First of all, yes, zombies lick their lips, we saw it in the season finale of season 2 showing how the herd gathered. And secondly, "oh he snarlded liek a tiger!". Wrong, most, if not all, actually, all of the time the actors and extras don't make the rasping noises, it's added in later. So um, not Michael Rookers fault.

And his acting as a zombie was superb imo

 

I didn't think he was great at first, re-watched the episode and I actually quite like it now same with Norman's acting in that scene.

 

Who said walkers can't do that? It's a slight movement of the lips, actually it's almost looks like how you would slurp noodles or something, the way his lip moves, in this case, not noodles, but blood =P

Also you're kind of over analysing it.

 

Re-watch it trust me, I felt exactly the same...

 

Hm, fair enough I guess.

 

One thing I did notice about Rooker is that as a zombie he walked exactly the same with how he swings his arms by his side as he did when he was alive. Usually the walkers walk with a limp or one foot dragging along the ground or walkers usually favour one side. But other then that nothing I thought was too strange =P.

 

I think the answer to that is that he was very fresh. I think the reason other walkers limp/drag is because they have ligaments/muscles that have decomposed to the point of uselessness.

I agree though that the lip movement was much too unusual. It threw me off as well.

 

Don't they have walker school or something like that? Lol.

The lip licking was the part I didn't really buy but it was easy enough for me to overlook. I'm not to picky about the details!

 

The bit I didn't like was they way he tripped over Ben's body but regained his balance any other walker would have gone down

 

Merle died of a gunshot to the chest though, it's not like he was attacked by walkers and had parts of his limbs eaten. I know their reactions and balance should be off anyway seeing as they're dead but he would still have had fully formed legs.

 

Maybe the fresh ones are more spry. Balance is only partially a brain related activity. Balance is mostly regulated by the inner ear

 

Hmm, I guess you have a point. It was still ok just a bit different to other walkers we have seen even fresh ones

 

What bothers me about any of the zombies is when they lunge. Like half of them can't move beyond a shuffle, but then out of nowhere they lunge at their victim.

 

Yeah that's kind of annoying as well...

 

Idgaf as to whether Michael Rooker's portrayal of a re-animated self qualifies as believable or unnatural — that's zombie movement language and primarily a consultant or director's call to pass or fail. Besides, I can let this one slip because his performance as Merle the Human in TWD had been consistently stellar. That's all that matters to me.