‘The Walking Dead’ – Volumes Five and Six (Robert Kirkman)

After picking up the last three issues I knew that I needed to get back into this series and the best way to do this is by picking up the trade paperbacks. One trip to Forbidden Planet and I was ready to go!
It’s a little bit weird reading these books knowing what is going to happen to certain characters but it’s still been fun watching Rick and his band slowly start to turn the prison into a proper home. There are still some surprises in store though including a couple of scenes that made me wince more than just a little bit…



‘The Best Defense’ (Volume Five)

Things are looking good for the prison dwellers now that they’ve managed to clear out all the zombies but things are about to change in a way that will have massive repercussions for a long time to come…
A helicopter in the sky is the first sign of life seen in a long time but following it leads Rick, Glenn and Michonne into even worse danger. Zombies are bad enough but humans are still the most dangerous animal (with the greatest capacity for evil) on the planet... Or are they? Kirkman keeps hopping backward and forward between the dark side of human nature and people doing what they have to do in order to survive in this post apocalyptic landscape. Rick’s group seem to be in the ‘do what you have to do camp’ while the new community, in Woodbury, are full of the ‘darkness of human nature’ and this seems a little bit too polarised to be realistic. Having said that though, the ‘Governor’ of Woodbury does have some nasty tricks up his sleeve and these will make you wince at the very least. ‘The Best Defense’ is not a comic book for kids!
It’s a little bit too polarised in places, like I said, but ‘The Best Defense’ is a read that carries on the story in the best traditions of this series

Eight out of Ten.




‘This Sorrowful Life’ (Volume Six)

The ‘Woodbury Arc’ comes to an end in a swarm of zombies and a torture scene that left me gasping but unable to look the other way. Did the Governor deserve what he got? In light of his crimes he definitely had it coming to him but Michonne has already been shown to be a law unto herself in this new world which makes me wonder how much the guy really deserved to get. Michonne is so far off the scale that even she questions her own actions in a conversation between her two personalities; I want to find out what’s going on here and am looking forward to learning more in future issues.
Rick and his group return to the prison to find it in a somewhat worse state than when they left it, easily fixed though!
The rest of the book is spent on relationships being re-established and Rick having to accept a new role in the group because of his newly acquired disability. This doesn’t stop him from taking care of a situation where the location of the prison is in danger of being revealed. Once again, Rick has carte blanche to do whatever is needed while the other guy is just there to be stopped. To be fair though, Kirkman does acknowledge that there are two sides to the argument by allowing Martinez to put his case across (doesn’t really make much difference though…)
‘This Sorrowful Life’ is a book that sets up events that are only now coming to fruition and it’s cool to see Kirkman thinking of the ‘long game’ here. I’m looking forward to getting my hands on more of these books.

Eight out of Ten

‘The Goon, Rough Stuff’ – Eric Powell (Dark Horse Comics)

A couple of weeks ago I picked the latest issue of ‘The Goon’ (number twenty five, I think) just to give it a go and see what it’s all about. Talk about a great read! There was plenty enough there to make me want to give the series a go in graphic novel format, and seeing as the best place to start is always at the beginning, I picked up a copy of ‘Rough Stuff’ (Volume 0 ) and started reading. If there was ever a book to show you that comic books are not just about superheroes then ‘The Goon’ is probably it. I’ll probably be picking up more of these in the future…

The Goon is a crime boss in a Depression Era city where his main rivals are zombies (under the rule of the Zombie Priest), the G-Men are corrupt, chainsaws can talk and the rats in ‘Rat Alley’ are the size of St. Bernards. ‘Rough Stuff’ collects the early adventures of The Goon, with his fight against the Zombie Priest, and gives us a little look at his childhood in a circus freakshow…

‘Rough Stuff’ basically sets the scene for stories to come and if it’s all like this then I’m certainly up for more. It’s pretty much one long fight all the way through but what raises it from becoming repetitive is Powell’s willingness to take the plot in unexpected directions all the time. Anything can happen and it usually does up to and including the talking chainsaw and a fight with a giant fish. The violence is suitably cartoonish but doesn’t pull any punches (‘knife to the eye!’) and is definitely not one for younger readers…
What really makes it for me is the humour on display, most of which comes from the psychotic midget Franky. Another word of warning though; tying a vampire to a car bumper, setting fire to him and then going for a drive appealed to my ‘non-PC’ side but might not be for everyone…

The artwork on display doesn’t match up to what I saw in Issue Twenty Five but the story makes up for it and I guess I’ve got all that good stuff to come in the future! :o)

