The Walking Dead #101 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Something really bad happened in the last issue.  How will the key players react?

A few things (with SPOILERS): 1. Kinda moving on fast, huh? – I really thought there’d be more intra-group fallout from Glenn’s death.  Maybe we’d get a little more: “You suck Rick!  You’re not our leader anymore!”  Or maybe the group would splinter?  Instead it seems like there was a little bit of venting from Maggie, but even she pretty quickly moved back into looking to Rick at least for vengeance – if not leadership.  The other characters who are staying with Rick seem 100% fine with following his leader.  Heath kinda scampers after Rick like a little kid, peppering him with panicked questions; he’s not looking to find new leadership.  Michonne flat out asks Rick, “What’s the plan?” as if she fully accepts that shit happens in this world and it isn’t Rick’s fault.  Even Rick himself doesn’t seem too full of self-doubt.  It sure seems like there should be more navel-gazing and second guessing of Rick, but it’s hard to call “foul” on this situation when I’ve never been in anything remotely like this before.  Hopefully Rick knows what he is doing because it isn’t like the group has a great #2 option.

The Walking Dead #100 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Our protagonists split up with some staying behind to guard their compound and some heading off to warn Hilltop.  Bad guys lurk everywhere…

The Review (with a SERIOUS SPOILER): 1. Brutal… Just brutal. – It’s been a LONG time since we got a death this gruesome in TWD.  Consider the deaths of big characters and they’ve mostly been clean deaths.  Lori shot, Dale died in bed due to wounds, Allen died due to wounds, Abraham shot with an arrow, etc…  The only death in this series that compares to the death in this issue is Tyrese.  He was a beloved character who got beheaded over a series of panels right in front of his friends.  Tyrese wasn’t just killed, his body was desecrated and dismembered.

The Walking Dead #99 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Does Rick’s group still want to pick a fight with the bad guys???

A few things [with SPOILERS]: 1). Deflated Rick. – Man….remember a few issues ago when Rick was all full of piss and vinegar?  “Oh yeah!  Negan things he’s a bad man?!?  Wait until he gets a load of ME!!!”  It’s interesting to see how meek Rick suddenly is.  Was Abraham the only thing that made Rick so confident?  Or, is Kirkman getting a little meta: Rick is recoiling because he thought all of the central characters were “safe” in The Walking Dead; just as many online reviewers have pointed out that TWD feels too safe and we just don’t believe that Kirkman will kill Rick/Andrea/Michonne/Carl/Glenn/Maggie.  Maybe Kirkman has realized that himself.  Maybe Kirkman killed Abraham to upset the reader’s footing.  Maybe Abraham’s death will mirror Tyrese’s death as a harbinger of a really bloody issue #100.  And….to wrap it all up, maybe Rick is mirroring the reader’s new sense of unease.

The Walking Dead #97 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Rick and his scouting party return to Arlington with news of the Bigger World.

Recap/Review (with SPOILERS): As was the case last month, The Walking Dead shows how much better it works when the reader can see a looming threat.  There’s nothing surprising about Kirkman using this approach because (a) it’s classic drama and (b) he’s historically used it well with Shane, the Governor, Dexter, the Cannibals, the zombies that invaded Arlington, etc.  Kirkman is really good at showing us a smoky threat in the distance, building it for 3-5 issues and then having a huge climax.  It may be formulaic, but it’s also  a useful storytelling technique.

Right now, this Negan character is kind like the shark in Jaws during the first hour of the film; we’ve heard about him, but haven’t quite seen him yet.  When Rick and gang run into Negan’s scouting party it’s like seeing the tip of the shark’s fin; we really don’t know what Negan will be like.  Will he be like the Governor?  Will he be Lord Humungous from Mad Max?  Will he look like the chainsaw dude on the cover of this issue?  The imagination runs wild and I love it.  All we know right now is that Negan is a bad character and by laying waste to the scouting party and then talking smack, Rick has thrown down the gauntlet in a BIG way.

The Walking Dead #96 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: A finale to the Larger World story-arc hints at possible future conflicts.

The Review (with SPOILERS): Yea!!!  We have a direction for the story leading up to issue #100!  That’s good and it’s in keeping with the “TWD formula”: For the most part, we’ve always seen the big blob of crap coming before it hits the fan. That doesn’t mean that Kirkman has foreshadowed every tiny event, but we’re usually able to smell it coming.  Consider the Governor or the trouble between Shane and Rick or the zombie herd that attacked Arlington.  None of those things just happened out of the blue, we had a few issues to anticipate the danger and think about what horrible things might happen when all hell breaks loose.  When TWD is at it’s best, the surprises are all in the details, not the general theme of the story.

The last story arc really suffered from a lack of direction and danger.  I guess there was a chance the the inhabitants of Hilltop would be cannibals or otherwise hostile, but we’ve already seen those types of stories and readers are cynical enough to know that Kirkman is unlikely to run the exact same play twice.  So, that left us with an overly long trek for the band to arrive at Hilltop; and it was boring.

