Comic Review

The Walking Dead Weekly #9 and 10

Creators: Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard

Publisher: Image Comics

Release Date: March 2011

Reviewed By Keith Hodder

If you haven’t heard of The Walking Dead then you’ve either been living in a cave or you’re the type who finds it cool and chic to purposely avoid popular trends. If it is the latter, than you’ve just been missing out on something brilliant and you’re probably wearing American Apparel clothes that you don’t really like that much.  Hopefully I can change your mind. On the show and comic, that is. You can wear whatever you want.

The television show The Walking Dead premiered on AMC this past October with a six-episode run and it quickly became AMC’s most-viewed premiere. For those not in the know, the show is actually based on the comic book of the same name. The series has actually had a successful run of nearly eight years and it is still on comic book shelves today. Like the TV show, tt focuses around a group of survivors who are struggling in a world where the living are a minority and the walking dead, well, walk the earth. Understanding the popularity of the TV show, Image Comics decided to re-release the past issues of comic books with hopes of generating more readers. They very originally titled the series The Walking Dead Weekly and I was lucky enough to get my hands on issues 9 and 10. 

The cover art for both issues fooled me. I had hoped that I would still be graced with Tony Moore’s art when I dived into the pages. Alas, it was that of Charlie Adlard. But is it right for me to complain? I must admit, Adlard’s art is quite gritty and he has a fantastic understanding of shadows and their metaphorical use as both issues display excellently. Nonetheless, I still prefer Tony Moore’s art despite its cartoony nature. I just believe he was able to capture expression a lot better than Adlard, but beggars can’t be choosers, right?

Writer Robert Kirkman finds it effortless to create real, and human situations in both issues and I’ll argue throughout the entire series. The opening of issue #9 is a great example as we read the discussions of each of the characters as they wake up in the morning. My description sounds dreadful but the quick exchanges actually establish a bit about each character, such as a screenwriter would write a subtle happenstance that ends up telling us a lot about their character. And it should be noted that this was Kirkman’s goal from the get-go of the series. While he wanted to write about a world of zombies, his main focus was how humans and their society would react and change when they must struggle to survive day to day. Morals change as the world changes, and characters change too, becoming dark caricatures of what they once were.

The brilliance of the Kirkman and Adlard duo is their sense for pacing and suspense. They’ll give you moments where the characters have time to discuss and develop, but as issue #9 displays, Kirkman isn’t afraid to throw you into the deep-end accompanied by one of Adlard’s sudden and gruesome illustrations. I’ll give Adlard credit where it’s due, he’s brilliant at drawing and giving detail to some horrendously gory moments. Also the team isn’t afraid to write an issue that doesn’t feature one zombie. This was the case with issue #10, which picks up after a fantastic cliffhanger from issue #9.

Don’t let the lack of zombies dissuade you. You’ll find the group of survivors very relatable and quite real. Though I’ll admit, at times, I struggled to remember some of their names, as there are so many survivors  (and it didn’t help that issue #10 quickly introduced at least five new characters). Its an odd balance really, while Kirkman will make each character original and give them a lot of back-story and personality, the sheer number of characters makes it hard for one to stand out on their own at times. Perhaps this is the only problem you’ll have to work through when reading the series, but it is worth it. The series is incredibly character driven and you can’t help but to fall in love with these horrifying and yet seemingly realistic tales.

Excuse the lack of detail in this review, but I want you to experience it for yourself. There are great stories waiting in The Walking Dead Weekly issues #9 and 10 and while they might fall into the group of issues that does not included a lot of action, the character’s and their interactions are too good to pass off. Don’t be the person who loves and watches an adapted production without reading the source material. You’re missing out!

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