Broken Frontier

The world is overrun by the hordes of the living dead, and a school bus full of frightened teenagers find themselves cornered in this hellish melee.

I think it’s safe to say the world has gone to hell in a hand basket, as thousands of dead bodies return to life to set a grim visage all across the world. The only question remaining unanswered is how a terrible thing like this happens, but there’s never enough time to stop and evaluate. All one can do in a time as horrible as this is run for dear life, and if that’s not enough to seriously get you to crap your pants, wait until King Zombie rears his ugly puss. I am sure that will do it.

The set-up to this series sounds clichéd, but don’t let that fool you from discovering the plights and perils of a world run amuck with the living dead. This series after all is the grand daddy of zombie/horror comics, despite what some of you might think, and Dead World certainly does deliver the goods. It starts out with a school bus full of teenagers searching for sanctuary with father Damien in charge of the group. Along the way they pick up a mysterious stranger named Deake who appears to be a crazy lunatic. Deake claims to be in possession of a book that is solely responsible for unleashing all hell on Earth, but before anyone on the bus can rationalize the situation a horde of zombies halt the proceedings.

Everyone is put into a precarious position, but the group is prepared to defend themselves at all costs. They battle the horde of zombies to the best of their abilities, despite the casualty of losing father Damien. The kids are forced to forge ahead and continue fighting while Deake cowers in fear inside the bus. Eventually, the battle comes to a halt and when the kids are about to exult in victory, another surprise awaits them. This time a motorcycle riding (King) zombie with the power of intelligence shows up demanding to have Deake turned over to him immediately, or else all hell is going break loose. Again, the kids show a ton of gumption and fight back unaware of the power King Zombie wields, and he does indeed have several demonic tricks up his sleeve.

I just love the story dynamics set up here to explain away a rotten situation. The characters find themselves in a totally amplified situation on a horrific scale, and I love how writer Gary Reed handles it. His dialogue is fresh, realistic and still kept within familiar parameters that the original series from the 80’s had. Again, this new series is meant to be a reworking of that classic Calibre 80’s title and it came out long before the slew of more recent zombie-infused comics (like The Walking Dead).

This time around there are several notable changes in characters and plot devices, but the one remaining constant is artist Vincent Locke. He was the original artist on the 80’s run and he’s returned here much older and more accomplished than at that earlier time period. His work still retains a crude line style, but I find it more streamlined and much slicker than before. I also think it helps to have his work printed on white bond paper as opposed to the grayish tones of newsprint. His art here is stark in quality and I think it works best for the graphic depictions this series is going to boast.

Overall I think this is going to be one hell of a ride for horror fans, and for anyone interested in the sub-genre of zombie comics. I think current titles like The Walking Dead have much to owe to a grand title like this, since Dead World came way before. I only hope that fans and horror aficionados embrace the grand daddy of them all. I know I did.