Ugh… No thats not a spurt of zombie non-sense, its exactly what I said when I opened Volume 2 of The Walking Dead. At this point Adlard had taken over and his characters are ugly. I'll try to avoid criticizing his work to much because I touched on it in the last review, and it is passable, but now we move away from greyscale to stark black and white contrast.
This contrast does not lend itself well to an already bleak world. We are left with characters who are almost unrecognizable and indistinguishable at times. Angles are often very awkward and there are even a few times when peoples eyes (not zombies) seem to wander in two different directions. Not a fan of this Adlard guy, but as I said before, I am here for Kirkman's story.
So Volume 2 picks up at Shane's funeral. We see Lori lingering behind and she spits on his grave. She's miffed because she gave into Shane and they made whoopee outside Atlanta. Also a big shocker comes in the form of Lori admitting that she's pregnant. Dun dun duuuun. Now that's a Jerry Springer episode right there: Lori's husband was in a coma and she had sex with his best friend, now her husband is out of the coma and the other man is now a zombie. Who's the father?
So Rick is happy, but also secretly upset because he wants to trust his wife but he has a nagging feeling (read: everyone in the camp told him) that maybe Lori wasn't quite so chaste in his absence.
Since Shane is dead Rick is made the official leader of the group and he decides to go with his gut instinct and leave the unprotected zombie infested outskirts of Atlanta, and mild intelligence perseveres. On the road we meet Tyrese, who ends up being a pretty awesome character, and his daughter and her boyfriend, who end up taking Shane's place as pants on head stupid (though there are many of those throughout TWD).
We get some vague foreshadowing of something wicked between Tyrees' daughter and her boyfriend, and let me tell you, this plot point develops in to a mecca cum laude of full lobotomy stupid. I guess Kirkman was going for a Romeo and Juliet thing, but honestly it falls completely flat. Though it will serve as a very dramatic realization, but more on that in the next volume.
So our rag tag group of head hackers find a lovely gated community. Everyone shacks up in one house to be safe with plans to clean out the neighborhood tomorrow. I always loved the scene that morning where the characters are all chatting with their significant other, one comments that its warming up and that the ice is melting off the window. The next panel shows the gate to the Wilshire Estates as snow drops from a sign that was covered, it reads "All Dead DO NOT ENTER".
Rick sees the sign just in time to yell about not firing a gun, when Alan fires his gun. Alan's wife has been an incredibly unlikeable character up to this point and Kirkman tried to make her turn around in an attempt to make her death more dramatic. Fail. In one of the most hilariously awkward scenes in the series she walks in on Dale and Andrea having pre-marital relations (of which she very vocally disapproves) but in this case she just shut the door and for two panels has the same disturbing little smirk. Not to harsh on Adlard anymore but it looks terrible.
So she gets chomped on, Alan loses it and basically shuts down, despite having two kids to care for. They flee the Wilshire Estates and make their way down the road. Feeling the urge to eat they decide to go hunting, while out Carl gets shot. Now I know what you're thinking "Oh snaps! Zombies with guns!?" nope. Carl was shot but the slightly lovable moron Otis, who is living at a farm nearby with a kindly old man who can patch Ricks kid up straight away.
So Carl survives and Rick and the gang make nice with the farm folk. That is until the farm folk reveal their pants on head stupid secret. They're keeping the zombies alive in a barn. Yes, thats right. They won't kill them because they think they're just sick. Honestly, a zombie they catch has NO SIDE, his ribs and everything are out. I can buy a guy not wanting to kill his son, who looked good and whole… but complete strangers…
Well of course everything goes wrong and the zombie funk hits the fan when the farmers other two kids get killed by the zombies he was housing. Rick is a pretty vocal guy by this point and basically tells him its his fault. They are forced to leave in a very "I quit, you're fired" way. The last image of this book hovers on a prison that Rick and company stumble across. With a few zombies visible in the yard Rick declares this to be their new home.
Overall Volume 2 is good. There are a few zombie attacks that require the reader to suspend their disbelief but as I touched upon earlier, that is generally expected in any zombie book. Zombies are usually brushed off as only a threat in large numbers, and since every attack and death can't be perpetrated by a huge group, certain liberties must be taken. In most cases its just buying that a person is that slow, deaf, and dumb to get bitten by a zombie when their back is turned.
I remember closing Volume 2 the first time I read it and being very excited for what was to come. They were finally going to buckle down and do the intelligent thing. This prison stood to be home for them for a long time, a safe and secure place that they could clear out slowly over time, room by room. I was so happy that these characters were actually attempting to be smart.
So while this Volume had its share of stupid people, it ended on a good note. Of course, this is a long running series, so they can't stay at that prison forever right? Oh just wait and see what happens in the next major story arch… But that won't be here for at least 2 more volumes. So up next, Volume 3! How to be a good neighbor.
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