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85 of 89 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best Zombie comic EVER, December 31, 2006
This review is from: The Walking Dead, Book 1 (Bk. 1) (Hardcover)
"The Walking Dead" is (as the name somewhat implies) one of those zombie comics that have become so popular as of late. I've read a few of them, and I must say, this one is the best. The opening is actually startlingly similar to the film "28 Days Later" as our hero, a small-town cop, wakes up from a coma to find that the world has been overrun by zombies and everything he knew and loved is missing or outright destroyed. That similar starting point aside, after that the story takes on a really unique flavor for a zombie story. It's not so much about the zombies themselves, but about our hero, the ragtag group of survivors he joins, and how they try to rebuild after the cataclysm.
Yeah, I know that a lot of zombie movies, at least the really good ones, are "commentaries on society" instead of straight horror flicks. That's very true. But every zombie movie has to have an ending. With "The Walking Dead" being an ongoing comic, and therefore open-ended, we get to see facets of life in a "zombie world" that we rarely see in a zombie movie. The comic is almost never about the immediate threat of a zombie attack (in fact, it becomes clear that many living humans are far more dangerous in this new world than zombies are). It's about how people get by after their entire world has been stripped away from them. That means it really runs the gamut of human emotion -- from terror to grief to anger. It's very dark, often painful, frequently moving, and even occasionally funny. It's like real life.
Really, this story would work almost as well in any global catastrophe scenario, from nuclear war to apocalyptic meteor strike. It's about how people survive, not what they're surviving.
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44 of 50 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
There's No Place Like Home...Anymore, December 19, 2006
This review is from: The Walking Dead, Book 1 (Bk. 1) (Hardcover)
Most of the folks here already know that The Walking Dead Book 1 is a compilation of Robert Kirkman's first 12 (Volumes 1 & 2) Walking Dead comic books that, beginning in 2004, picked up on a story that is well know to any zombie movie fan. The main story. The one started in earnest by George Romero in 1968 with Night of the Living Dead and later remade in 1990 (the version that I prefer) by Tom Savini (with Romero oversight).
The Walking Dead begins the story of Police Officer Rick Grimes as he wakes up from a coma--after being shot months ago in a normal world--in a world overrun by The Walking Dead. The beginning of the story starts kind of the way Paul S. Anderson's film adaptation of the popular game Resident Evil (2002) ended...with the lead character waking up from a coma (in Resident Evil after her adventure trying to stop a virus from escaping into the population that creates zombies; and you guessed it...she failed to stop it).
I'm not a regular comic book reader. But I was drawn to this volume compilation because of the convenience of being able to get a full story without the month to month waiting for each issue. And I am now hooked.
I was surprised to see that Tony Moore's art that supported Kirkman's Walking Dead story was all black and white throughout instead of color, but as I said earlier, I don't read a lot of comic books, so perhaps that's standard op.
Book 1 was like reading a screenplay with story boards of a version of Night of the Living Dead that begins simultaneously, but in a different part of the country. Yes, it's kind of a rip-off of a story (stories) already told, but the key is that it's done very very well. The zombies are true to the original Romero creation: slow and stupid as opposed to the 28 Days Later (2002) or 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead fast and thinking zombies.
Book 1 took me under 2 hours to get all the way through, so indeed, it's just like spending the time to watch a film in front of your big screen.
Volumes 3 & 4 are already available individually and the Book 2 compilation of Volumes 3 & 4 is scheduled for January 2007 (my preorder is in!). Volume 5 is also out already and Volume 6 is scheduled for February 2007; I have no info on the release of Book 3 (Volumes 5 & 6 compilation), but I'd guess mid-2007ish.
So anyone in need of a very well done zombie fix that you don't put into your DVD player should absolutely get down with The Walking Dead sickness. Add it to your cart.
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13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Kirkman's Zombie Soap Opera begins!, June 20, 2007
This review is from: The Walking Dead, Book 1 (Bk. 1) (Hardcover)
The Walking Dead Book 1 is a wonderful hardcover collection containing the first two trade paperbacks in the series. Robert Kirman has created an interesting world and a host of even more interesting characters based on a premise that has been overused in the past (i.e. the world being overun by zombies). The art in the beginning of the book is definitely better than at the end, and once the artist changed when the second storyline came along it took a while for me to get used to it, but Kirkman's excellent writing soon won me over again. With the Walking Dead the strength of the writing really counts for a lot, and it should not really bother me that the book is in black and white, but it does. The characterization of Rick and his family is superbly done, and all the scenes are well-written and excellent. Even so, I would have given this book 5 stars if it appeared in color. Many would scream bloody murder, but I think that the only comic book in black & white worth 5 stars is Alan Moore's From Hell. The Walking Dead is entertaining, but would have looked even better in color, easily warranting the 5 stars I wish I could give. Still, I would definitely recommend it to anyone, even those who don't like the horror genre. It is so much more than just a horror comic. Read it, and find out for yourself.
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