As it turns out, Hilltop isn’t that much different that Arlington in that the folks inside are mostly sheep.  Not many folks with sharp-teeth in this joint!   About the only difference between Hilltop and Arlington seems to be scale: Hilltop is big enough to be self-sufficient; Arlington is not.  Actually, just that difference in scale illustrates how TWD has played the with theme of TRUST.  Obviously in the world of zombies, you can’t make it all alone.  So, you have to trust people.  Actually, you have trust a LOT of people if you want to have all the skills and labor supply that a self-sufficient society needs.  Rick trusts Andrea not to slit his throat as he sleeps, but that isn’t enough.  It isn’t even enough that he (mostly) trust the denizens of Arlington. To make it work, he’ll have to trust all of Hilltop too.  However, bringing that many people into your tent means you’ll inevitably get some rotten apples (which means rapists, cannibals and murderers in this world).

And, the threat is clear: There is another group of people who seem to be hard-core baddies.  They’re basically running a protection racket: Give us your food and we’ll keep the streets safe.  Is it really surprising that organized crime would arise in the post-apocalypse?  What’s also super cool is that we haven’t seen these baddies.  We just know their leader’s name: Negan.  Doesn’t that just sound awful?  And we get the stray comment about a captive that “If Negan has Crystal, she’s already dead…”  We also learn that the Hilltop-gang doesn’t even know where Negan’s base is!  Holy crap!  And, bad-ass commando/karate guy Jesus is scared of them.  Did you get the sense that Jesus was remotely afraid of Rick’s group????  Me neither…

The Walking Dead #95 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) and Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Rick and gang finally see the community called Hilltop.

A Few Things: [as always….with SPOILERS]

Glad to finally see this place. – Well, it’s taken us a long time to reach this Hilltop joint.  At least 2-3 issues, right?  For me, one of the fun things is just seeing how different groups have fortified themselves against the zombie menace (and the stray bandits).  So, it’s kinda cool to hear that their walls were built out of metal scavenged off of barns whereas Arlington is walled off with those noise barriers from the sides of highways.  Lots of good tips in here for doomsday preppers!  It was also neat to see a community that isn’t built entirely upon scavenging cans of pinto beans from deserted houses.  The initial walk-through reminded me of visiting a Renaissance Fair with all the chickens, cows, etc.  For some reason, Hilltop also gave me a very strong “plantation” vibe…. It seems like there may be a strong division between classes of people.  It may not be that way, but that’s the vibe I got.

Something is clearly going on. – Well, those guys on the wall sure were jumpy, huh?  And then that “scouting party” came back and that didn’t go well at all.  It seems like Hilltop is having a little trouble with the neighbors.  I’d tend to think that Hilltop are the “good guys” since only bad guys turn messengers into assassins, but… One fascinating thing about TWD is that it doesn’t have to just be about zombies.  This comic could go on for years after the zombies have rotted away.  Let’s see the survivors sink deeper into barbarism and begin to forget the knowledge that mankind has accumulated over the millennia.  If it goes long enough, I’d love to see TWD explore a new Dark Ages.

Can Michonne get some dialog? – Am I the only one bothered by this?  Can we let Michonne do something other than mutely hack up zombies?  Remember a year or so ago, when there was a whole story-line about how Michonne was having difficulty adapting to the relative safety of Arlington?  Remember how upset she was when Morgan died?  Remember when it seemed (for a second) like there might be a romantic notion between her and Rick?  That was interesting. I just don’t understand why she can’t be the subject of a background storyline.  I mean….it isn’t as if these issues have been jammed full of cool events since we just spent several issues trekking to Hilltop.  It’s puzzling, especially with the boost the character will get from the TV show and her origin being explained in an upcoming issue of Playboy.

The Walking Dead #94 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (artist), Cliff Rathburn (grey tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: The gang sets out to find one of these new cities that we’ve been hearing so much about.

A few things: [with SPOILERS]

1. Too much writing for the trade. – There was a time when TWD was equally enjoyable in both single issues and collected forms.  If you read the trades, you really couldn’t find the break point between issues since Kirkman doesn’t put the covers in there.  The story just flowed in trades.  But, if you read the single issues, you got a satisfying chunk of story and a cliffhanger each issue.  I used to always throw out TWD as an example of dual excellence whenever anyone would defend some tedious 6-issue superhero story… But recently, I feel like the single issues are suffering a bit.  I’ll bet this story reads just fine in collected form, but I’d like a little more punch and snap to these single issues.  Unfortunately, not enough happens here.

2. Keep playing the Andrea/Rick card. – Let’s keep playing with this relationship.  I LOVE both of these tortured souls and if they can find happiness anywhere, it would naturally be with each other.

3. Good use of Carl. – I’m happy to see Carl do something unexpected in this issue.  Rick’s group has gotten so tough that a shambling group of zombies just isn’t any danger, now that the “warriors” are the only ones leaving the protection of Arlington.  Send Carl into the mix and suddenly everything is scarier. I also like how Rick adapted to Carl’s presence pretty fast. He was pissed, but knew there was no point in going back.  It does beg the question of what is going to happen when Maggie finds out that Carl isn’t there.  She’ll shit a brick!  And I guess Rick has no way of letting her know.

