Comic Info
Comic Name: Marvel Zombies
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Writer: Robert Kirkman
Artist: Sean Phillips
# of Issues: 5
Release Date: 2008
Marvel Zombies #3
Reprints Marvel Zombies #1-5 (February 2006-June 2006). The zombies are running out of food and are growing hungry. Sealed off from the other dimensions, they will have to find a new source of food, and the arrival of the Silver Surfer as the herald of Galactus could provide the means to escape Earth. Meanwhile, a small group of survivors are trying to save the Earth and rebuild the human population…but the zombies hunger for flesh!
Written by Robert Kirkman, Marvel Zombies is a Marvel Comics limited series. The collection features art by Sean Phillips, and issues in this collection were also collected as part of Marvel Zombies: The Complete Collection and Battleworld: Marvel Zombies.
The zombies first appeared in Ultimate Fantastic Four #21 (September 2005) in a storyline called Crossover by Mark Millar. The characters instantly found fans and with the rise of popularity of The Walking Dead, a Marvel Zombies comic seemed like a no brainer (ironically). Marvel brought in The Walking Dead writer Kirkman for this entry, and it found legs and ran.
Marvel Zombies #5
Though personally I was kind of over zombies by the time this was released, the comic did work. While Kirkman’s The Walking Dead is a dark and grim approach to the zombie tale, Kirkman here takes a more humorous approach to a zombie story (kind of like his series Invincible). The zombies bicker like little children while eating humans and dealing with the maladies of being a zombie. The comic has Spider-Man overdramatically moaning and angst about his actions, and he and the other zombies are pretty much the amplified versions of what made them heroes.
I’m not a real big fan of Sean Phillips art for this collection. The covers of the book by Arthur Suydam are fun with zombiefied versions of some of Marvel’s classic covers, but the interior art is over-inked and sometimes hard to follow. I realize that the comic is “dark” but it is overdone.
The comic launched a new franchise at Marvel. This series was followed by multiple series and a crossover series with Army of Darkness at Dynamite Entertainment. The original series probably has the most standing power though it is rather opened ended. It feels like the continuous consumption and cannibalization of the Marvel characters would hit a brick wall, but the series endure. The zombies keep coming back, and I don’t know that the zombies will ever die. Marvel Zombies was followed by Marvel Zombies vs. The Army of Darkness.
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