The Walking Dead

If you've been keeping up with The Walking Dead up until the point where this fifth collected hardcover edition picks up, then you've probably been wondering just what Robert Kirkman has up his sleeve now. In the wake of the massacre at their prison-based safe haven, Rick and his young son Carl continue their trek through the zombie-populated world, only to have Rick fall ill and Carl fend for himself for a time. After that, we are introduced to some new faces, re-introduced to some old ones, reunions are had, and that sense of dread that hangs over every panel and page continues to permeate more and more the longer the series goes on for. If there's any indication from the events that take place in the two storyarcs collected here, "Here We Remain" and "What We Become", it only re-affirms the fact that the worst thing to come out of the zombie apocalypse is not that the dead are returning to life and feasting on the living, but the mental effect that it is having on the survivors and denziens of this new wasteland, which has been Kirkman's intention since the beginning. Charlie Adlard continues to deliver the goods in terms of his pencil work, while Cliff Rathburn's underrated work on the gray tones of Adlard's pencils and inks adds subtle degrees of equal parts emotion and horror that has helped make The Walking Dead so good for so long now. All in all, if you've missed out on the series since its inception, it is way past time to check out The Walking Dead, and this fifth collected hardcover is proof positive of that.