‘Rough Stuff’ is a good slice of pulp action filled to the brim with mindless (but very funny) violence. I reckon I’m going to get a lot out of this series, if you like the sound of what you’ve read then head on down to your local comic store and get reading…

Nine out of Ten

‘Slaine: Timekiller’ – Pat Mills (Rebellion)

Comic books, graphic novels, whatever you want to call them I think they’re just great! For me, a good graphic novel is the very best kind of cross between books and film. You get to have a good read and see what’s going on at the same time ;o) I had a great time with the first Slaine collection for just this very reason and was looking forward to getting into the next instalment. Things didn’t quite work out the way they were meant to though…

Unlike the ‘Rogue Trooper’ collection, I looked at last week, there’s a definite story-arc going on with Slaine who is continuing his journey home (with his untrustworthy dwarf Ukko) to rejoin his clan and take the fight to the Drunes who threaten his people. Slaine indulges in a spot of dragon rustling, to speed up his journey, and adds the trainee priest Nest to his party but there are people with greater needs than his tribe and Slaine is about to take a trip through time and space to do his bit towards saving creation itself…

If you’ve read the ‘Warriors Dawn’ collection then there’s more of the same for you to enjoy in ‘Timekiller’. Slaine is as brash and obnoxious as ever and will not duck out of a fight. Expect loads of derring-do (Conan style) from a larger than life character! So far so good, until things start to get all metaphysical… I’m cool with the time-travelling aspect of the tale as it basically involved Slaine doing all the stuff that I like to see him doing (cutting people’s heads off and warping out!) but it was things got ‘extra-dimensional’ that I started to switch off a bit. All the talk of ‘Macrobes’, ‘Microbes’ and ‘dimensional balance’ drew my attention away from what the story was all about (for me) and left me wondering just what was going on. The introduction of Atlanteans was cool but I wasn’t convinced by Slaine being able to just pick up a ‘leyser gun’ and use it after several stories set in a world where sci-fi technology just doesn’t exist. Apparently he’d been trained in secret by the warriors of his clan. Oh, that’s alright then… (For goodness sake)
It ends on a pretty good cliff-hanger though so I will definitely be picking up the next book!

Artwork is a pretty subjective thing and it may be that you like the art in ‘Timekiller’ for the same reasons that I didn’t get on with it. I had real trouble switching from Bellardini’s evocative artwork to that of David Pugh’s more functional (for me) stuff that told the story well enough but didn’t make me feel anything for it…

‘Timekiller’ is a real mix of good and bad but I found that Slaine’s character was just about enough to carry things through and make me want to pick up the third book in the collected series. Its early days for me and Slaine so let’s see where things go from here…

Seven out of Ten

‘Rogue Trooper: The Future of War’ – Gerry Finley-Day (Rebellion Books)

Yesterday I was reading an interview that Aidan ('A Dribble of Ink') had conducted with Brian Ruckley. One of the things that Brian mentioned was that he would like see more coverage of graphic novels in SF blogs and, funnily enough, I was just finishing up on reading this collection of the first ‘Rogue Trooper’ stories so I could post something today…
Brian – I’m not sure if this was what you were after but this one’s for you anyway!

I never read a lot of 2000AD when I was a kid but such was the influence of the comic that I was still able to tell you who all the characters were that had ongoing stories. I’ve already mentioned Judge Dredd, Judge Anderson and Slaine the Beserker, Nemesis the Warlock (a personal favourite) is one for another time. This post is all about the Rogue Trooper…

In the distant future war rages between the Nort and Souther factions and one of the most heavily contested planets is Nu-Earth, a world so damaged and broken that you need a mask just to be able to breathe. That’s where the Genetic Infantrymen come in, Souther troops bio-engineered to be able to survive in these harsh conditions. Such training doesn’t come cheap so if any of them are killed in action their personalities can be stored on a bio-chip until such time as a new body can be cloned. The ‘G.I’s’ were meant to provide the decisive push in the war, until they were betrayed in the Quartz Zone massacre. Only one G.I survived along with three bio-chipped souls hitching rides on his gun, backpack and Helmet. None of them are going back to the war until they’ve found out who betrayed them and tracked them down…

Even though it’s set in the future, the ‘Rogue Trooper’ stories don’t pull any punches in depicting the horrors of war in a way that we can identify with right now. You get to see just what it means to be living in a warzone and what it does to both soldiers and civilians (although I did find myself wondering why the civilian population hung around if the war was that bad, especially in an age of space travel…) It was also cool to see what the writer came up with in order to spice up what is a war of attrition. Decapitator drones and projecting propaganda onto gas clouds are just some of the more outlandish weapons on display! The overdone ‘war is a bad thing’ messages, at the end of each episode, did get on my nerves though. If we’ve already been shown that war is bad then surely we don’t need to be told as well?
The ‘Future of War’ collection marks the beginning of the story arc where the Rogue Trooper sets out to track down the man who betrayed his comrades. This probably came across better in comic form but I still liked the way that the overall plot was gradually introduced with little snippets of information and flashbacks to the Quartz Zone massacre.

