As far as I can tell, the zombies are just gonna keep a-comin’ and there’s little we can do to stop them. The Chippewa Valley’s zombie mania is hitting a bloody crescendo, and it’s been a long time coming. A long, slow, foot-dragging, decomposing time coming.

Seriously, zombies started to get big again after 2002s acclaimed horror film 28 Days Later, which helped usher in the “fast-moving zombie” archetype. Then 2004s zombie comedy Shaun of the Dead helped to transform the undead brain-lovers into a bottomless source of humor and even endearment. People have been taking zombie love to new heights for almost a decade with movies, TV shows, flash mobs, political protests, and survival guides. But only just this year has that love spread to Eau Claire in truly noticeable levels of blood and guts and flesh wounds. It’s about time.

And corn mazes? Please. You can’t swing a dead cat around your head in this area without it landing on a group of people navigating a corn maze.

Eau Claire’s well-attended (and well-organized) mid-October Zombie Pub Crawl (and similar events) may represent a tipping point in the area’s zombie scene. Local lovers of the undead – not to mention local tavern owners – have already expressed interest in making the event an annual affair, assuming it will only get bigger. 

But it’s more than zombies. Lust for the macabre seems to be at an all-time high throughout the region. The Chippewa Valley Ski Sprites’ annual “Haunted Asylum” continues to grow, the giant Village of Terror has returned for a second year of ghoulish mayhem, and the area’s rife with all manner of spooky trails and haunted barns. If you’re looking for a tour of local paranormal hotspots, there are multiple choices. There were even plans for yet another large-scale Halloween-themed attraction out on the Country Jam grounds, but the debut has been pushed to 2012. And let’s not forget about the trick-or-treating, the community celebrations, and the many, many, many Halloween parties held at local bars – ranging from full-on spooktaculars to the ubiquitous costume contest.

And corn mazes? Please. You can’t swing a dead cat around your head in this area without it landing on a group of people navigating a corn maze. They’re everywhere. Local corn scientists believe that if you placed all the Chippewa Valley’s corn mazes end to end, it would take a group of college students roughly 38 hours, 7 bags of Doritos, 2 cases of sneaked-in beer, and 200-250 Children of the Corn references to find their way out.

Science!

You may have heard a news story from earlier this month about a family who got lost in a Massachusetts corn maze and, once all hope was lost, resorted to calling 911 on their cell phone. Using a (corn sniffing?) tracking dog, it took the police about nine minutes to locate the family. They were 25 feet from a street. According to the 911 call records, the mother told the police dispatcher, “We thought this would be fun. Instead it’s a nightmare. I don’t know what made us do this. ... Never again.”

If I’ve learned anything from this story, it’s this: Massachusetts families are kind of wussy. Isn’t Massachusetts supposed to be full of witches and stuff? At the very least, I’d expect occasional hauntings from the ghost of a fanatical puritan minister or something comparable. Those people shouldn’t scare so easy. 

And I’m not sure what kind of iron-stalked corn they grow out on the East Coast, but in Wisconsin, corn bends. 

I found myself in a similar, though significantly less freaked-out situation last year at a Chippewa Valley corn maze. My wife and I spent what felt like an embarrassingly long time trying to lead our kids through the starchy labyrinth. At one point, I’m pretty sure we saw some scruffy-looking muppets do a song number with David Bowie. But instead of calling 911, we just cheated and slipped through gap in the maize. I’m not proud of this, but at least there weren’t K-9 units involved.

All that said, corn mazes are great, and it’s cool to see some local mazes stepping up the Halloween fun by using actors to not only scare people, but set up story lines and goals. Mark my words, as soon as someone devises a spooky, fall-themed family attraction involving an alfalfa field ... the local Halloween economy is going to explode.

I love it. And I want more. Zombies, haunted houses, terrifying villages, poltergeist-ridden farm fields ... bring it on. Besides producing an honest-to-beelzebub boost to the economy, all this spooky fun provides yet another focal point around which the community can rally. It brings us together. So let’s keep it rolling. You bring the torches. I’ll bring the pitchforks. Let’s aim for the head.