My Top 5 Zombies In Comics

Today is Easter Sunday which is the day that Jesus rose from the dead, which kind of makes him like a zombie and such is my vague justification for doing a zombie top 5.

#5 Zombie Avengers from Marvel Zombies

Okay cheating a little here by naming an entire team but really I couldn't choose between zombie Captain America, zombie Spider-Man and zombie Wolverine. Marvel Zombies takes place in an alternate universe where many of the superheroes have been infected with a virus that turns them into zombies hungering for human flesh.

#4 Rachel from Rachel Rising

Rachel was murdered and then came back with no memory of her death. Rachel doesn't feel much pain, has a heart rate of only a few beats a minute, has visions by touching the dead and so far has been unkillable.

#3 Lo Pan from Big Trouble In Little China

 
Lo Pan has been killed by Jack Burton twice now (once in the movie and once in the comic) and has been brought back but only in spirit so his goal is to perform a ritual so he can be made flesh. The best part about this is that the main reason Lo Pan wants to be made mortal again is so that he can have sex.

#2 Em from Revival

Em was murdered and then came back on "revival day" with other members of her town, Em heals when injured and can see the past by kissing the living. An 18 wheeler couldn't stop Em who simply laughed as her bones knitted back together in mere minutes.


#1 Jughead from Afterlife With Archie

Archie comics are usually seen as pretty dated but Afterlife With Archie is anything but. Jughead is bitten by his dog, Hot Dog, who had been brought back from the dead after being hit by a car and is now the leader of a giant horde of zombies intent on feasting on the last remaining survivors of Riverdale.

Page vs Screen - The Walking Dead

Page vs Screen - The Walking Dead

WARNING THAR BE SPOILERS AHEAD!!

The spoiler pirate has warned you

Many comics in recent years have been adapted into TV shows and movies mostly being incredibly successful with movies like The Avengers, Iron Man, Batman The Dark Knight, Arrow, The Flash and Captain America to name a few. One of the most successful comic to TV adaptions has been the Image comic The Walking Dead and lets face it if you aren't watching it yourself you know at least 3 people that do.

The show and the comic will be compared on 3 categories, Story, art/visuals and characters

Story

The TV show seems to be fairly similar with the comic in the general feel of the story which is just a group of people, who honestly don't really know what they are doing, trying to survive in a worse hell than anyone can imagine although I do feel that the comic seems to have a bit more direction in a sense its trying to go somewhere not just watching a bunch of dirty people freaking out all the time. A huge criticism of the show is that it isn't as intense as the comic, which of course is a common complaint when anything is translated to film/TV, but for the themes I honestly think the show does pretty well with the content it is dealing with. In the comic there are twin boys called Ben and Billy who are about 8 or 9 years old, Ben murders his brother and then cuts up his body and simply responds with "Don't worry he's going to come back. I didn't hurt his brain" when discovered. Now I honestly can't see a way that the show could do that even within an R rating.
The winner is: The comic

Characters

The characters from the comic and the characters from the TV show are completely different, some characters from the show do not exist in the comic, such as Daryl & Merle, and the personalities of the characters are not even close to the same. I find some of the really strong and independent characters, especially many of the women, are turned from strong and resourceful characters into complete morons that make terrible decisions on a regular basis. The comic has very human characters that aren't perfect but really do try to make the best of their situation but do still have problems, they make bad plans, have an awful lot of grief driven sex and have mental breaks. The characters in the TV show have the same names but I find it easier not to think of the TV characters as the same as the characters from the comic as it is just irritating. My main issue with the characters from the TV show is Andrea, in the comic she is a tough as nails, loyal friend who's a crack shot with a high powered rifle where as in the TV show she is a whiny, fool who even after she finds out that the Governor (who is waaaay toned down for the show but I suspect that was mainly because they wouldn't be able to show some of the horrible things he did) sexually assaulted Maggie & had Glen beaten still goes back to him, something that comic Andrea would never ever do.
The winner is: The comic

Visual/Art

The comic's art is both gruesome and chilling but the greatest impact the art has is sometimes in what you don't see, one of the greatest examples of this being when Carol slits her wrists and all you see is a a bleeding hand and the terrified Sophia huddled in the corner. The show has just the most amazing makeup special effects and have some of the best looking zombies to ever grace the screen. The zombies are rotten, dried out, sun damaged and filthy, which is what you would expect from a dead body left out in the sun for weeks/months. One of the best examples of the shows fantastic zombies is the half eaten "Bicycle girl" from the first episode.
The winner is: The show

Bicycle Girl is one of the most iconic zombies from the show

Overall winner:

The Walking Dead Comic

The winner today is the Comic due to superior story and characters, now this is not to say that the show is bad but I feel the comic has a far more realistic representation of how people would react, both good and bad, during the collapse of society and the story has a much more clear cut direction that it is heading. The show looks fantastic with it's terrifying zombies and dilapidated towns but the visual look wasn't enough for the win this time.