It’s not all good though. Despite the number of great ideas on show, this collection does come across as very formulaic with Rogue facing down ‘the threat of the week’ and winning through each time. The story itself is now over twenty five years old and some of the concepts involved are starting to show their age. What was cutting edge back in the day is now far too familiar to get a real buzz out of. Having said all of that though, ‘Rogue Trooper’ makes for an entertaining read and I’ll certainly be back to read the rest and see where the tale takes me.

Seven out of Ten

‘Anderson, Psi-Division’ – John Wagner, Alan Grant (Rebellion Books)

I never read a lot of 2000AD when I was growing up (the local newsagent got wise to my just standing there and reading his stock without paying for it…) but I knew who Judge Dredd was, everyone did. In the towering landscape of Mega-City One Dredd was the law but he didn’t have to do it all by himself, oh no… In this world of the future people with psychic ability are trained at an early age to go into the Justice Department’s Psi-Division, a team of Judges who can detect crimes before they are even committed! Foremost amongst these Judges is Judge Cassandra Anderson and this book is the first collection of her stories from 2000AD.
The first thing I thought when I picked this book up was, ‘if the Psi-Judges can detect crime before it’s even committed then won’t this be a really short book?’ Surely all the Justice Department would have to do would be to place all citizens under house arrest and then all the Judges could go and buy doughnuts and coffee! It’s not as simple as that though, not only do Psi-Division help out the regular Judges but they are also called on to solve crimes of a para-normal nature and go up against psi-agents from other countries. In this collection Anderson not only has to save the life of a boy possessed by a demon but she must also prevent Sov agents from releasing the assassin Orlok. If this wasn’t enough, she must save the city from the Dark Judges, undead custodians of a dimension where all life has been declared a crime and the only sentence is death…
The stories are fairly straightforward but definitely entertaining, police procedural tales in a world of the future. Plenty of gunfights, wise cracks and justice being served! Anderson’s cocky attitude makes a change from Dredd’s stoicism and lends extra emphasis to scenes where she has a tough choice to make. This is something I particularly liked about this book and what I’ve also managed to read from 2000AD. The writers are not afraid to acknowledge sticky situations and they will take the risky option in order to tell a story that packs some punch, this is definitely the case in at least one of the stories in this collection… They’re also not afraid to acknowledge that the Judges do have weaknesses and are not by any means infallible. I’m not sure if this is a comment on the totalitarian system in Mega-City One or simply a means to keep the story moving. Probably a bit of both but still good fun to read.
Having come to this book after having read the Slaine collection I wasn’t that impressed with the artwork this time round, there was nothing wrong with it as such it just didn’t seem to do it for me as much as the Slaine stuff. This is awkward when you’re reading a book where the artwork forms at least 90% of what you’re looking at!
It’s still a good read though, definitely one for the fans and ideal for a quick flick through if you want to know what all the fuss is about.

Seven and Three Quarters out of Ten

‘The Essential Batman Encyclopaedia’ - Robert Greenberger (Ballantine/Del Rey)

