might point out his statement which seemed to be a change of heart concerning use of a noose "I was thinking shooting would be more humane." However, if this statement was intended as a continuation of a cover-up of this supposedly demoralizing knowledge Rick received from Jenner, why was he a) Considering hanging in the first place, and b) Going far enough with the idea as to actually fashion a noose?



I suppose his thought process could have been that it is easier mentally to stick a knife in a dead guys head than a living human being? Also it was also shortly before that that he gave Shane the we need to use less bullets and employ quieter kill techniques.

I assume it was line of thinking like that. Because Andrea and Daryl would have spoken up when he said hanging. As those two ran into someone who hung themselves and then re-animated in the noose at that camp site.

[Thorn]

I suppose his thought process could have been that it is easier mentally to stick a knife in a dead guys head than a living human being? Also it was also shortly before that that he gave Shane the we need to use less bullets and employ quieter kill techniques.

I assume it was line of thinking like that. Because Andrea and Daryl would have spoken up when he said hanging. As those two ran into someone who hung themselves and then re-animated in the noose at that camp site.

This is an excellent and well thought out counter argument. Makes perfect sense.

[babomb]

SOMEONE chained the doors to the Morgue, because in their mind they had good reason to chain said doors and spraypaint: "DON'T OPEN! DEAD INSIDE! That was a makeshift quarantine of sorts. Ironically, the sign above the door reads "Cafeteria". So it was basically just a room they put everyone who died of bites in. They didn't have time in the beginning to observe that all dead bodies reanimated regardless of cause of death.

[Legion2213]

That was a makeshift quarantine of sorts. Ironically, the sign above the door reads "Cafeteria". So it was basically just a room they put everyone who died of bites in. They didn't have time in the beginning to observe that all dead bodies reanimated regardless of cause of death.

Slightly OT, but I loved that, showed the chaos, confusion and severity of the outbreak. :)

[babomb]

Slightly OT, but I loved that, showed the chaos, confusion and severity of the outbreak. :)Me too. I liked it so much I started a 3D recreation of it a few days ago. 1st project in a series of TWD related 3D renders I plan to do.

[White_Zombie]

This thread should of been named "what do you think Jenner told Rick?"... Not trying to be a dick, we suspect what Jenner told Rick but don't have a solid concrete answer. It would be nice if they could do a flash black when Jenner whispered in Ricks ear so we could actually see what he said.

[bungi43]

I suppose his thought process could have been that it is easier mentally to stick a knife in a dead guys head than a living human being? Also it was also shortly before that that he gave Shane the we need to use less bullets and employ quieter kill techniques.

I assume it was line of thinking like that. Because Andrea and Daryl would have spoken up when he said hanging. As those two ran into someone who hung themselves and then re-animated in the noose at that camp site.

That guy was bit. He said so in his suicide note.


Got bit. Fever hit. World gone to shit. Might as well quit.

[rgc2005]

Regarding the thousands of undamaged unre-animated bodies in the cars on the highway. Fuel Air Explosives.
http://www.zombiemib.com/2012/03/dale-and-shane-are-dead-who-is-next.html
I wrote a few paragraphs on FAEs and how we have used them to great effect. There is a link to a US Army sourcing document about Russian FAE tactics and deployment in Chechnya. In the flash back to Atlanta scene you can see Napalm and FAE airbursts. This should shut up naysayers considering Ft. Benning, the largest military base in the USA, was Rick's intended destination and is less than 100 miles away.
The more I watch this show the more I understand just how hard the crew is really trying to realistically set up the scenarios and back story.

[Thorn]

Regarding the thousands of undamaged unre-animated bodies in the cars on the highway. Fuel Air Explosives.
http://www.zombiemib.com/2012/03/dale-and-shane-are-dead-who-is-next.html
I wrote a few paragraphs on FAEs and how we have used them to great effect. There is a link to a US Army sourcing document about Russian FAE tactics and deployment in Chechnya. In the flash back to Atlanta scene you can see Napalm and FAE airbursts. This should shut up naysayers considering Ft. Benning, the largest military base in the USA, was Rick's intended destination and is less than 100 miles away.
The more I watch this show the more I understand just how hard the crew is really trying to realistically set up the scenarios and back story.

Sounds good to me, and is better than my theories in actuality.