General Overview:
I still remember grabbing the first vol of Walking Dead. I bought it because I had heard good things and it was in my price point of $9.99 at Olympic Cards and Comics. (btw best comic shop around the nw). The book started off amazing with Rick in a coma to him waking up in the full blown zombie apocalypse. As I continued reading I quickly realized that no one was guaranteed safe, and that at any moment any one could end up dying. This becomes even more true as the series continues on. I have seen a many good people die. Some were annoying, some were loved and will be missed, and few were just shocking more then anything. If I can say one thing about Walking Dead, always expect the unexpected. There are barely moments to even stop and catch your breath, most of the time there is danger lurking around the next corner.The books follows a pattern of lows and highs. Overall the series has had many high stress moments followed by a slightly less stress filled moment where the reader is able to catch his/her breath before the next stressful moment. This creates an amazing dynamic, but if I were to have one critique this might it also. As much as i love the dynamic it is almost becoming a little predictable. You know every time a moment of happiness starts up, something crazy is about to happen. Like I said its one of the best things about the book, but still you can almost see it coming. The craziest thing about the series though is that even though you hit the slow moments and that can last 3-5 issues easily, I never find myself bored, in fact quite the opposite. I can sit down with one of the 3 volume hard back books and finish in 30-40 minutes without being able to put it down. The book will grab me by the throat and force me to continue reading. It is absolutely amazing in that aspect. Its very engrossing and anyone who is on the fence about reading it needs to jump on it now.
Craziest Moments:
There is no shortage of crazy shocking moments. I am going to pick a few and maybe say a thing or two about them. Now I want to give one more giant warning. If you have not read the books and are still reading this... There are going to be HUGE SPOILERS. So dont be mad. I warned you.
One of the quickest moment comes when Carl has to kill Shane. I mean you already knew something was going to happen, but no one saw this coming. And then you see him shoot him and man does this start Carl's slow decent in to near insanity. I was absolutely shocked when I saw this, but loved it. I really set the tone for the series and really kind of set the tone for who Carl was and was to become.
2. Cannibals
This was pretty crazy. When you saw these people you knew something was up but you didnt know what. When I realized they were cannibals I was shocked. It really felt like they bumped the intinsity and insanity of this zombie filled world to a next level. Then when they went all ape shit on them and basically murdered them in a pretty gruesome manner that was crazy. This may not have been super shocking for most, but seeing humans go to such and extreme to survive was just unexpected for me.
I dont know about everyone else but this may have been the most shocking moment to me. This was one of those low moment that I was talking about earlier. Everything seemed chill and calm and happy. Lori just gave birth the prison was cleaned out for the most part and things felt right. Even when the governor and his crew had come into the mix and started the fight, i thought "the person who just had a kid was going to survive for sure". That was not the case. Lori died, the baby died. I was gobsmacked to say the least.
Glenn's Death:
I will be completely honest. Before I read issue 100 I already knew someone was going to die, I did not know who, and i could not even begin to guess whom, but I knew someone was going to die. As I made my way through the comic and I saw the events start to unfold. I would still never have guessed it would have been Glenn. This one was shocking and equally sad. I loooved Glenn. In fact before I read the issue a friend and I were talking about how much we loved him in the comic and the show. He was awesome and possibly one of my favorite characters. This... I took hard. And is easily the most shocking and saddest event to happen in the comic for me.
The FUTURE!!
100 issues of any series is a lot of issues, and its amazing to think that even after all of that I still find myself feeling an awry of emotions. The series is just that good. Now I will admit that after Glenn's death I felt extremely sad and at the same time a little numb, because this is their pattern. You get comfortable feel safe and "BAM!" someone important dies. So I think before the series gets old or stale they need to mix it up a bit. I feel that I can go with the series as it is for about another 60-80 issues before you even start to feel old or tiresome. I honestly feel that at another 100 issues you have started to do the same stories too many times and you have felt the same emotions and every starts to feel a little old. There needs to be a big change at some point and I think I have the best plan for this... Follow me if you will... down the rabbit hole of AWESOME!!!
