Stephanie Kay
Oct 13, 2007, 09:57 pm
<a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/4images/details.php?image_id=10099" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/marvel/zombie1t.jpg" alt="Zombie #1" hspace=10 align=left></a> Reviewer: Alan Bergin, alan_bergin@yahoo.com
Story Title: The Getaway
’Take your best shot and die here over some girl you probably never even tasted-or grab the bags, Simon. Your choice’.
Writer: Mike Raicht
Art: Kyle Hotz
Colour Dan Brown
Letters: VC’s Joe Caramagna
Consulting Editor: Axel Alonso
Editor: Warren Simons
Editor In Chief: Joe Quesada
Publisher: Dan Buckley
Published By: Marvel Comics (www.marvel.com)
This title is suggested for mature readers.
It would be quite tempting to leave this title on the shelf. Ever since the Resident Evil videogame single-handedly re-introduced the waking world to the zombie, back in 1996, creators from every corner have been milking the undead cow for all it’s worth. Where films such as Shawn of the Dead & 28 Days Later and comics such as Remains, Blackgas and The Walking Dead prove that there’s room for innovation with our rotting brethren, films like Resident Evil & Boy Eats Girl and books such as DC’s Toe Tags kinda make you wish that the flesh-munchers had atrophied that little bit faster. The biggest break-out success of the past year has had to have been the house of idea’s own Marvel Zombies. It focused on a desolated alternate reality, in which undead Superheroes and villains have devoured humanity. The book was as twistedly engaging as it was grotesque. With word of issues and hardcovers selling-out and numerous wonderful alternative Arthur Suydam covers gracing the background of laptops the world over, one couldn’t help but wonder why every other creator couldn’t bring this level of innovation to the zombie universe. With the newly realized potential of the undead, Joey Q has commissioned this, a four-issue limited series, which in many ways brings the zombie story around full-circle. Gone are the gags about zombie-Spidey’s missing leg or zombie-Hulk’s chronic indigestion, as instead readers are force-fed an unhealthy dose of tried & tested terror.
From speaking to creator Mike Raicht about this project a number of months ago, it became quite obvious to me that we were dealing with an undead fanboy. He seemed to approach the project with a kind of enthusiasm that marked him out as a longtime fan, who was finally given his chance to write the kind of zombie story that legions of George Romero fans the world over, near-demanded. While Robert Kirkman is given free-reign to build his undead world in The Walking Dead (a title that Kirkman himself was quoted in saying that he would like to write until the time of his own demise), Raicht has been given the slightly more pressing task of setting-up (and tearing down?) his own zombie utopia in the course of 4 issues. In a sense, it could be viewed as a positive thing. With obvious time & page constraints, Raicht’s skills as a storyteller will most assuredly be put to the test. Introducing a cast, a premise, a strong plot and a satisfactory conclusion is no small feat, especially when you don’t have the benefit of continuing with characters or an agenda that were already established (Marvel Zombies) or a book that can continue to evolve over time (The Walking Dead). Do Raicht and company have what it takes to satiate the appetite of an army of rotting comic-fans? If this first issue is anything to go by, the answer is an undoubted yes.
Like all good horror films, you need to be gripped from the outset. The opening scenes of Zombie #1 serve to meet this pre-requisite, but it does so in the most striking of ways. While other zombie tales will plant you either at the dawning of the invasion or directly in the aftermath of the outbreak, Raicht takes the unprecedented step of garnering our attention through the means of an everyday bank robbery. For me personally, this is the issue’s greatest achievement. By sneakily subverting our attention away from the anticipation of an undead menace, we’re literally forced to engage with our protagonists in a manner that is completely exclusive of our original expectations. Raicht expertly crafts the usually more mundane occurrence of the robbery with the arrival of the undead threat, all the while forcing us to make acquaintance with our lead character(s) under a variety of different contexts. It works.
