When civilization is the main character

I am writing a series of blog posts about The Walking Dead. In Part I, I revisited the troubled Scott Gimple era of the television show. In Part II, I explored what I consider to be the show’s long-awaited embrace of the zombie’s roots in horror B movies. Now in Part III, I will discuss who I think is the true “main character” of the series, both the comic books and the television show, viz., civilization itself. Future installments may focus on the Whisperers, the role of skills and unlocked capacities in the post-apocalypse, and/or working out the philosophical basis of a civilization as main character.

When I first read the news that Rick’s actor, Andrew Lincoln, would be departing The Walking Dead, it seemed to me that this was the narrative head shot to a show that had been shambling on for a while. It is something of a natural law of storytelling that unless the loss of a main character is elemental to the story’s overarching plot or moral — as in the case of Ned’s death in the first season of Game of Thrones — shows that undergo such a massive change tend not to prosper in the aftermath. And on the surface, Rick did indeed seem so key to this story, both symbolically and in terms of the relationship with us, the audience. He was the small town sheriff turned post-apocalyptic Solon, the symbolic lawgiver; no other character really could suffice as protagonist, not even Daryl, the perennial fan favorite.

Yet, in my opinion, it seems much like the unnatural “walkers” at the center of the show’s story, The Walking Dead has broken this natural law of storytelling. Rick’s kidnapping by a mysterious helicopter certainly felt like a loss, as not only did Lincoln bring gravitas to every scene he was in, but the character was so compelling. Yet, it also felt like a necessary change. The question is why, and I think the answer is that Rick all along had overshadowed the true main character of both the comic book and television series. That main character has been civilization itself.

Making a Barbarian World

It has been a long time since I last blogged, and there’s a lot to talk about: my entrance into academia as a full-time lecturer at the American University of Central Asia, my marriage, my ongoing PhD, the growing clarity of my philosophical interests — “philosophical” for me being both academic-intellectual and spiritual-psychological, even spiritual-therapeutic — not to mention my interests’ evolving focus and scope. However, my first post in a long time will not be about these things, and it will even constitute a thematic break in the sense that what I want to post about right now is, well, very un-spiritual!

This post is intended to indulge in a hobby, namely, strategy gaming and the possibilities for tinkering (see this old 2010 post, “Checkmate by Checkers”, for example). In this particular case, the game is FreeCiv, the online fan-made version of Sid Meier’s Civilization history simulation franchise. This past summer, I have been playing the role of Saruman with the Orcs, experimenting with the game’s Barbarians. Here is my potentially crazy idea: it is possible to “social engineer” the Barbarian AI without any tinkering to the ruleset using the default settings of the average online easy-mode game. Furthermore, it may even be possible using such social engineering to establish a “Barbarian World”, i.e., a play scenario in which the Barbarian AI has seized control of all of the major civilizations and production centers, relegating the human and AI players to the margins, from which they will need to find a way to fight their way back to power.

This, then, is a love-letter post by one fan to other fans, although it is also part of a growing historical fascination of mine for social engineering, of which post-Soviet Central Asia is arguably (and controversially) a potential prime example in real-world history (and more about which I will hopefully be writing about in this space and elsewhere in the future). So, without further ado, what follows are my “mad scientist notes” about the progress I have thus far made in my experiment. The intention is that this will not be the final post. The experiment will be ongoing, so I will try to provide updates with screen-caps whenever possible. I now have a career, a family and fitness to attend to, so if this post attracts an audience, be forewarned that there may be long gaps in time between reporting. That said, if anyone would like to “carry on my (ig)noble work” (*ahem) please do!