Kinski - Seriously Dude Thats Not Your Dog.

Kinski - Issues 1-6 complete series

Kinski is written and illustrated by Gabriel Hardman and published by Image. Kinski is a crime thriller about a man called Joe who decides he will rescue a dog from what he thinks are neglectful owners. Personally I wouldn't classify Kinski so much as a crime thriller so much as I would just a story about a guy going through a mental breakdown.

The cutest puppy in comics

Joe is on a business trip with his company when he finds an adorable black lab puppy and decides that he is going to keep him and names him Kinski. An animal control officer turns up and takes the puppy away, despite Joe's objections. The animal control officer says that the owner has five days to claim the dog before he goes up for adoption, Unfortunately Joe doesn't have five days to wait as his flight leaves in the morning. Joe lies to the pound saying that the dog is his and goes to retrieve him learning that somebody had already claimed the dog. Joe quickly checks their address when the receptionist isn't looking and sets off to find Kinski. When Joe reaches the address he sees a little boy playing with Kinski whose real name is Bosley, Joe thinks that Kinski will only escape again if left with these owners so he decides to whisk Kinski away in the night. Joe puts a collar on Kinski with a tag and his phone number deciding that he is now his. Joe doesn't end up taking his flight back because he refuses to put Kinski in cargo so his work mate, Frank, offers to drive the 12 hours back with Joe at the annoyance of their boss who gives Joe this one last chance to shape up or he's fired. On the way back Joe bumps into a waitress he met the night before who gives him a missing poster for their dog saying her son is incredibly upset. as Joe drives back he starts having second thoughts about what he has done and decides to take Kinski back to his owner but when Frank finds the lost poster for the dog he realises that not everything is exactly as Joe said it was.

DUN DUN DUUUUUUUUUN!!

The art in Kinski has a wonderful noir feel to it with great facial expression and just the happiest little puppy you've ever seen. Kinski has some really fantastic panels some with great scenery, others using shadows to really communicate the tone of the current situation. The facial expressions of the character's are so good this comic could almost be printed without words and still be have a very clear story.

I just love the look of this panel

Personally I find Joe a really unsympathetic character, he seems to be completely normal on the first page and even starts to look for the lost dog's owner and then suddenly decides the dog is his to keep because it is friendly and cute. Joe seems to have a complete mental breakdown over this dog that he has only spent a few minutes with, Joe gives up his job, loses friends all of which begins huge ripple of negative impact on his life. We are given no prior evidence that Joe is having trouble in his life or that he has some previous issues with lost dogs, he simply seems to lose it out of nowhere. I have a hard time feeling sorry for a man who literally sneaks into a child's yard at night and steals his puppy when he had absolutely nothing to go on that the owners were neglectful other than the fact that the puppy got out once, he even witnessed the child playing lovingly with the puppy but still decides that he would be a better owner. In defence of the comic all of the other characters in the comic have the general attitude of "what the hell is wrong with you, Joe?" attitude, his boss says to him he may be taking some body's dog and Frank even flat out tells him that what he is doing is wrong.

This puppy is apparently like the one ring

I may be slightly biased with this story because professionally I am a veterinary nurse and have actually dealt with similar situations where people find dogs, have them for a few hours and decide that they are theirs. This is not only illegal (technically this is stealing the dog) but the owners, 99% of the time, will be looking for their much loved member of the family.  So if I were to rate this story on art alone it would be getting a much higher rating but taking into account the story and main character I give Kinski 2 out of 5 lost dog posters.

Find out more about Kinski here.

If you do find a lost dog or cat take it to your local vet clinic and they will take care of them, they will scan them for a microchip (a legal requirement in Australia for not only owning but selling a puppy or kitten) and get them home before dinner. On the off chance that the vet clinic cannot find the owners they will be taken to the RSPCA the owner's have 8 days to claim their pet then the pet will be assessed for adoption. People do not work as animal rangers/control officers and at shelters because they enjoy euthanizing animals and they will always do their best to take care of all the animals that come through their doors. You can put in an application when dropping a lost animal at the vet for you to be contacted if the animal does come up for adoption.

Lady Killer - Dirty deeds done with style and grace

Lady Killer Issue #1

Lady killer is a six issue miniseries written by Joëlle Jones & Jamie S. Rich, art by Joëlle Jones, colours by Laura Alfred and letters by Crank!. Mrs. Josie Schuller is the picture perfect 1960's housewife, she is stylish, graceful, a wonderful cook, a loving wife, a caring mother to two beautiful girls and a highly skilled assassin for hire. Wait, What?