If you were a criminal looking to make it big in Gotham City then it stands to reason that you would want to know as much as possible about the city and the people who live there. Imagine how stupid you’d look in front of your fellow gangsters if they started talking about Poison Ivy and you thought they were talking horticulture… Or what about if people were reminiscing about the ‘good old days’, when the Electrocutioner first came to town, and you didn’t have the slightest clue who he was… Do you know what a ‘Lazarus Pit’ is or what ‘No Man’s Land’ signified? You wouldn’t last long in Gotham City if you didn’t know these basic things, at the very least you would have nothing to talk to people about…
Luckily for would be criminals everywhere, and fans of Batman, I’ve spent the last few days flicking through a book that answers all of these questions and more besides. Robert Greenberger appears to have spent most of his life (or a few hours on Google) gathering every scrap of information on Batman, his friends/enemies and everything else that’s related to Batman in any way and wrestled it all into one huge book. Now, I wouldn’t say that I know loads about Batman but based purely on the size of the book I can safely say that there isn’t much (if anything) missing. There’s also plenty of illustrations inside so people like me, who don’t know a lot about Batman, can see exactly who we’re reading about – the ‘Hooded Hangman’ for example.
This isn’t a book that you can pick up and read from cover to cover but it is great for just picking a page at random and finding out new stuff. I never knew who the ‘Heavy Weapons Gang’ or ‘Killer Moth’ were until I happened to come across their pages…
If you’re a Batman fan who has managed to get their hands on all the comics’ etc then this probably won’t be much use to you as it’s all stuff that you’ve seen before. If you’ve just started reading Batman however, this book will prove invaluable at filling in all the gaps and getting you up to speed quickly.
Batman isn’t really my thing but it’s easy for even someone like me to see how fans could get a lot out of this book. Worth a look in my opinion…

Eight and a Half out of Ten

‘Slaine: Warrior’s Dawn’ – Pat Mills (Rebellion)

Only halfway into my ‘Week of Love’ and I’m taking a short break, just to get myself ready for that final push! ;o) I wanted to get back to my ‘fantasy loving roots’ but I didn’t want something that was going to take ages to finish. Luckily for me, I had bought a ‘Slaine’ graphic novel in the last few days…
For those of you that don’t know, Slaine is one of the more iconic figures of the 2000AD comic, striding the Land of the Young killing his enemies (as well as Gods and monsters) and generally making himself very rich indeed. Unfortunately for him, the dwarf Ukko can always be relied upon to lose any money that Slaine makes! Does this sound like a Conan rip off to you? I guess it is in the sense that any barbarian in the fantasy genre is inevitably going to have a little bit of Conan in him. Slaine is a typical barbarian; all too fond of wine, women and wealth but any similarities with Conan end right here. Slaine’s world is steeped in Celtic mythology adding a depth that isn’t apparent in Conan’s tales, I was left thinking, ‘maybe things were like this back in the day…’ Well, apart from the ‘Time Monster’ obviously!
‘Warrior’s Dawn’ collects Slaine’s first few appearances in 2000AD as a young man returning, from exile, to his tribe now that the King is dead. It would be a pretty boring journey though if things didn’t happen along the way so Slaine has plenty to contend with. As well as the ‘Time Monster’ and a failed attempt at running a prison, Slaine must fight a running battle with the Drune priests who are ruining the land with their magic. Boats that fly are also involved and there’s a great battle with sky pirates! These are the main plot strands but it’s just scratching the tip of the iceberg really, there’s a hell of a lot going on with a ‘mini adventure’ on each page. A really exciting read with plenty of cliff hangers! Three artists each had a turn with Slaine’s early stories and there is a marked difference in the styles that they employ, it’s all good though and my personal favourite is Mike McMahon’s scribbly but really detailed take. There’s a really good site Here that gives you a feel of what McMahon’s artwork is all about as well as a peek at the story itself.
I had a great time reading this collection and it has whetted my appetite for more of the same. If you’re a fan of barbarians and Celtic mythology then this is a series that I think you’ll get a lot out of.

'FreakAngels' - New Warren Ellis comic online

I know next to nothing about comics but I do know that Warren Ellis is one of those comic book people whose name inspires awe in people who know about this sort of thing. I'm still to graduate from 'reading comics and then putting them back on the shelf at the shop' (I know, I know) so when I saw on Elusive Twilight that Warren Ellis' 'FreakAngels' online comic had just gone live I thought I'd head over and have a look. It's in that format where you get a few pages every week but the six pages that are up should keep you going for a while. London's pretty much underwater and a group of people (with strange powers) are about to be visited by a woman with a shotgun... Fancy a look? Head on over Here, it's looking pretty good so far...