Thief of Thieves #1 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (story), Nick Spencer (writer), Shawn Martinbrough (art), Felix Serrano (colors), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor).

The Story: An art thief takes on a new apprentice.

Review: Nick Spencer is a very good writer.  I tend to think that a lot of comic writers are a little overrated and they rarely impress me, but Spencer has a way of stringing his words together in a very agreeable manner.  I like to read a comic and see sentence structure that is better than I could do myself and Nick Spencer fits the bill.  His words add to the over story concept, and that is a rare thing in comics.

That overall concept is compelling enough too.  I’m personally not much of a fan of art thief stories, but you could do a lot worse in your comic reading than to read a story about an experienced thief who takes on a younger and sexy female apprentice.  Surely there will be some big caper coming down the road, some sleeping together and some double-crosses, etc.  Maybe I’m speculating too much about the future of the story, but that’s a solid premise for any fictional tale and it is only common because it is good.  And as I mentioned, most common set-ups aren’t going to be blessed by having a writer as smooth as Spencer.

The art also checks out.  Shawn Martinbrough is an incredibly clean artist who has been around for a while.  He’s often doing fill-in issues, but he always brings a nice clean look to his projects so it is nice to see him get an opportunity at an ongoing with some big name writers attached.  If you like artists like Sean Phillips on Criminal you’ll probably like this.

The Walking Dead #93 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (artist), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Is this promise of a new colony a blessing or a threat?

Five Things:

1. How do you know who to trust?  – I really do like how TWD continues to be about everything BUT the zombies.  How do you know who to trust?  Clearly, no one can survive in this zombieland on their own, but where do you stop your circle or trust?  Rick’s gang has added new folks before: Michonne, Abraham, the Arlington folks…  Clearly, more people is potentially better, but only if it is the right kind of more.  If “more” means “more Governor” or “more cannibals” then it’s a bad thing.  And of course anyone who has survived this long in the apocalypse is going to be a little paranoid due to natural selection.

2. How badass is Rick’s gang? – Rick makes an interesting observation towards the end of this issue: His gang is pretty darn badass and maybe they don’t have to worry about running into bad guys because they’ll just kill them if they act funny.  How true is this?  What evidence do we have that Rick’s gang is all that tough?  Let’s see, they got smashed by the Governor.  They crushed the cannibals.  So, their record would be 1-1.  I guess they did take out that other group that attacked the Arlington compound about 10 issues ago, but that wasn’t really a fair fight with Rick’s group being fortified.  And, Rick’s group is clearly tougher than the original Arlingtonites, but those sheep are so wimpy that it kinda defies reason that they would have survived this long (it’s almost a plot hole).  I think it’s not THAT clear that Rick’s group is badass.

3. Adlard does great storytelling. – Simple storytelling excellence is easy to take for granted, but when you also review books like the GI Joe comics, you realize that you can’t just assume the the storytelling will be solid.  With Adlard, you rarely get anything flashy (although there are some pretty vistas in this issue), but you can always tell the characters apart and the action is always crystal clear.  There’s even a neat fight scene in this issue where Rick smashes a dude to the pavement and each panel flows from the one before.  That’s slick because we’ve all see countless comics that make you wonder, “how the hell did he land on the RIGHT side of his face if he was being thrown like THAT in the panel before?  Did he do a flip or something?”

Witch Doctor: Resuscitation One-Shot – Review

By: Brandon Siefert (writer & letters), Lukas Ketner (art), Andy Troy (colors) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Our titular Witch Doctor runs into a necromancer on a case that has ties to an urban myth about waking up in a tub full of ice.

Five Things: 

1. LOVE these characters! – In 5 short issues (4-issue miniseries, plus this one-shot), this creative team has really made me LOVE these characters.  Dr. Vincent Morrow has this great, hurried swagger where he knows just what the problem is but doesn’t want to suffer any fools along the way.  He’s kinda like a comic version of House without the limp.  Then there is the weirdness of Penny, who looks like the scrawny, heroin addict with stringy hair and a hoodie. But she’s hosting a demon and literally eats monsters for sustenance.  Finally we have Gast, who is the everyman helper and brute force for the team.  It helps to have one “normal” member of the team for the reader to identify with and help us see just how strange their world really is.

2. Art is very Wrightson-esque. – I look at Ketner’s art and it reminds me instantly of Bernie Wrightson.  Hopefully you can appreciate what high praise that is because Wrightson is one of the absolute masters of comic art.  Other times, he reminds me of Tony Harris (again, high praise).  He uses this fine line and pours incredible amounts of detail into his panels.  Unlike a lot of artists whose work gets worse the more detail they add, Ketner’s work get’s better.  This is one of the best looking books that Image is publishing right now (colors too).

