Blog 25: Mentorship

Literal 

• Mentorship Log
• Contact Info: Matt Mogk  Phone: 310-266-1868  email: mogk@zrs.me

Interpretive 

The most important thing I have gained from this experience was the ability to communicate with others. For example, I had to communicate with all of the radio show hosts, zombie fans and authors, my partner Luke Boyd and mentor Matt Mogk in order to raise money for the once existing George Romero Star Campaign, get the interviews/ interview proposals done, and update the ZRS blog. Another important thing I gained from this experience was the ability to understand what it is that zombie fanatics like to see. I have learned that zombie fans would rather prefer to see articles that they could connect with through humor and those about a popular zombie film, book or video game. Most of the fans on the ZRS page absolutely adore George Romero for Night of the Living Dead, Max Brooks for his book World War Z,  Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg for their film Shaun of the Dead. I have also learned to be patient when it comes to setting up meetings with other people because often the people I'd work with would often have a busy schedule. 

Applied

My experience has helped me answer my essential question,"What is the most important factor for successful zombie fiction?" by allowing me to view for myself what it is that interests zombie fanatics. Helping Luke Boyd and Matt Mogk run the Zombie Research Society blog allowed me to see which movies and books were most popular and why. For example, when the novel World War Z was adapted into a film, Max Brooks himself admitted that he wasn't too sure that the film would fulfill World War Z fans. He even claimed that the only similarity between his book and the film was the name and that he had practically no involvement with the making of the movie so he can't guarantee that it'd be good enough to live up to his fan's expectations. This helped me realize that if an author isn't involved with the making of a film adaptation, then the entire story behind it will be distorted and may have a less chance of becoming as successful as the novel due to the different interpretations.