‘Dark Wraith of Shannara’ – Terry Brooks (Del Rey Books)

Love him or hate him (and I’m starting to quite like him) you can’t argue that Terry Brooks is one of the big names in the fantasy genre and has been since the late seventies. The two series that he is most well known for are his ‘Shannara’ books and ‘The Word and the Void’, both of which are now inter-linked. Not only has Terry done this but he also seems to be looking for any gaps that need filling. While it’s probably too early to see if ‘The Word and the Void’ gets similar treatment, well known characters from ‘Shannara’ have made the leap from the written word to graphic novel format and it’s a pretty good spectacle to behold.
Now, I’m woefully poor with the history of Shannara but I’ve done a little bit of digging around and can tell you that ‘Dark Wraith’ takes place after the events of ‘The Wishsong of Shannara’ and the short story ‘Indomitable’. It is the story of the machinations of the hitherto unknown Croton Witch but ‘Dark Wraith’ is more about the trials of Jair Ohmsford as he must balance the needs of his friends (and Shannara itself) with the damage his newly found magic does to his psyche every time he uses it. Does he succeed? Well, if you’ve read the rest of the Shannara books then you’ll already know the answer but ‘Dark Wraith’ is still a good read to get stuck into with a cast of characters that veterans of the series will instantly recognise but who also serve as a good introductory point for the casual reader.
‘Dark Wraith’ ticks all the boxes for a ‘quest story’ but human interest elements ensure that the story stays relatively fresh and free of cliché. It’s nice and short as well which means that events don’t run out of steam, there’s a job that needs doing and that’s what the story is all about. For a tale that is short, ‘Dark Wraith’ really does well to show the reader all the thoughts and feelings of certain characters, I really got a feel for who Jair Ohmsford was and this helped me understand the story much more. I also enjoyed watching the relationship play out between Jair and Garet Jax, I’m certainly interested to see where this goes next.
One problem I did have was Edwin David’s artwork and that’s unfortunate seeing as his artwork is on every single page! ;o) While the more monstrous characters/creatures come across very well I didn’t see much else that made the artwork stand out from any other comics (or graphic novels) that I’ve read. I’m not really big on art though so I may well be missing loads of stuff that others will enjoy.
‘Dark Wraith of Shannara’ is a fun read that lost marks, for me, only because it wasn’t set in a world that I could identify with more. There wasn’t the ‘spark’ I would have got from a ‘Malazan’ or ‘Westeros’ graphic novel and that’s no-one’s fault, just the way it is when personal preference comes to the fore. Fans of Terry Brooks will love this to pieces!

Seven and a Half out of Ten

‘The World of Quest (Part One)’ – Jason Kruse (Yen Press)

It turns out that Yen Press aren’t just doing Manga, they’re also releasing comic book adaptations of cartoon shows. ‘The World of Quest’ is one of these and while it hasn’t quite made me want to go out and get a TV licence (so I can watch the show) it did make me chuckle on the tube to work.
What do you do if you’re a Prince whose father has gone missing and whose kingdom is in danger? It’s simple; you go and find the hero with the biggest jaw in the kingdom and get him to help you. What if he doesn’t want to help you though? That’s where the fun begins…
‘The World of Quest’ is a quick read, a little too quick in fact. Although there was plenty going on it ended rather suddenly and left me thinking, ‘oh… was that it?’ I enjoyed the artwork, nice and bright with plenty to look at. Ideal for a guy who’s trying to wake up on the way to work! There are also plenty of original ideas that mark ‘The World of Quest’ out from other fantasy comics in a light hearted way. I particularly liked the walking prisons and Quests innovative way of escaping one of these! There’s plenty of humour evident but it’s very much aimed at the 8-10 year old audience that would be watching the cartoon on TV. It made me laugh (I really should try growing up one day…) but it may not be to your taste.
The relationship between Nestor (the Prince) and Quest has been likened to Calvin and Hobbes. To be honest I didn’t see this at all but it may become more apparent in later books. Their interaction is full of quips and a mutual dislike based on each other’s perceived superiority to the other, should be fun to see how this one develops.
‘The World of Quest’ is a quick fun read but at a first glance feels like it probably worked better as a twenty minute cartoon rather than a 140 page comic book. Maybe this will change as the series grows. In the meantime though, it’s definitely one for the kids or maybe for you if you fancy something light and not taxing…


Six out of Ten

‘The Walking Dead’ (Robert Kirkman) – Volumes 2-4

'Miles Behind Us' (Volume 2)
What’s the first thing you do after escaping a city filled with zombies and watching your little boy gun down the man who was sleeping with your wife? You pack everyone in your group into a camper van and set about trying to find somewhere (zombie free!) where you can settle down and wait things out. You pick up more travellers on the way and the unwritten laws of the horror genre start to come into play; the woman with the largest mouth will always be one of the first to die and teenagers will always be having sex when zombies attack!
Kirkman moves the action out into the countryside, builds up our hopes (for our band of travellers) and then takes them all away again. In this frightening new world a walled housing estate isn’t as safe as it seems and there is more to an isolated farm than at first meets the eye. Kirkman shows the reader, in no uncertain terms, that the problem is now widespread and will not be going away. Human reactions ranging from numb denial to grudging acceptance are shown along with their consequences. Can our survivors find safety anywhere? The answer may be just over the next hilltop… (Eight out of Ten)

