Broken Frontier

Can you resist a book with zombie gorillas, zombie rhinos and a zombie elephant? Nope, thought not! The sequel to the popular online animation reaches halfway.

Dirge, the sentient zombie, together with his faithful undead dog Cerberus and human companion Zoë, continue their investigation into the sabotaged rail link that is so vital to the survival of the human settlement. Meanwhile back in the city, their ally Nephthys, the female Egyptian mummy, offers up a pretty radical tactic for protecting this isolated pocket of humanity from attacks by the zombie hordes surrounding them…

This month’s offering of the ever-likeable Xombie serial sees Dirge and Zoë’s quest take them through the ruins of an abandoned zoo, with predictably gruesome results when the former residents take offence. The dialogue is as sharp as ever with some memorable one-liners from Zoë and Dirge ("I am not in the mood. Did you see what those monkeys did to my upholstery?") and top-notch verbal sparring between our two leads.

More chilling is the zombie parrot whose selection of stock, repeated phrases gives a potted account of the zookeepers’ final moments after the zombified animals broke loose. Upping the ante on the creepiness front we have another enigmatic appearance from the mysterious zombie saboteur who has been pulling the strings these last few issues, making his inevitable confrontation with Dirge all the more anticipated.

Onto the visuals and it’s pleasing to be able to say that Nate Lovett’s storytelling is as accomplished as ever. The whole zoo sequence has an element of wry slapstick to it with Lovett’s marvelous use of perspective making the chase sequences both absorbing and suitably frenetic. This month’s issue ends on another gripping cliffhanger (almost literally) that should ensure that no-one will want to miss the next installment.

If you haven’t given this book a shot yet then do yourself a favor and check out the online Flash animated series that it spun out of at http://www.xombified.com/flashtoons.html . You’ll find yourself quickly immersed in this quirky near-future world of the shambling undead and the last vestiges of struggling humanity. It’s a zombie story with real heart that doesn’t rely on gore or excessive violence and, most importantly, it’s fun!

With an animated series, a comic book, a prose novelization and a potential movie adaptation in the works, it’s only the most hardcore semaphore enthusiast who can complain that Xombie doesn’t exist in a medium to suit them.