3. Whacky paranormal stuff galore. [SPOILER ALERT] – There are all kinds of fun things in here if you like the paranormal.  For starters, it begins with a guy finding himself in a tub full of ice with an incision in his side (Yay!  Urban Myths!).  Only, as it turned out, no one stole his kidneys. The necromancer has put IN the kidney of old Egyptian pharaoh in hopes of bringing him back.  And the necromancer has a familiar that is based on her own stillborn child.  And there’s all the insanity with Penny and her extensible, poison injecting fingers.  It’s just a riot of the wacky and weird.

The Walking Dead #92 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (artist), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: New stuff pops up, but is this going to be a threat or an opportunity?

Five things: 

1. Glad to see something intriguing happen! – I was really hard on the last issue of TWD.  The last “big climax” a few issues back (the unsuccessful insurrection by the Arlington natives) was kind of a dud and then when we have a few issues of fumbling long-standing characters, I did start to wonder if this series had jumped the shark when Andrea started talking to Dale’s hat.  So, it was nice to see TWD get back to a sense of mystery and exploration.  We haven’t had that in a long time (since Rick’s gang came to Arlington) and exploration is an important part of this series.  Just having a new scenario to exert some new forces on the equilibrium the characters are settling into is a great thing and can power the series through rough patches.

2. Interesting new scenario. – The new scenario is neat and kinda makes sense.  So far, Rick’s gang has mostly been out in rural areas.  Not a lot of people = not a lot of settlements.  Now we’re in the Washington, DC area and it makes sense that there would be more pockets of survivors and that they’d start to interact like a big game of Sid Meier’s Civilization where you can achieve supremacy via diplomacy, economic prowess or military conquest.  It sounds like Rick’s group was that “nation” in Civilization that was off in the corner doing its own thing, but will now be forced to find a way to deal with these other groups and who knows if their weaponry will be sufficient to be taken seriously.  Just the sense of exploration makes me a little giddy even if a nay-sayer would say that this scenario is similar to the prison/Governor set-up from ~60 issues ago.

3. Shoosh! Carl’s getting his memories back… – Man, this is going to be rough.  Poor kid and poor Rick.  Can you imagine having to tell your kid that his “dream” of killing another child was no dream… That it really happened?  And imagine telling him that it was the right thing to do because the other kid was a sick bastard.  If Kirkman keeps handling Carl this way, it’ll be a powerful reminder of just what a screwed up childhood this world forces on the kids.

The Walking Dead #91 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Life drags on inside the Arlington enclave.

Five Things: [SPOILER WARNING]

1. What a bummer resolution to the Rick-Andrea situation!  Really?  Issue #90 ends with Rick and Andrea having a passionate kiss and then we come back to the scene at an undetermined time later to see Rick pushing her away?  That sucks!  There’s no real problem with having the relationship “end” in this fashion, but why did everything have to happen off-panel?  We don’t even know if they just kissed or slept together or had an affair for a week.  This was a really unsatisfying way to handle two characters in which the readers have a lot of emotional investment.

2. Don’t like the Rick – Carl relationship either.  Man, Rick just isn’t have a very good time.  Now his son is getting all kinds of chippy with him.  Hopefully Kirkman has a plan here because it isn’t fun to see Rick getting yelled at by his son.  There were such great dramatic possibilities when Carl got shot in the face.  Imagine if Carl had forgotten everything that had happened and had to be told that his mom was dead, that he’d killed Shane and later executed another child in cold blood, etc.  THAT would have been incredible to see if Carl would reform in the same way that he had formed the first time.  But, I really don’t get the point of having him get shot if it was just to have him scream, “You don’t understand!” at his father and argue with him about the proper terminology for this hole in his head.

3. Vague new threat.  So…someone is watching the Arlington enclave.  We’ve already seen that.  In fact, one of the last crises was strangers attacking the compound.  We don’t really need to see that again.  Granted….it probably won’t be precisely that same scenario.  This stranger could be friendly.  They could be there with GOOD NEWS for a change.  But, the fact remains that the cliffhanger on the final page didn’t hit with typical TWD crispness because it came out of the blue.

The Walking Dead #90 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (penciler/inker), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: How will Rick respond to the plot against him.

Five things: 

As always, this is a FULL SPOILERS review….

1). This was a really “meh” story cycle. This climax and aftermath to the plot against Rick by the existing residents of Arlington was really blah.  The hope I’m clinging to is that we’re just not at the finale yet and something BIG is right around the corner, but I don’t see anything imminent building.  Last issue, the attempted coup against Rick got off to an incompetent and premature start when Glen overheard the plotters and the big reveal in this issue is that Rick let the guy live rather than executing him on the town square.  It just isn’t clear what the point of this story was rather than to kill time for a few issues.  On one hand, it really would be awful if stress like this were a daily occurrence, but it wasn’t that interesting to read about.  I really am starting to think that Kirkman has too much on his plate between TWD, the TV show, all the ancillary TWD properties (novels, board games, video games), Invincible, The Infinite, etc.

