I'm going to say yes. In order to become a zombie a body must be dead, and generally the soul becomes a ghost after death. Zombies aren't related to the person they were, they're just a corpse that's been animated.
Unless they're the original Romero zombie, which are corpses animated by souls from an overflowing Hell, which might imply they went back to their original body.
I don't believe there is objective official lore on the cosmology of Romero. (Romero seems distinctly uninterested in that sort of approach to storytelling). I know it says so on the poster of Dawn Of The Dead, but that seems more like poetic ominous tone setting rather than a literal lore dump. Everything inside the movie is speculation by characters who don't have answers.
I don't think the above issue really matters too much, though. I'd say that if we accept that souls exist in the Romero zombie universe, then the fact that zombies can retain memories and habits from their lives shows the soul is retained.
I'd say, as a baseline, any setting where zombies can retain some of their personality/memories means that if a soul exists, it is in the body and shouldn't be able to become a ghost.
I can accept a setting where zombies only exist as reanimated husks being puppeted in some way as also having ghosts of those people.
How about a setting where emotions are part of the soul but the body can keep memories?
So a zombie like that could recite stuff and respond, but would otherwise be instinct/reflex driven since there's nothing in it that makes it want stuff, it just looks for food. It wouldn't react to anything you say unless you convince it that it has to listen to get fed
This is essentially one* of the Kingdom Hearts plot threads. Sora sacrifices himself and becomes a Heartless (ghost) in KH1, but since he has such a strong heart, the husk he leaves behind becomes the Nobody Roxas (zombie).
There's a Wattpad Novel, "Running with Scissor", where the mc's body and soul are separated by some sort of spell and he has to recover his body before midnight or the spell becomes permanent. It's pretty good absurdist humour reminescent of The Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy.
I'm going to say yes, they can.
Yes. Depending on the fiction, if the ghost isn't a soul but instead a psychic/spiritual remnant, both can happen and the soul can have gone to the afterlife too. You can do a lot with fiction.
Story pitch: Soul gets to leave hell for one night to convince someone to put down their zombie corpse so their ghost will demanifest and they can finally go to a better afterlife.
mc chris has an album about this
For by death is wrought greater change than hath been shown. Whereas in general the spirit that removed cometh back upon occasion, and is sometimes seen of those in flesh (appearing in the form of the body it bore) yet it hath happened that the veritable body without the spirit hath walked. And it is attested of those encountering who have lived to speak thereon that a lich so raised up hath no natural affection, nor remembrance thereof, but only hate. Also, it is known that some spirits which in life were benign become by death evil altogether.
~~For there be divers sorts of death—some wherein the body remaineth; and in some it vanisheth quite away with the spirit. This commonly occurreth only in solitude (such is God's will) and, none seeing the end, we say that man is lost, or gone on a long journey—which indeed he hath; but sometimes it hath happened in the sight of many, as abundant testimony showeth. In one kind of death the spirit also dieth, and this it hath been known to do while yet the body was in vigor for many years. Sometimes, as is veritably attested, it dieth with the body, but after a season is raised up again in that place where the body did decay.~~ woops, wrong Hali Qoute
I saw a short horror film about this exact scenario a few months ago.
I just spent some time on the festival site trying to find it but I don't remember what it was called. The festival organizer is a friend, I'll send him a message.
Did the friend respond?
I love this idea.
Just make sure at least one member of the party is in a compromised position when they bite it. Example: not wearing any pants.
Orel! Think of the decency issue!
In this /c/, we call home
Everyone hail to the pumpkin song!
All year round!
