Reviewer: Will Cooling
Story Title: N/A
Written & Lettered by: Robert Kirkman
Art by: Charlie Adlard
Grey Tones by: Cliff Rathburn
Editor: N/A
Publisher: Image Comics
Last month (well last week for me as I caught up with this fine book after my hols) we learn that just because zombies overrun the world doesn’t mean people’s personal lives cease to be difficult and complex. We learnt this in the time-honoured soap opera technique of the love triangle. Shane sort of confronted Rick as to his love for Rick’s wife Lori who (and Shane doesn’t know this) had slept with Shane when they thought Rick was at best in a coma or at worst a zombie. Only for Rick’s young son Carl to shoot Shane for fear that he was about to kill Rick (I don’t think even Sunset Beach did that). With that ended issue 6.
You know, I probably should be shot for making light of what was a hugely effective and moving ending that highlighted a theme that continues throughout this issue; namely the brutalisation of the surviving humans. It’s a common theme in literature down the ages that man can quite easily and rapidly be brutalised if his environment is brutal. Lines such as, “he who fights monsters should be careful not to become one†are testament to this. Kirkman brings it up here with what happened with Shane being the prime example, yet he doesn’t invite the reader for a bout of postulation on the spirit of man instead he attempts to use his characters to mirror the actually horror (I hate this phrase) “ordinary people†would feel if placed in a situation where they saw people they loved and respected descend into barbarism. If it weren’t for the fact that these scripts are over six months old you could take it as a deliberate parable for most of the American public’s reaction to the behaviour of some of their reservists in Iraq. Perhaps this is best shown by the meeting of the camp with Tyreese and his family who recount how their community had been ravaged by the rotted menace with even kindly old men reduce to savagery. Kirkman however is subtle enough to also feature other less obvious examples of brutalisation one of which is the collapse of trust amongst people with neither Tyreese nor the camp able to commit to each other easily; so deviating from the zombie flick cliché of survivor solidarity.
Another example of the brutalisation is for the majority of the camp’s tribal-fascistic desire for a strong leader to protect and guide them. Kirkman, through the character of Dale (who he seems to have set up as the “conscience of the campâ€), shows how far modish, progressive attitudes wither when faced with harsh realities as the camp yearns for strong hunter-gathers. This is first seen in Dale’s admission that they’d accepted Shane’s leadership due to him being a cop, secondly by him listing only male candidates for the leadership, proposing Rick after dismissing two on the grounds of age and then, lastly, his rejoicing at the arrival of Tyreese as he brings another strong man to the group. This descent to tribal prejudices/realities (take your pick) is never explicitly highlighted, we never get a didactic aside to the audience from one of the characters but it’s definitely there and makes for some mature, thoughtful group socio-characterisation.
Then there is the character of Shane who in his grave marks the American Dream gone bad. Whereas others fell to pieces as their world’s collapsed around them, Shane, in true frontier spirit, made the most of new circumstances and attempted to achieve that which he had always wanted. He had always wanted genuine respect, status and authority and had got it. He had always wanted to play happy families and had played it. He had always wanted to get Lori and he got her. That is until Rick returned, then there were two alpha males so diluting the respect, status and authority he got and of course Lori and Carl were Rick’s, meaning that he lost them too. The man who had used the greatest disaster the world had every seen, in doing so embodying all that there is to admire, fear and detest in American opportunism had lost everything he’d ever dreamed of. The supplementary felt supplemented as Rick began to agitate for them to move camp and “flaunted†his marriage for Shane to see until finally he snapped. In that there is an irony, what Shane had lost what he had lost not due to anything to do with the zombies, indeed they had given it to him, but due to the return of a friend. Many men have lost what Shane did and reacted as he did in more normal circumstances, yet somehow he represents to the camp their brutalisation by the zombies; despite Shane being the only one to have relished the crisis. In addition, Lori’s hatred of Shane and descent into spiteful isolation and distrustfulness spurred in part by a revelation as effective as it is predictable threaten that Shane will remain as Walking Dead’s own Banquo’s ghost for some time to come.
Whilst all these themes are there to be enjoyed by the reader (or invented by the reviewer with nothing better to write) Kirkman strikes an engagingly unpretentious note with an emphasis on characterisation, dialogue and action that wouldn’t be amiss in the three Vertigo big (non DCU) ensemble-cast hitters of Y: The Last Man, Fables and The Losers (which you all should be reading by the way). He has created a world and cast that manages to engage with the reader not only a sense of horror but also warmth with the relations contained creating affection for the characters beyond the obligatory “don’t wanna see the humans eaten aliveâ€, which is a testament to Kirkman’s skill and workrate as a writer.
Hitherto, Kirkman had been weaving his spell with the aid of Tony Moore, long-term collaborator and doyen of a mixture between naturalism and cartooney exaggeration. Moore’s replacement offers a purer blend of cartooney exaggeration with a style heavily reminiscent of the legendary Mike McMahon before he became a poor man’s Picasso. We are of course talking about the excellent (when in black and white) Charlie Adlard who brings to the title his trademark chunky, slightly angular character design and tight grasp of action scenes. However, the art doesn’t feel quite like his usual work as seen most recently in the excellent 2000AD (which you should all be reading…well at least my reviews) and that’s because of the addition of Rathburn’s grey tones, which are a great aping of Moore’s. Due to this we get the strange situation that while Adlard’s pencils and inks are very different from Moore they convey a feel and tone that is very similar and fools you into seeing an artistic constancy that shouldn’t be there. Depending on whether your regard for artistic consistency and the two artists this is either a great shame or a great joy. Personally, I’m undecided on the matter, as the tone suits this issue, but, should Kirkman ever want to crank up the nastiness factor (and he says in the ever excellent letters page he plans to add more zombies) an uncompromised Adlard may have been better.
Still that is a fly in what is otherwise a delightful omelette. Kirkman develops an issue that refuses to dwell on either the most dramatic developments of last issue by introducing new strands and developments to what is one of the best comics of the moment.