Witchdoctor #3 – Review

By: Brandon Siefert (writer & letterer), Lukas Ketner (art), Sunny Gho & Andy Troy (colors) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: The world around Dr. Morrow begins to come into focus as his gang raids an lair of aquatic beasties.

Review: This is a pretty hot comic.  The first thing that lunges out at me is the incredible art that Lukas Ketner is doing.  Maybe it’s because of the monsters in the series, but it really reminds me of Bernie Wrightson and anytime someone compares your art to Wrightson’s….you’re doing something right.  There’s nothing not to love about this linework from the intricate brushwork to the really cool monster designs.  It’s very nicely colored too.

Actually, that creature design is so important to this issue that it’s hard to confine its discussion to “the art” (as in “I liked the art.  I also liked the story.”).  In one particular sequence, there’s this comatose aquatic monster strapped to the table.  Big, nasty, toothy bastard with fins all over him.  Of course….he busts loose, but before he can do anything he is taken down by one of the main characters: Penny.  We don’t get to see the actual take down, but when we flip the page, Penny has this huge monster in her arms and is eating it .  The visual on Penny is just priceless.  She’s a scrawny 14-ish-year old girl who is possessed by a demon who compels her to eat monsters.  Except that the demon is manifesting through her mouth and she has these weird appendages protruding from her mouth to bite the aquatic dude.  It sounds nasty as I’m typing it, and it is nasty to look at on the page, but it’s pretty rare to get visuals these days that impress in this way.

The Walking Dead #88 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letterer) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: Life goes on in the Alexandria compound now that someone has woken up from a coma.

What’s Good: As with all Walking Dead reviews I do, this review contains SPOILERS….

Honestly, there isn’t a whole lot to really cheer in this issue.  There is a nice little bit of Andrea as she fends of an unwelcome romantic advance.  This sort of love triangle is just what would probably happen in any small, closed environment.  I’d bet that the Alexandria compound doesn’t have a perfectly 50/50 ratio of eligible men and women, so some folks aren’t going to make a love connection.  Beyond the biological imperatives that these folks might be feeling, sometimes it would be nice to just have some companionship, ya know?  And, you can only imagine the potential violent messes that could arise from unrequited romantic feelings in this pressure cooker!  Chalk this up as another trademark Kirkman “slow burn”.

It was also just generally interesting to see the folks getting to work, scouting the immediate area, planning for the future, etc.  One of the interesting things about any post-apocalypse story is seeing how humanity tries to put the pieces back together and we haven’t gotten any of that in TWD in years.

The art is also a plus on this issue.  There is really zero showing off by Adlard; just good solid comic storytelling.

Infinite #1 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Rob Liefeld (pencils), Liefeld & Adelso Corona (inks), Hi-Fi Design (colors), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: A man has to go back in time to fight a war.

What’s Good: The concept for this comic is pretty solid and interesting.  Discussing it here is slightly spoiler-y but if you follow internet previews or have heard any interviews with Kirkman, you’ll have already heard it.

The basic idea is that during some future war, a soldier travels back in time to enlist the assistance of his younger self.  We also get fed some good sci-fi action in this issue, but that is the basic premise.  That sounds pretty neat because it seems that Kirkman is staying away from the customary “rules” that science-fiction has traditionally placed on time travel: Don’t affect the timeline, don’t interact with your younger self, blah blah.  Just this concept and the track record of Kirkman as a writer mean that this should be an entertaining series that is worth checking out.

The art is pretty strong too.  It isn’t an issue where your jaw hits the floor over the glory on the page or anything that has me reaching for my wallet to buy original pages, but the art is snappy, stylish and tells the story quite well.

The Walking Dead #87 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (creator & writer), Charlie Adlard (artist), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: The survivors of the Alexandria compound set about rebuilding their walls and their lives.

What’s Good: [The top portion of this review is spoiler-free.  I’ll have discussion of the big “Oh crap!” spoiler at the bottom of the page, after the Grade for the issue.] This is another one of those issues that features Kirkman doing quiet character-building.  He spends a good bit of time on our long-standing characters, while also starting to put names to some of these previously anonymous and interchangeable characters that were in Alexandria before.  Kirkman is a pretty efficient writer, so the only reasons to build some of these characters up is either (a) he’s going to be using them a lot in future issues or (b) to make it hurt when they get killed.  Adding these news folks to the mix is really necessary because so many of the Alexandria people who had names didn’t survive the zombie attack from several issues ago.

However, we can already see the beginnings of conflict beginning to brew.  For one thing, it seems like Kirkman is fiddling with a possible love-triangle with Rick, Andrea and Michonne.  There’s nothing overt (yet), but we clearly see Rick and Andrea getting closer and we also clearly see Michonne appreciating that Rick cares about her.  The prospect of a love triangle between these three is both thrilling and heartbreaking.  Thrilling because we readers who have followed these three characters really LOVE them.  Honestly, do you know any TWD readers who don’t love Andrea and Michonne?  We want them to be happy.  But, can you imagine what a painful issue it’ll be if in 5-6 issues, Rick and Andrea become an item and the heartbreak is what pushes Michonne over the edge?  Ouch….

