The Walking Dead, issue #59

Hallelujah! Actually, coming from a Catholic background, it's really Alleluia for me.

This issue hits all my happy spots, starting by breathing lightly against my neck, then running its fingers down my trembling sides and nibbling my earlobe while whispering dirty, dirty promises.*

It's quick-moving, relatively light on dialogue (and what dialogue we get is generally brusque), covers a lot of territory in just a few action-packed pages culminating in a perfect mid-scene, un-silly cliffhanger ending. Kirkman hauls us back to the hair-raising scenarios that hooked us into this series. As I've mentioned before, Adlard's best work is his zombies. If we were to graph me nitpicking his art, we'd see that my whining's highest when zombie content is low. This issue dishes up our friendly neighborhood shamblers in spades, and Adlard rises to the occasion. The high water mark is a *superb* double-splash, capitalizing on some pulse-pounding action.

I have no idea how it will resolve; I'm on pins and needles. This issue is clearly the payoff I've been waiting for. (Who doesn't mumble and whine in line? Even in line for something awesome. I'm guilty.)

I repeat the point I articulated several posts ago: month-to-month is no way to read The Walking Dead. I'm sure that for youngsters in the sixties and seventies, getting a quarter to spend on books was a special treat, and they wore that quarter thin every day after school, reading and re-reading each issue for four weeks, their grubby li'l fingers leaving it filthy and dog-eared. Never distracted by the legion multimedia that today keeps our heads snapping in a different direction every twelve seconds, these kids had the time and tenacity to commit that issue to heart. They knew exactly what resolution to hope for with the next issue and never lost the narrative thread.

Couple that with the fact that comics at that time were written for kids who needed a spandex-befitted fix every month, written to be punchy and rewarding every time, and you can see why a mature title like The Walking Dead is really not suited for monthly reading. The plot takes time to ripen. The characters are usually interesting to observe just *being*. There are a lot of lulls while these things happen, and those lulls are critical.

They're critical because they are definitively punctuated by issues like this, #59, blowing your balls clean off. If every issue were like this, the title would've been an insane adrenaline-fest, ass-kicking as a horde of hyperactive tweens having their way with a donkey piñata, compulsively readable but ultimately empty. It would've burned out years ago.

Instead, Kirkman gives us a well-paced, thoughtful, long-reaching narrative that (I can't say it enough times) is undeniably best enjoyed in collected format. (Now, whether that is a series of stapled floppies or a trade paperback is left to your preference. I'm a big trade fan, myself, but that's because a: I'm cheap, b: I'm clumsy, and c: I believe the collectibility of modern comics is negligible if not dead.)

Next time you read me bitching about an issue being slow, direct my short-ass attention back to this entry and I'll promptly STFU.

Another note: When Adlard switched to drawing his pages actual-size several issues back, there was a marked drop in the quality of the faces, with eyes clearly misplaced, mugs flattened, etc. I think he's finally starting to get his footing again and is beginning to master the smaller layout. There are only a small handful of WTF faces in this issue. Most of the art has come up to the level Adlard established when working full-size. High five, Charlie!

See? I'm not so insistent a whiner as you've empirically observed me to be.

*I'm not so Catholic anymore, but I feel like I ought to say some Hail Marys just now.

There Will Be Boobs, and Other Assorted Stuff.

Watchmen

Like any nerd worth his or her weight in Golden Age comics, I sat in line for the midnight premiere of Zack Snyder's Watchmen.

I'm not going to attempt any kind of in-depth review, as even now--some two days since I saw the film--I'm still processing it. It will take several future viewings, I believe, for it to stand in my eyes on its own merits. For now, it's merely a lush visual representation of the book, the viewing of which was heavily informed/influenced by my most recent re-reading of the source material.

I will say this: the violence lacked subtlety, and thus lacked impact. It's cartoonishly grand guignol. It didn't help that what could have been the most shocking and unnerving kill (the child killer's run-in with his own meat-cleaver) was marred by shockingly unfinished digital gore.