'Safety Behind Bars' (Volume 3)
Prisons used to keep the dangerous people locked up but now the chain link fences of a prison may be the group’s only chance at living in safety. Or are they? Kirkman stays true to one of the zombie genre’s oldest tenets, ‘a zombie is only a mindless hungry corpse, it is humans that have the true capacity for evil’. Once the zombies have been cleared out of the jail, Kirkman finally has time to show us more of the motivations of each character. There is poignancy, frustration and rage. There are also misunderstandings that will have ramifications far into future episodes. We also learn that you don’t have to be bitten to become a zombie…
This is perhaps my favourite volume so far. The counterpoint of human drama, within the prison, and the ever increasing number of zombies outside makes for some tense moments which make you wonder if there is ultimately any point to what they are doing. Only time will tell… (Ten out of Ten)

'The Heart's Desire' (Volume 4)
The cliff-hanger from Volume 3 comes to a bloody conclusion that leaves the reader in no doubt as to what you must do to survive in this post apocalyptic world. Unfortunately, others are not so quick to catch on and this results in a falling out between friends that is almost apocalyptic in itself. Kirkman shakes things up by introducing an enigmatic new character who almost immediately sends established characters spiralling off in new directions. A radical approach to saving someone from zombie infection is hard hitting, graphic and will leave the reader gasping. Kirkman also has the knack of not letting things stagnate and always seems to be able to throw in a tricky situation to keep the impetus fresh. Rick’s speech, right at the end, is a real classic moment in the series and I’m looking forward to catching up and seeing what this means for everyone else… (Nine out of Ten)

In a genre that, at first sight, seems to overcrowded with superheroes (and moneymaking exercises… sorry, I meant superhero crossovers), the ‘Walking Dead’ is a little treasure chest hidden amongst the morass. A sometimes harrowing read that is ultimately rewarding.

‘The Walking Dead (vol. 1) – Days Gone By’ – Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore

I’m a big fan of anything with zombies in it; movies, books, you name it. The bottom line though is that unless you’re trapped, and facing a horde of the things, the zombie is perhaps the least scary of all the monsters. It’s not fast on its feet; it’s easily killed and has no plans other than to eat what it can catch. What makes great zombie fiction then are not so much the zombies themselves but the reactions of ordinary people who have been placed in a quite extraordinary situation (think any of George Romero’s ‘Living Dead’ films for starters; ok maybe not ‘Land of the Dead’…). Robert Kirkman’s ‘Walking Dead’ series (issued monthly but also collected in graphic novel format) does this very well indeed.
Police Officer Frank Grimes wakes from a coma (gunshot induced) to find that the world has irrevocably changed while he was asleep. He is the only human left alive in the hospital for starters; everyone else has somehow become a flesh eating zombie. By the way; the reader never finds out how this happened and by adopting this approach Kirkman cleverly avoids falling into the trap of ‘zombie apocalypse cliché’, this tale is concerned more with how people react to the ongoing situation. Frank’s reaction is to go looking for his family and it’s not really a spoiler to say that he finds them (along with a group of refugees). The rest of the book focuses on the change in group dynamics following Frank’s arrival and builds up to a shocking conclusion.
I’m very much a ‘read a comic and then put it back on the shelf’ kind of guy (to the annoyance of newsagents everywhere!) but the consistent excellence of this series has prompted me to buy the first four graphic novels, reviews will follow. The plot is tightly run and it seems like nothing happens without a very good reason. I also liked the way Frank is drip-fed information during the course of his journey, seems like a good way of building things up for the reader while keeping a level of suspense throughout. The ending is signposted earlier on but I still never saw it coming; if you can’t find the next volume then the ending also works well in a ‘stand alone sense, questions are raised but there is also a sense of closure.
Tony Moore’s artwork is great and I am in awe of the way he has conveyed the visceral gore of zombies (and zombie attacks) without using any colour. The black and white panels also keep the reader’s attention (whereas the use of colour might have proved distracting) and are evocative in terms of the bleak realities that the characters face.
If you’re after something a little different than the latest superhero ‘crossover’ (or something more thoughtful than the standard ‘pulp horror’ comic) then you can’t go too far wrong with this series!

Nine out of Ten