I'd open the door for her

The story of Lady Killer follows Josie as she assassinates her targets then makes it home to have dinner on the table when her husband is home from work. Josie keeps her work completely secret from her family and friends explaining away her time with charity work and meeting up with friends. Josie's contact and fellow assassin is the cheesy and vulgar (vulgar for the 60's anyway) Peck who bring Josie her assignments and gives her information on her targets. Josie's mother-in-law lives with her and her husband and begins to grow suspicious of Josie when she sees her meeting with Peck, not suspicious that Josie is secretly an expertly trained assassin but suspicious of something.

Just a regular housewife who could kill you with every object in this room

The art of Lady Killer combines to beautiful look of a 1960's catalogue with the crazy bloodiness of Game Of Thrones. That sounds like a pretty weird combination but it just works so well, there is something surprisingly satisfying about watching a beautiful woman wearing darling blue Chanel style suit having a knife fight with another woman. One of the best things about the art of Lady Killer are the close ups of Josie's face, especially the eyes, as you can always see that she is planning something deliciously evil. The only one thing I'm not super keen on is the way hands are drawn they aren't bad exactly but they look old but hands are really, really, really hard to draw well.
.

Despite the fact that Josie is a remorseless killer you can't hate her because she's just so damn good at it. In issue #1 you only get a small glimpse into Jose's personality but at home she seems to be a happy, bright housewife who loves her husband and children and takes care of her family but when "working" Josie is a heartless, stone cold killer. As the series continues I'm sure we will get a more in depth look at Josie's personality but so far I think she is great. Josie's husband, Gene, seems to be in completely blissful ignorance of anything unusual his wife does and appears to be a loving husband however Gene's mother, Mother Schuller, is a bitter old woman who seems to hate Josie, referring to her as "your wife" rather than by name, class act Mother Schuller, class act.

Blood is just impossible to get out

I would recommend to pick up a copy of Lady Killer for regular comic fans and it is a great first time read for new comics fans (providing they don't mind a bit of blood). 
  
I give Lady Killer 4 out of 5 bloody mop buckets
Find out more about Lady Killer here.

New Comic Book Day Swag Bag 22.3.15

New Comic Book Day Swag Bag 22.3.15

Powers Volume #1: This is the topic of April's Women's Comic Club. Find out more about that here.

Batgirl Volume #4:  More epic adventures for Barbra Gordon as Batgirl

Catwoman Volume #2: Volume #1 was pretty damn dark we'll see how volume #2 goes.

Kinski: I've been looking forward to this one for awhile, its about a man who finds a stray dog and the adventures he goes through adopting him.

Ms. Marvel Volume #2: Everybody loves a teenage superhero!

Batgirl End Game #1: End game special event!

Princess Ugg #8: By the looks of the cover the Princess Ulga is going to lead an attack.

Red One #1: A new series about America's greatest hero who is secretly a Russian spy.

Rat Queens #9: THE RAT QUEENS ARE BACK THE RAT QUEENS ARE BACK PRAISE N'RYGOTH!!

Squirrel Girl #3: Squirrel Girl in space!

Giant Days #1: I don't know anything about this one but I love the colour.

Princess Leia #2: They are women on a mission.

To Hell With It Volume #1: This is a mini comic by a local creator Scott Reid. Pretty funny

Mail-Order Mutant: Another cool little comic from the Franken Comic series.

My top 5 irrationally aggravating things in comics

Comic books are wonderful things for readers and for creators they are extremely hard work between art and stories it is incredibly difficult to put together. Like all forms of media I sometimes find myself getting irrationally aggravated at what are really minute things be they story choices or tiny mistakes that slip past editors. These things don't make the comics bad and often don't even make them any less enjoyable but they seem to fill me with unbridled rage for some reason, I possibly have anger issues.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY ARE CHANGING ARTIST?!?!?

#5
Time Travel

This is how you explain time travel to a nerd

Now don't get me wrong I love time travel but attempting to understand it is just so, so, so very aggravating. Time travel can be fantastic for a story when used well but it can turn a story into a completely muddled mess when overused.

#4
Clones

Spider-man in the 90's

*Sigh* Clones. All I'm going to say is Spider-Man in the 90's. The idea of a clone trying to find its way in the world feeling like they don't belong can be a very interesting and touching story but having clones appearing left right and centre is just over doing it.

#3
Eye colours randomly changing

They couldn't find the blue

I know comics are very hard work and especially if there is a large team working on the series mistakes can slip through the cracks and I understand that these things happen but for some reason I find eye colours changing from panel to panel incredibly aggravating.