Just the fact that I’m blathering away about a potential love triangle tells you all you need to know about the subtlety of Charlie Adlard’s art.  His style is definitely on the realistic side, and while he does inject emotion into his characters, he also leaves their expressions vague and open enough that the reader can start to pour their own thoughts and feelings into the story.  It’s just a sign of a mature and confident artist who has gotten to the point where they know what to show and what not to show.  Bravo!

The Walking Dead #86 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: The survivors reestablish their status quo in the wake of the big zombie attack from several issues ago.

What’s Good: Robert Kirkman is a master of the slow burn.  Every story cycle he starts out with the smoldering embers of the last story arc’s explosive conclusion. He gathers those embers into a pile, adds some fresh fuel and in ~6 issues you have another explosion.  What’s amazing is that the formula has stayed pretty constant throughout TWD’s run. It never gets stale since the “explosion” is always different.

This is one of those stories early in the cycle.  Basically, we bounce around the Arlington compound and touch base with a bunch of characters and see where their heads are.  Rick is worried about his son and wants to rebuild their compound better, and stronger.  There is fallout from the Rosita and Abraham break-up.  Rick has nice chats with Michonne and Andrea.  But the theme for this issue is character development and community.  Rick wants to live in this compound forever, he says. [Although you wonder how much of that is simply that Carl cannot be moved.  Perhaps all this ‘wall building’ is merely his way of protecting his vulnerable son?

We do get to see zombies, but having fought off hundreds of swarming zombies inside the walls, it’ll take a lot more than 5-10 roamers to unsettle our survivors now!  They treat the zombies almost with disdain.

There are still a lot of mysteries.  It seems like Rick might really lose his shit if anything bad happens to Carl and we don’t know what form the new danger would take, and that’s fine.  It’s always fun for TWD fans to guess: Will it be zombies?  Will it be human cannibals?  Kirkman also seems to be noodling around with Rick’s relationship with both Michonne and Andrea.  I personally think you could get a very powerful storyline by establishing a love triangle among those three and then have it go wrong.  Who would you bet your money on if Andrea and Michonne were trying to kill each other?  What is the gender ration in the post-zombie world?  I’d imagine having a 60/40 split either way would lead to all kinds of societal stress…

This is another very strong issue from Charlie Adlard.  TWD is so rooted in first person realism, that it doesn’t give him a chance to really show off.  But his storytelling is excellent.  TWD would get really confusing if you ever had questions about who was talking or what was going on in the story.

The Walking Dead #85 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: The humans clean up after laying a massive smack down on the zombies in last month’s issue.

[SPOILER WARNING ]

What’s Good: Comics can’t be breakneck all the time.  The Walking Dead is a marathon that alternates lots of issues of quality character-building with an issue here or there of action and terror.  In issues #83 and #84, we got a LOT of that action as the zombies came pouring into the “safe zone” outside of Alexandria and the humans (led by Rick) decided that this was the time and place to make a stand.  In those issues, you could just see that “a lot” of zombies were killed, but this issue really drives it home as we see the survivors setting about burning all the corpses.  Wow….that’s a whole lot of dead zombies!

What makes Kirkman such a good writer is how he can bounce from the action of last issue to the calm and post-traumatic stress of this issue.  After spending the last ~10 issue being certain that the survivors were going to be driven out of Alexandria by the zombies, I love that we’re getting to see them learn from the mistakes that allowed this near catastrophe to take place and make affirmative efforts to fix the situation.  Rick and his gang seem to be 100% in charge of Alexandria now.  When they first got there, they were the guests, were worried about fitting in and didn’t want to rock the boat.  Now they’re in charge and have all kinds of plans to fortify their living quarters.

Kirkman also isn’t above giving us an “Oh Shit!” moment when Rick’s girlfriend comes lurching out of the pile-o-zombies, lurching towards people with her almost severed hand from where Rick chopped her with his hatchet because she was slowing the group down and was going to get Carl killed.  As if the scene of Rick chopping her to save his and Carl’s lives a few issues ago wasn’t harsh enough, having her reanimated corpse lurching back to life just shows that Kirkman really isn’t pulling his punches.

The Li’l Depressed Boy #4 – Review

By: S. Steven Stuble (writer, colors & letters) & Sina Grace (art)

The Story: Have you ever met a really cool girl who has a really good male friend and felt obligated to be nice to him because you liked the girl?

What’s Good: It’s really impossible to review this comic and say what is good without spoiling the big wrinkle.  So….SPOILER ALERT…..