Am I the only one confused by Snyder's choice to transform the alley brawl into a massacre? Disarming a thug and then plunging the knife into his throat? Rorschach or Blake would do that, sure--but Laurie and Dan?

Contamination Follow-up

I finished watching it. It's the most under-edited movie I've ever seen, a 45-minute story (possibly thirty!) stretched and padded to the ninety-minute mark.

It's interesting to note that writer director Luigi Cozzi was no mere hack hired to churn out an Alien knock-off, an easy assumption to make. The accompanying documentary reveals him to be a science fiction fan steeped in the rich history of the American pulps. This is evident in the decidedly quaint silent invasion plot, as well as in the design of the cyclops, a creature that would have looked at home on a cover of Amazing Stories (or maybe sprawled across Times Square in an effort to stop a nuclear holocaust).

For all of his love for and knowledge of the genre, Cozzi produced a film that is little more than an amusing oddity. There are a few fun ideas on display, but, unless you're an Italian horror completist, this one isn't worth your time.

Unless, of course, you want to have some fun playing around with it in Premiere or Final Cut.

The Man Who Saved Night of the Living Dead

The first part of my massive interview with Don May, Jr. is now live at Fear Zone. The second will be posted this coming Thursday (the 12th), at which time I'll run my review of Synapse's upcoming release, the boob-filled Swedish sexploitation flick, Exposed.

Belated Thoughts on a Movie Already on the Way Out

I liked the Friday the 13th remake. I began writing this half-baked review a few days after seeing the movie, but it sat around as a draft for too long and now it's just plain stale.

It's not a great film. It's not really even a film. It is, however, a fine Friday the 13th movie--a low bar, but a bar nonetheless.

I have a certain fondness for the Jason flicks--not because they've very good (they're mostly not), but because I was a kid when I saw them and they titillated me in all the ways good slasher flicks are supposed to titillate a thirteen-year-old boy: a scary and unstoppable monster, creative and bloody kills, and boobs (unless we're talking about Part 7, which delivered perhaps the coolest-looking Jason, but nary a blood-droplet or even a barely-glimpsed areola. (The MPAA were zealous when it came to butchering horror films back then.)

The new Friday delivers on all of the above: Jason is as imposing and unstoppable as ever (and maybe even a little cooler), the kills are fairly creative (though not nearly as bloody or inventive as one would expect, given the freedom offered by digital FX. A sign of some modicum of restraint on the part of the film makers, or a lack of imagination?), and boobs. Not a bountiful abundance of boobs, but more boobs than I've seen on screen since Hostel, as well as a bouncy and protracted sex scene that would have prompted me to go on a slow-mo frenzy, back in post-pubescent VHS glory days of 1987.

The Friday movies are the butter-slathered popcorn of the horror genre. They're junk, but they're greasy good fun. Because of this, one should not go into a Friday the 13th remake with the same apprehension or incredulity inspired by remakes of truly great films. It's Friday the 13th -- not Dawn of the Dead or The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.

With Scream 13 years behind us, the slasher film is, for better or worse, once more allowed to merely be a slasher film: the new movie is self-aware only in that it references elements from the first three Friday films. Surprisingly, it's not nearly as winky as one would expect, and there's even a nuanced and--gasp!--sophisticated moment or two.

If you're an old-school Friday fan and you're up in arms over this movie, it's probably because you've not given the original films an objective assessment.

Congratulations to the guys behind THE SIGNAL

...on their nomination for the Independent Spirit John Cassavetes Award for an independent film with a budget under $500,000.

The first recipient of this award was The Blair Witch Project in 2000. It seems they've since lost their appreciation for genre films.