#2
The "sexy woman/sexy underage woman pose"

physical impossibilities are sexy

Now I'm all for beautiful people in comics (for that matter t.v. & movies too), we want to see sexy women and handsome men in a visual media. As refreshing as it is to see a normal sized person in comics (Think Gertrude from The Runaways) I do understand why most of our heroes are especially good looking. I do not however have a lot of tolerance for these women being in a pose that Mr. Fantastic would find uncomfortable. It is physically impossible for a woman to have her butt and her breasts showing at the same time because the human spine does not work that way, I hate up skirt shots that expose a heroe's underwear, Breasts that are ridiculously sized and weirdly tiny waists. These things aggravate me even more when these are done with an underage girl. Now the age of consent in Australia is 16 years which is a few years younger than a lot of other countries, so if I have to explain to you why it is inappropriate to have a 15 year old super hero dressed like she is attending a fetish show I think you need to rethink your life. I'm not saying that the portrayal of men is not without its flaws (think teeny tiny waists and giant arms) but I'll get to that in a later blog.

#1
Awesome characters become useless

A character one minute is on top of their game and absolutely kicking ass and then suddenly they are turned into an absolutely helpless blubbering mess at the drop of a hat. This happens a lot with female characters especially but males are not immune to suddenuselessness-itis. During the Secret Invasion story Tony Stark (although affected by an illness) is almost talked into believing he is a skrull but the skrull queen when we all know that Tony Stark usually tends to go the "screw you I'm Tony Stark" route. If this breakdown is explained well such as Batgirl's post traumatic stress disorder which she eventually deals with and overcomes I don't find it madly enraging but when a character, who is normally strong and independent, is suddenly completely disabled by either something the villain says or a flashback it makes me want to destroy things with fire.

Batgirl - The Variant Scandal

Recently you may have heard about a variant cover for Batgirl #41 by Rafael Abuquerque being cancelled at the request of Rafael himself. This cover, which was meant to pay tribute to the incredibly popular and well known The Killing Joke written by Alan Moore, published in 1988 and for the 75th anniversary of the Joker (happy birthday Mr. J!). 

The cover that made twitter blow up

The Killing Joke, in which the Joker shoots Barbra Gordon (Batgirl) in the spine putting her in a wheelchair, is heavily referenced in the current run of Batgirl. The complaints tend to be that the cover is offensives and promote rape culture many having an issue with the frightened, helpless look on Batgirl's face. The reason the cover was eventually pulled at the artist request and due to threats that were being received. Oh, the threats weren't towards DC or the artist but to the people complaining about the cover now this aggravates me personally because it's not okay to threaten somebody for disagreeing with you ever, like ever, ever. So the people who decided they wanted to keep the cover ultimately were responsible for it being removed due to their own bad attitude. These threats have been condemned by both Rafael Abuquerque and DC Comics in official statements.

A reference to The Killing Joke in the current run of Batgirl

I understand that people can have different opinions on almost anything in life and that people find different things disturbing or unnerving so before I give you my opinion on the cover I showed the picture to five of my female friends whose knowledge of the Batman universe ranges from never seen a Batman movie to big Batman fan and asked them how the picture made them feel but gave them no other context for the image.
Person #1 focused mainly on how scared Batgirl looked using words like terrified and weird.
Person #2 recognised the characters, described the picture as being scary but not making her feel scared and that it looked like something that would be displayed as a piece of art
Person #3 said the image gave her excited nostalgic feelings of Batman from when she was younger but at the same time she felt weird because she felt like she was excited about something that could potentially be violent erotica.
Person #4 said the picture made her feel saddened, horrified, frightened and felt angry that a female character was being attacked and treated so badly. For her the image invoked feminist and protective feelings.
Person #5 (who knows the Batman universe fairly well) simply said "aww poor Batgirl".

Why does everybody pull this face when critiquing art?

No opinion is wrong and cover art, like all art, invoke different feelings in different people but in my personal opinion I don't think the cover should have been pulled because I think its great because it is so disturbing. This is a scary cover and the Joker is a scary guy, the cover works because it is so unnerving and frightening. I've read some people saying that this cover doesn't fit with current tone of the comic which I disagree with as in a recent arc of Batgirl involved The Joker kidnapping Batgirl's mother, cut off her ring finger, using that ring finger to propose to Batgirl while her mother sat weeping, tied to a chair with a nail bomb under it. I really don't think you can say that this cover is out of tone for the batman universe but admittedly below is a variant cover for Batgirl #39 but a fun, colourful cover doesn't change the content of the comic or Batgirl's violent past involving The Joker.

I think this is a great cover too

The cover has been pulled so it is gone now and won't be happening which is a shame but what is a real shame is the small minority that decided it was appropriate to threaten people for disagreeing with the cover and having a different opinion so on that note I will leave you with a quote from DC Comics official statement: "Threats of violence and harassment are wrong and have no place in comics or society."