There, with that out of the way, what makes this comic so good is that it reminds guys of the little things that make awkward teenage romances so unique and special because at that age, guys pretty much suck at anything having to do with girls.  So far in this series, we’ve already covered the phase where Li’l Depressed Boy (LDB) meets this hot, geek-chick who totally doesn’t realize that she is hot and seems to like LDB, we’ve seen them going out on kinda dates, we’ve seen his awkwardness when he forgets her name and is then too afraid to ask her because it’ll be awkward, but mostly we’ve seen LDB just being super nice to the girl (Jas).  And, through it all, we’re pulling for LDB in a big brother sort of way since Jas is totally out of his league.

This issue picks right up with LDB helping Jas to clean up after her party.  What a nice guy huh?  Haven’t all of us guys been there?  Helping the girl we like to clean up messes?  That’s what “nice guys” do!  Then we learn that Jas has a male “roommate”.  No problem, this guy Jet seems like a super nice guy too and LDB goes out of his way to be friendly to Jet.  All along, he’s getting little kisses on the cheek and being told what a “super guy” he is and how his is “so nice”.  Then BOOM, out of left field, Jas reveals that Jet is her BOYFRIEND!

The way that Struble and Grace make this reveal is so spot-on.  Jas doesn’t do it as if she wants to make sure LDB “understands” the situation and doesn’t get his hopes up….she just tosses it out in casual conversation thereby showing that she didn’t even realize that LDB had the hots for her.  How’s that for a sharp stick in the eye?  Maybe there are guys in comicdom who have no experience being “the friend”, but for those of us who went through that horrid experience, this comic will speak to some very emotional experiences from our teenage years.

The Walking Dead #84 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (gray tones), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: After the shocking events of the last issue, the survivors need to man-up.

What’s Good: [SPOILER WARNING]

If you thought that this issue would continue the bloodbath we got last month, you would be wrong.  After issue #83 (where Jesse and Ron got gobbled up by zombies, and where Rick chopped Jessie’s wrist with an axe to get her to let go of Carl, and where Carl got shot in the head due to some very unsafe gun handling by Douglas), I really expected this to be the issue where Kirkman thinned the herd again and distilled our core group back down to a few members before moving TWD on to the next set piece.  And Kirkman probably could have written that story as a pretty good issue even if he’s already shown us THAT story (in issue #48)… But, what we get instead is something completely awesome!

Rick and company decide that they’re taking a stand.  It starts organically with one-handed Rick fighting the zombies to give the doctor time to work on Carl, but just as things look bleak for Rick, Michonne comes flying in with her katana, leading her and Rick to fight back-to-back against a whole herd of zombies.  Of course we all expect Michonne to be the first of the survivors to suck it up and get down to business, but what happens next is truly incredible.  One by one, the survivors peek out of the houses where they have been hiding and go running out into the fray.  It isn’t too surprising that Abraham springs into action; he’s a military man after all. But some of the coddled survivors from the settlement, the fat science teacher and even Gabriel the priest come running wielding blunt instruments.

The fat science teacher even has the best couple of lines of the issue.  First, as he opens the door to the church to go to the rescue, he tells the priest, “C’mon Gabriel.  You can’t sit this one out” and later, when Abraham suggests that he take a breather in the turmoil he says, “This is a story people are going to tell.  I’m a part of this — I’m not giving up.”

And that’s this issue in a nutshell…  It’s all about a group of survivors who have been running for their lives from zombies and they are SICK of it; and by running this gauntlet they are born again.  In the end, they kill every single zombie that came into the compound and have retaken control of their destiny.

If you’ve ever recommended The Walking Dead, you’ve probably used the phrase, “It’s actually not about zombies.”  Well, maybe it wasn’t about zombies for the reader, but until this issue it was about the zombies for Rick and the other characters.  By the end of this issue, the zombies are, as Rick says, “a manageable problem.”

Super Dinosaur #1 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Jason Howard (art & colors), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: A boy genius and his Super Dinosaur friend fight an evil scientist.

What’s Good: Comics for kids…  Some folks think we need a lot more comics for kids since most of the people reading comics are 30-45 year old dudes and people wring their hands about the “death of comics” and the “need to bring in new readers”.  But, how do we do that when even “safe” titles like Amazing Spider-Man has a bedroom scene every 40 issues and is “burdened” by decades of back-story.

This is a great kid’s comic.  It has the look and feel of a Ben 10-esque cartoon.  The basic story is simple: Derek Dynamo lives with his super-scientist father, Doctor Dynamo and his partner/friend Super Dinosaur.  They come into conflict with Dr. Dynamo’s former lab assistant, Max Maximus and his squad of evil, uplifted dinosaurs over access to some scarce raw material.  The dinosaurs come from some Inner Earth (think Journey to the Center of the Earth) and have been modified by the good/evil doctors.  That’s pretty much the plot and Kirkman explains it all in the first 3-4 pages with the rest of the issue being devoted to dinosaur fights and an interesting plot wrinkle tossed in at the end.

The best thing I can say about this is that it is fun and I think that any adult comic fan with a 7-10 year old boy could try handing this to them.  There is nothing even remotely risqué in this comic and it somehow gives you the confidence that it won’t ever get into bad language and wanton violence or sexuality in the future.  I think you’d be perfectly safe buying this at the comic shop and just handing it to your kid without previewing it first.

