Night of the Socially Dead

I went to see Rifftrax Night of the Living Dead showing the other night with a friend. Why are people just so weird?

My friend likes these and I asked him to let me know the next time he was going. So we went.

It was pretty funny. Every once in a while I tried paying more attention to the movie than the humorous commentary, but mostly I just enjoyed the commentary.

The movie itself really was kind of bad. Let me just say that World War Z would have been a cakewalk for humans with the zombies (who are never called that, though) of this movie.

But the oddest thing happened before the movie started. My friend and I were just talking before the movie started, watching the humorous pre-movie fare (I believe I was in the middle of noting a moral dilemma I had--it's resolved and I'm keeping my mouth shut) when this guy plops down right next to me.

Which is odd, is it not, in a theater far from even half full? Social space respect usually leads people to use different rows; and unless you have to, you don't sit right next to someone--me, in this case.

I initially assumed he must know my friend. So when he turned to me to talk as he sat down, I was expecting a "Hi, Pete. Bad traffic. Glad I found you!" followed by introductions.

But no, the man smiled and said to me, "I'm here for a meet-up."

As if that explained why he was sitting right next to me.

Well, we were kind of near the back so maybe he wanted the vantage point to watch for his group, I thought.

That's how I roll. I try to figure out how things make sense even if it doesn't make sense to me.

But he never left. He never even stood up to look around and even pretend he was looking for "his group."

Or was the meetup one where everyone sits next to a stranger in order to compare notes post-event to see who got the most outrageous reaction. If so, he lost.

And I have to wonder if people even use the term "meet-up" anymore? It sounds so "you've got mail." But I guess I'm not the one to make that call on this issue.

Whatever.

If this was a standard meetup, their procedures are fairly ineffective in the "meeting" aspect.

I suspect the guy simply thought it was unacceptable to sit alone in a theater as if he had nobody to go with, and so just plopped next to two guys to pretend he was in a group.

Which is odd. I have no worries about going out alone if I want to be at that location. I just saw Captain Phillips that way. I really don't worry about seeming like I'm isolated. Maybe because I'm not.

Of course, at one point he verbally expressed his frustration that the main armed character in the movie kept shooting zombies ineffectively in the chest rather than in the head.

That might explain a lot.

I refrained from participating in his meetup fantasy by saying, "Maybe he is a veteran and was trained to shoot center of mass."

I know my thinking of that explains a lot, I admit. Well, that and my tendency to go off on the injustice of friggin' hand grenades being a right-handed weapon.

Anyway. An odd footnote to a funny movie experience.