Raicht’s dialogue also constitutes one of the book’s main strengths. Our lead protagonist, & friendly bank employee, Simon is humanized from the outset. While preparing the loot for the villains, he blasts their decision to shoot his manager, who met his end while mouthing-off: ‘And Andy may have been an *******, but he was an ******* with kids, F@#k these guys’. The felons themselves also receive more that their fair share of expository dialogue. While Shorty still comes across as a two-bit lackey, the character of Gyp is perceived to be something entirely more sinister. It’s very possible to secretly hope that our hoods either die or switch to the side of the angels, when the much more malevolent threat of the zombies present themselves, but Raicht holds fast with his original plans for our thieves and sets-up their continued involvement for the upcoming installments.
With the exception of the heist/invasion angle, the book might seemingly suffer from a lack of originality, but it’s actually quite alright. Raicht comes through with strong cast performances, a number of shocks and plenty of high-octane action sequences. He’s established his premise, his crew & setting and the ensuing rivalries all in the space of the first issue. The sight of survivors taking refuge from the undead is a familiar one, but Raicht has given sufficient indication through this first installment that he’s capable of coming up with the goods.
Kyle Hotz has been charged with the task of penciling the story and he does an admirable job in depicting not only the askew settings of the plot, but also the twisted caricatures of its players. His facial expressions are deserving of special mention, as are his portrayals of widespread carnage, but while he does a fine job overall, I really do wish that he had made more of an effort to distinguish his lead man, Simon from his lead villain, Gyp. On closer inspection, Gyp’s face is more disheveled (and plain ol’ mean!), but when the majority of the scenes in the issue are given over to fast-paced action, it’s sometimes difficult to distinguish who’s kicking who, or who’s getting beaten over the head with the butt of a rifle. Another fault with the artwork had to have been the sudden, out of the blue appearances of zombies. It may be Raicht’s intention to make his zombies, Olympic runners, but it seems a bit odd to have his characters converse in one panel and then have a zombie grappling with the orator’s leg/neck in the next. These are small concerns, however as Hotz generally does a solid job of combining scenes of heightened stress and abject violence.
Zombie #1 may not be to everyone’s taste, but if you enjoyed the more sinister aspect of Kirkman’s undead offspring, you may very well get a kick out of this. Recommended.
OVERALL:
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdnone.jpg
Buy Zombie #1 online from X-WORLD and save! (http://x-worldcomics.com/yourvirtualstore/shopexd.asp?id=20663)
Story Title: The Getaway
’Take your best shot and die here over some girl you probably never even tasted-or grab the bags, Simon. Your choice’.
Writer: Mike Raicht
Art: Kyle Hotz
Colour Dan Brown
Letters: VC’s Joe Caramagna
Consulting Editor: Axel Alonso
Editor: Warren Simons
Editor In Chief: Joe Quesada
Publisher: Dan Buckley
Published By: Marvel Comics (www.marvel.com)
This title is suggested for mature readers.
It would be quite tempting to leave this title on the shelf. Ever since the Resident Evil videogame single-handedly re-introduced the waking world to the zombie, back in 1996, creators from every corner have been milking the undead cow for all it’s worth. Where films such as Shawn of the Dead & 28 Days Later and comics such as Remains, Blackgas and The Walking Dead prove that there’s room for innovation with our rotting brethren, films like Resident Evil & Boy Eats Girl and books such as DC’s Toe Tags kinda make you wish that the flesh-munchers had atrophied that little bit faster. The biggest break-out success of the past year has had to have been the house of idea’s own Marvel Zombies. It focused on a desolated alternate reality, in which undead Superheroes and villains have devoured humanity. The book was as twistedly engaging as it was grotesque. With word of issues and hardcovers selling-out and numerous wonderful alternative Arthur Suydam covers gracing the background of laptops the world over, one couldn’t help but wonder why every other creator couldn’t bring this level of innovation to the zombie universe. With the newly realized potential of the undead, Joey Q has commissioned this, a four-issue limited series, which in many ways brings the zombie story around full-circle. Gone are the gags about zombie-Spidey’s missing leg or zombie-Hulk’s chronic indigestion, as instead readers are force-fed an unhealthy dose of tried & tested terror.