The Li’l Depressed Boy #3 – Review

By: S. Steven Struble (writer, colors, letters) & Sina Grace (art)

The Story: LDB and his girlfriend (?) Jaz go shopping and plan for a party.

What’s Good: Lil Depressed Boy continues to do a few things really well.  For one thing, it captures those everyday situations that young guys get into when they first meet a cute girl.  The first issue covered the mere fact that the girl liked LDB.  The second had a TON of fun with the fact that LDB couldn’t actually remember her name (it’s Jaz).

This issue gets into some of those other things that happen once you become a couple: She’s going to take you shopping.  Ugh!  She’s going to drag you to parties with her friends who you don’t like nearly as much as you like her.  Ugh!  You’re going to have to give her presents.  Yikes!

Pretty much every guy in the world has been through some iteration of those situations, so there is a lot to connect with.  I also personally, read through this as a middle-aged man thinking, “Wow.  I certainly did that, but boy, was that stupid and I could have handled it better knowing what I know now!”  I’d be curious to know how younger men or women connect with the basic stories in LDB, but I expect that these stories provide a very nice blank slate for any reader to project their own personal experiences.

The Walking Dead #83 – Review

By: Robert Kirkman (writer), Charlie Adlard (art), Cliff Rathburn (grays), Rus Wooton (letters) & Sina Grace (editor)

The Story: As the walled enclave turns into a zombie-filled death-trap, Rick & Gang make a break for it.

What’s Good: [Spoilers ahead.  If you haven’t read the issue, just skim to the bottom, see the “grade” and come back after you’ve read it!] Wow!  Damn!  That’s all that can really be said after an issue like this one.  One of my criticisms of The Walking Dead over the last few issues was that I was starting to feel like certain characters were “safe” and that (unfortunately) Kirkman was going to have to kill someone to make me really buy into the long-standing notion that anyone could die at any time in TWD.

Well, we don’t get a straight-up death of a major character in this issue, but we DO get something pretty traumatic that could lead to death.  Actually, I don’t see how this injury is anything but fatal.  The events of this story could play out in so many tantalizing ways.  If Carl dies, will Rick really have the balls to put a bullet in his own son’s head when he reanimates?  There is an interesting parallel with Morgan who was unable to “kill” his zombified son.  If Carl dies, what will become of Rick?  Will being without his child be a lifting of a burden in a way and free him up to be a better leader…. or…will it ruin him?

So, many other superstar moments in this issue.  Michonne spilling her guts to a dead man before getting her “game face” back on.  Goodness do I love Michonne!  How about Maggie and Sophia making a decision to stay behind and Rick being 100% willing to leave them because he doesn’t want to waste the time to try talking them out of it?  Amazing, considering all that Rick & Maggie have been through together!  How about Ron & his mom getting gobbled by zombies and Rick chopping off her arm to get her to let go of Carl? Sheesh!  Only a few moments earlier Rick and this lady were being all snuggly and now he is ignoring her pleas for help and hacking her arm to save his son.  What about how blatantly clear it was that the residents of this enclave simply can’t hack it when the shit hits the fan?  Our original gang is basically dealing with the zombies like they are old pros whereas the “civilians” are peeing their pants and firing guns wildly.  How about Andrea coming up with a pretty decent plan to help her friends inside the wall?  Did you really think she’d turn tail and run?  I know that if I ended up being in The Walking Dead, I want to be on the team with Rick, Andrea and Michonne.

Lil Depressed Boy #2 – Review

By: S. Steven Struble (writer, colors, letters), Sina Grace (art), Nicholas Brandy (edits) & Zachary Trover (design)

The Story: Have you ever forgotten someone’s name and then gotten past the point where you can politely ask them, “What’s your name?”

What’s Good: What a cute and fun comic!  If you’ve ever looked at a big pile of gritty comics in your “stack” and sighed a little bit because it would be nice to have a fresh and clean comic to chase all that drug addiction, grittiness, violence and vomiting into each other’s mouths (PunisherMax reference)… This is the comic for you.  Lil Depressed Boy (LDB) follows a nameless ~20 something directionless guy.  He’s not a loser or anything so morose. He just doesn’t have a ton to distinguish him from the crowd.  He’s just kinda there.  In the last issue, we saw LDB meet a really cute geek-girl who really took a liking to LDB.

What’s great about LDB is that the creators take a common, every-day circumstance that everyone can identify with like forgetting someone’s name and expressing that circumstance through this LDB character.  As you can tell from the lead in, this issue revolves around the fact that LDB has met this great girl and been on a few kinda-dates, but… He can’t remember what her name is.  He’d ask, but he’s way past the point where he can do so politely because he’d be admitting that he didn’t know her name the whole time.  So, he and his buddy engage in a series of comical attempts to figure out what her name is before LDB gets put on the spot.  Even if it is just a conversation at a cocktail party, hasn’t everyone been in this circumstance where you can’t remember someone’s name?