I didn't watch the awards, not really, but RJ saw enough that he got me to catch the Cassavetes Award section of the re-airing. The Signal was the only genre contender, an excellent movie made for only $50,000 and, to my mind, the obvious choice--it represents the very spirit of low budget, using creativity, crew enthusiasm, clever shortcuts and a packed, short schedule to produce something that plays big, feels smart, and looks fantastic. I'm not going to claim outright that there's a bias in the Spirit Awards against genre films, as I haven't even seen the other movies, but they didn't look that great. My only piece of evidence is one that couldn't have affected the decision-making process:

Presenter Sandra Oh expertly announced each nominee and delivered its synopsis with solemn respect and admiration. Except for The Signal, of course, whose fantastical, violent plot she described with patently sarcastic disdain. You got the sense that she wanted to spit into a napkin when they cut away to the trailer.

Grr. What did you ever do for zombies, Oh?

Watch this space for an interview with Justin Welborn, the star of The Signal and Dance of the Dead and all-around dramaturgical fireball.

The Walking Dead, Issue #58

Last month's prognostication:

Can't wait to read BFF Handlebar McWeepy's touching-ass Vaseline-lens family flashback.

It didn't shake out exactly that way. Instead of a visual flashback, we're given a solemn recounting by Handlebar (apparently "Abraham", which I had to look up) of exactly how he lost his family.

Kirkman's heart is in the right place. I just don't know where his head is at.

In spite of what he may think, these extreme events experienced or retold with emotional frailty are neither touching nor shocking anymore, at least to me. They still have power over Rick, though, whose eyes bug out of his head as he hears Abraham's story. Why? After years of outrageous trials and losses, why are Kirkman's characters not as desensitized as we are?

Again, he overuses dialogue to come around to a very simple, powerful point, one that would have been served better through minimalism. Adlard matches his lazy stride through this segment. Things take a turn for the better when the crew approaches Morgan's house. Adlard bats one out of the park with his sweeping shots and with the depiction of Morgan's palpably maniacal state through excellent facial renderings. (Challenge: See if you can spot the vastly different panel where Adlard appears to ape Romita Jr. Winner gets a virtual handshake!) Of course Adlard wouldn't have gotten as far as he has without kicking ass at drawing zombies. I wish he got to flex this muscle more. His illustration of little Duane is chilling.

As much as I complain about Kirkman extending scenes beyond the limit their content can sustain, I truly wish that roping Morgan into joining their expedition had been a little less quick and easy. (He does manage to squeeze in some stale adages about the inhumanity of the undead.)

Lastly, the Mullet Moment--you'll know it when you come to it--reads like a reader complaint addressed within the pages. Curious!

Overall, not a terrible issue, but certainly not one that shakes off the shackles that have been holding this book back. I look forward to the return to terse action. District of Columbia, here we come!

Contaminated Expectations

I've wanted to see Contamination since my uncle bought me a Fangoria Video Guide back in--what was it, 1987? The review mentioned explosive gore FX and a Goblin score, and that was pretty much all twelve-year-old me needed.

Too bad I waited until last night to try and watch it.

I turned it off and went to bed after thirty or so plodding and severely under-edited minutes.

(The exploding rat was cool.)

I'm gonna try to wrap it up now. I'll let you know what's what...

The Best News I've Heard All Day

George's Undead Neo-Western has a composer: John Harrison.

I was personally hoping that the Big Guy would pick Donald Rubinstein, as Ruby's scores for Martin and Knightriders are fantastic (his Bruiser score was pretty damned solid, too), but you'll hear no complaints from me: Harrison's Caribbean-infused and Carpenter-esque score for Day of the Dead is perhaps the finest in the series. After two less-than-memorable Dead scores, George has taken one daddy-long-legged step in the right direction.

...of the Dead is on schedule to be completed in either March or April, barring reshoots.

Thank you, Dread Central.

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The Don May, Jr. interview is in the can. Expect it soon at FearZone.

Be Clever and Win Zombie Goodies from Tor Books!

Can you concoct a caption for this captivating cop corpse couple?

Then head on over to Tor.com and check out John Joseph Adams' contest--all you need is brilliance! Winner receives a copy of Adams' anthology The Living Dead and the video game Left 4 Dead; a prize package as uncompromisingly saliva-summoning as any I've ever seen.

Bon chance, deadites!