From speaking to creator Mike Raicht about this project a number of months ago, it became quite obvious to me that we were dealing with an undead fanboy. He seemed to approach the project with a kind of enthusiasm that marked him out as a longtime fan, who was finally given his chance to write the kind of zombie story that legions of George Romero fans the world over, near-demanded. While Robert Kirkman is given free-reign to build his undead world in The Walking Dead (a title that Kirkman himself was quoted in saying that he would like to write until the time of his own demise), Raicht has been given the slightly more pressing task of setting-up (and tearing down?) his own zombie utopia in the course of 4 issues. In a sense, it could be viewed as a positive thing. With obvious time & page constraints, Raicht’s skills as a storyteller will most assuredly be put to the test. Introducing a cast, a premise, a strong plot and a satisfactory conclusion is no small feat, especially when you don’t have the benefit of continuing with characters or an agenda that were already established (Marvel Zombies) or a book that can continue to evolve over time (The Walking Dead). Do Raicht and company have what it takes to satiate the appetite of an army of rotting comic-fans? If this first issue is anything to go by, the answer is an undoubted yes.
Like all good horror films, you need to be gripped from the outset. The opening scenes of Zombie #1 serve to meet this pre-requisite, but it does so in the most striking of ways. While other zombie tales will plant you either at the dawning of the invasion or directly in the aftermath of the outbreak, Raicht takes the unprecedented step of garnering our attention through the means of an everyday bank robbery. For me personally, this is the issue’s greatest achievement. By sneakily subverting our attention away from the anticipation of an undead menace, we’re literally forced to engage with our protagonists in a manner that is completely exclusive of our original expectations. Raicht expertly crafts the usually more mundane occurrence of the robbery with the arrival of the undead threat, all the while forcing us to make acquaintance with our lead character(s) under a variety of different contexts. It works.
Raicht’s dialogue also constitutes one of the book’s main strengths. Our lead protagonist, & friendly bank employee, Simon is humanized from the outset. While preparing the loot for the villains, he blasts their decision to shoot his manager, who met his end while mouthing-off: ‘And Andy may have been an *******, but he was an ******* with kids, F@#k these guys’. The felons themselves also receive more that their fair share of expository dialogue. While Shorty still comes across as a two-bit lackey, the character of Gyp is perceived to be something entirely more sinister. It’s very possible to secretly hope that our hoods either die or switch to the side of the angels, when the much more malevolent threat of the zombies present themselves, but Raicht holds fast with his original plans for our thieves and sets-up their continued involvement for the upcoming installments.
With the exception of the heist/invasion angle, the book might seemingly suffer from a lack of originality, but it’s actually quite alright. Raicht comes through with strong cast performances, a number of shocks and plenty of high-octane action sequences. He’s established his premise, his crew & setting and the ensuing rivalries all in the space of the first issue. The sight of survivors taking refuge from the undead is a familiar one, but Raicht has given sufficient indication through this first installment that he’s capable of coming up with the goods.
Kyle Hotz has been charged with the task of penciling the story and he does an admirable job in depicting not only the askew settings of the plot, but also the twisted caricatures of its players. His facial expressions are deserving of special mention, as are his portrayals of widespread carnage, but while he does a fine job overall, I really do wish that he had made more of an effort to distinguish his lead man, Simon from his lead villain, Gyp. On closer inspection, Gyp’s face is more disheveled (and plain ol’ mean!), but when the majority of the scenes in the issue are given over to fast-paced action, it’s sometimes difficult to distinguish who’s kicking who, or who’s getting beaten over the head with the butt of a rifle. Another fault with the artwork had to have been the sudden, out of the blue appearances of zombies. It may be Raicht’s intention to make his zombies, Olympic runners, but it seems a bit odd to have his characters converse in one panel and then have a zombie grappling with the orator’s leg/neck in the next. These are small concerns, however as Hotz generally does a solid job of combining scenes of heightened stress and abject violence.
Zombie #1 may not be to everyone’s taste, but if you enjoyed the more sinister aspect of Kirkman’s undead offspring, you may very well get a kick out of this. Recommended.
OVERALL:
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/wdnone.jpg
Buy Zombie #1 online from X-WORLD and save! (http://x-worldcomics.com/yourvirtualstore/shopexd.asp?id=20663)