Comic: "The Walking Dead: Compendium One"
Published by: Image Comics
Written by: Robert Kirkman
Artist: Tony Moore , Charlie Adlard

Reviewer: Nick
Posted: 9/13/2010

Plot: A small town police officer awakes from a coma to discover a world besieged in hellish creatures. Can he find his family within this nightmare he has awoken to?

Review: In this day and age of unoriginality and remakes the easiest thing for me to say is that zombies have been done to death (ha-ha, get it, oh man I'm great.). Seriously, everyone and their grandmother have done a comic about zombies from the main comic czars like Marvel and DC comics to ridiculous tie-ins based on George Romero movie's, absolutely everyone has a zombie comic in some form or another.

Luckily there is at least one decent zombie series out there that I find to be A-Okay in my books, and that is The Walking Dead. This series has been going on since 2003, and I hope it doesn't end anytime soon. I admit, the series doesn't have the most original title out there, but with a title like The Walking Dead it doesn't leave any room for you to guess about what its contents could possibly be about.

Now is a great time for newcomers to jump in and catch up to the monthly series as Image Comics released The Walking Dead: Compendium One last May. This big boy collects issues #1-48 of the series in one, gigantic behemoth of a novel, which I am almost certain, can also, be used to crush small animals and children if the need arises for one of either to be crushed. Sure, it may cost around $50.00, and you may be living on Ramen noodles and tap water at the moment, but it's the cheapest and easiest way to read the series outside of illegally pirating it off the internet (Editors note: I-Mockery does not condone pirating awesome books of the internet illegally, no matter how much we do it.) seeing as your next best option would be to buy all the monthly issues or trade paper backs separately.

Within this tome of awesome-ness you will find the story of Rick Grimes, police officer from the small-town of Cynthiana, Kentucky. Rick was injured in the line of duty while trying to take down a rabid hillbilly, no doubt fighting the "man", and was admitted to a hospital where he had lapsed into a coma. Having awoken sometime later he is surprised to find that he has found himself in a post-apocalyptic hellhole just crawling with zombies. Doing what anyone true-blooded American would he sets off in search of his family and a safe haven away from these nasty ankle-biters.

I can't give you much more detail than that as it would completely spoil the story for you, and with a book like this that would completely ruin the experience for you. Though, sadly the title of the book does contain a huge spoiler, but as long as you don't stare at it too much, you should be fine. What I can tell you is what I find to be the greatest thing about this series. All the characters in this book are quite human, and as humans are, quite frail as well. It's a common fact that people die, and this book is happy to let teach you just that. Absolutely no character is safe in this series and it just breaks your heart to see one of your favorites get ripped to shreds by zombies, even if does look pretty cool, but that is life.

Luckily, the artists make sure not to let any gory detail go missing, and with a zombie series that is just great. Some of you may be interested in the series' black and white art style, but when your pencilers are great at what they do, you don't need color. Luckily, Robert Kirkman does a good job of keeping the story grounded in reality, and makes it seem that this is exactly what someone would do to survive in a horrific world no filled with zombies. The characters not only struggle to survive the undead that hunger for their flesh but the people who have regress to more animalistic way to insure that they survive, all whilst trying to keep their sanity and humanity in check as well.

I would love nothing more than to give this series as a whole a 5 pickle review, but sadly it does slow to a crawl halfway through, but you'll be too engrossed in the story and the characters to care. Now that the series has picked up again, I for one can't wait to see what becomes of our poor survivors. I suggest you all jump on while the getting's good, and join me.

Overall rating:
(Scored on a 0.5 - 5 pickles rating: 0.5 being the worst and 5 being the best)