The first panel after issue 160-180, at the end of or hell even the middle of a smaller story arc. The first shot is focused on the back of someone, they look a little familiar, but not too familiar. Dark shaggy hair, broad shoulders, etc. Over his shoulder you can see the top of a makeshift gravestone. It pans back and on the ground you see Andrea's rifle and Rick's hat and pistol. It pans back and rotates a bit as the person stands up and puts the rifle over his shoulder, the pistol in his holster, and the hat on his head, still his face is covered. The next panel he turns and you see his face and body, his face looks familiar but with an awesome eye patch. His features are something you have seen before... that is when you realize its Carl... not the child Carl, but a the Man, and you wonder "when is this?". The next panel pans a little bit further and you can see the name on the grave. "My Father Rick Grimes". Carl steps further away and it pans more. You see more graves. One says "My Step-Mother Andrea". Another says "My Friend Michonne". You then realize this is in the future, but how far? He takes a couple more steps and you see a line of graves, nameless. Then he walks up to a girl... a blonde girl with a sword... oh wait thats Michonne's katana and maybe some kind of scar, or a scarf over or face or something. It takes a second because this face is also recognizable, "but who"... And then like a distant memory you recognize her its Sophia. They embrace in a hug.... And this starts the next run of comics of the walking dead.
Oh man did you feel the chills? Just thinking about this is making me hope something like this happens. I mean we all know Carl is going to be a bad ass at some point because he has seen some shit and been through hell. I want to see a series in the future where they tell the story of the past and at the same time live in a world with less and less zombies trying to figure out what to do in this wasteland. Zombies are still a threat and the world has forever changed, but people must still go on. Its a dark world or maybe there is this weird moment of hope even though most of the population is gone forever, maybe there is a hope for a future finally. I dont know man, I just would love to see this. It doesnt even have to be that far into the future. Maybe 7-10 years. But god. This would be cool.
Conclusion:
Man I just made myself too excited. I wont be able to sleep for days. Either way I am super excited to see what they do for the next couple of issues. I can only imagine pure insanity will ensue. I hope they do get out of this ebb and flow feel, but if they don't that is also fine. I trust Mr. Kirkman on this one. He has lead me down an awesome path so far and I doubt he will disappoint.
Either way if you liked this post. Please let me know. I have been doing stuff for a couple weeks and I dont even know if anyone is reading this, and that is fine. I plan on running this no matter what. If people read its a blog. If no one reads its a journal. But honestly this has been one of my favorite things to write so far. I dont know why but I was seriously feeling this and feel really good about it. So let me know..
I agree. I think the same thing of settling in, meeting new people, domestic problems, then invaders coming in and core members die has to change. It can't keep repeating like this. Hopefully Kirkman will come through on this and make this arc more violent than the prison arc and indeed have Negan as being mightier than the Governor. How many people Negan controls will be key I believe. If it is very big then the story can go for a long time as Rick will have to somehow serve Negan, but at the same time come up with a plan and possibly meet other communities to team up with, to take Negan and the Saviors down.
ReplyDeleteI just don't think Kirkman can go back to the things the way they were before Glen died, because 100 was built on so much. It would be a letdown to not have the violence continue for the next few episodes. I think Kirkman has thought about this and I expect another key core member to die before this arc "Something to Fear" is over. People claim it won't be Michonne, but I do think it will be her. There's no way Carl is going to die anytime soon. Kirkman has to keep Carl alive as a trump card just in case the series can go on for a very long time.
At the same time Kirkman also has the option of ending the series quite quickly if things go bad, by just killing Carl off perhaps and then Rick killing himself, series over. Not that I think it will come down to that but that's the one way to quickly pull the plug if things go bad.
I am definitely interested to keep buying merchandise and continue to let my collection grow. I think I've spend over 8,000 bucks already! My collection can be viewed here and I have much more to post after TWD 100. Waiting for a few more items to get before I update it post 100 stuff. http://forums.imagecomics.com/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=1554
Cheers
I do think that Kirkman is probably "on the fence" as what to do with Sophia. I think he's thinking of killing her off in a torturous way in which would be the worse horror of the series since she's a young girl, and it would top Glenn's death. However, I do think he is thinking should he leave her for the future and what would her role be if so. I do agree with you that it would have to be one with Carl. Other than her being around as an adult with Carl, it just doesn't seem that there's too much holding Kirkman back from getting rid of her and that's why I am leaning in favor of her dying sometime during the Negan story. I think that while Season 2 of AMC is over, Kirkman does feel that he wants to keep the show and comic somewhat together in terms of who is around and who isn't, in terms of the core fellas. It makes me wonder if we will ever indeed see Merle or Daryl in the comic series. I always though that Tyreese was sort of the Daryl in some ways for the comic series.
ReplyDeleteBTW I just watched the S1 in January and quickly saw S2 on the net and then watched the second half of S2 as it aired every week on AMC. After that in April I started doing the comics and buying things like a madman. I sold my Garbage Pail Kids to fun my Walking Dead addiction!.
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