The ‘dead’ will come to life for laughs

Dying to have a little fun in Carytown?

Head over Saturday, and you'll have plenty of company. No promise you'll find prom-date material, mind you, but what's a little blood, guts and gore when you're having a ghoulishly good time?

Beginning at 2 p.m., a couple of hundred zombies will dig themselves out for their annual scarefest in Richmond's tony midtown shopping district, dragging themselves this way and that as they make their way from the Kroger parking lot to the Byrd Theatre and back.

With a little luck and a good bandage or two, the undead won't leak too much fluid. Some, no doubt, but nothing that can't be washed down a storm sewer in a good rain.

"Nobody comes to Carytown to get squirted with blood," said co-organizer Josh "GreyMatter" Bishop. "We're respectful."

"Zombies have rules," added Anthony "DeadMason" Meñez, the other co-organizer.

Bishop, a Virginia Commonwealth University art professor, and Meñez, a Web designer, will lead the charge for the fourth year. A friend of theirs came up with the idea for the walk five years ago and led it once before leaving town. Or otherwise disappearing; no one's saying for sure.

"It's my favorite time of the year," Meñez said. "But Halloween is just one day. We're trying to make it last."

Mild-mannered -- rather polite, in fact -- by night in a coffee shop near campus, the two promised another year of "bloody and dirty" fun.

"I work in a very, very sterile environment," Meñez said. "I really need this."

"I'm always trying to get my students to think of different ways to get their mental juices flowing," Bishop said. "This is my way."

Both say they'll be "recently inflicted" zombies.

Others in the crowd will range from the newly undead, victimized en route, to the seriously undead, crawling out of their graves for the first time in decades. There will be open wounds, exposed bones and vacant stares aplenty. It won't be a quiet group.

Bishop and Meñez say they'll mingle in the middle, keeping the mob moving and actively engaged in its pursuit of whatever it is zombies pursue when they're trying to be reasonably respectful.

"We're the kind of guys, it's going to take a lot to embarrass us," Bishop said.

The idea, they said, is akin to a flash mob, which is when a group of people gets together for a brief, seemingly spontaneous event, then quickly disperses.

"It's like if a bunch of people show up at an intersection and scream for 60 seconds, then they're gone," Meñez said.

The ideas are usually hatched and passed around online. That is whatZombie Walk planners had in mind five years ago when they set their sights on Short Pump Town Center.

"What better place for zombies than the mall?" Bishop said.

Until one of the participants alerted mall security, who in turn alerted Henrico County police.

"They threatened to arrest everybody," Bishop said.

Enter Plan C: Carytown.

The whole operation moved on a moment's notice. It fit right in and has gone back every year since.

"The first year was the best," Meñez said, "because it was completely unexpected."

But every year has its highlights.

"Every now and then, you get a good girlie scream," Bishop said.

One of those screams got him out of character, the only time that has happened.

"I couldn't help myself," he said. "We got a girlie scream from this big guy. It just totally surprised him. I couldn't help laughing."

Mostly, though, the zombies stay in moaning, groaning character.

They look nasty, but they don't touch.

"Zombies obey the law as best they can," Meñez said.

Contact Zachary Reid at (804) 775-8179 or .