Zombie Invasion: The Walking Dead Goes From Comic Book To Television

Photo Courtesy of AMCTV.COM

BY JACK BRADY

In a typical zombie movie, the ragtag band of survivors find themselves trapped in some confined space, ready to make their final stand against the relentless zombie hordes. These moments and the ensuing battles are a staple of zombie films and are often the best parts of every one of them, yet in AMC’s upcoming television series, The Walking Dead, this is only the beginning.

Premiering on Halloween as part of the network’s horror-themed Fearfest, The Walking Dead is based on award-winning author Robert Kirkman’s long-running Image comics series of the same name and is being developed for AMC by Frank Darabont, director of the critically acclaimed film The Shawshank Redemption, as well as Gale Ann Hurd, producer of both The Terminator and Aliens.

The story follows the struggle of small town Sheriff Rick Grimes as he searches for his family along with other survivors through a zombie-infested America. What makes this series unique is that it focuses mainly on the characters and their effort to rebuild their lives after society, as they knew it, has completely collapsed. The Walking Dead basically asks the question, “the world has ended, what’s next?”

“The Walking Dead is that rare piece of material that plays on many levels,” Joel Stillerman, AMC’s Senior Vice President of Programming said on AMC’s website. “Kirkman’s series brilliantly captures the social commentary and ongoing human drama of the zombie apocalypse, and lets us kick a little zombie you-know-what from time to time.”

The series has received enthusiastic support from AMC, home to the critically acclaimed and Emmy award winning series Mad Men and Breaking Bad. The network has already green-lit season two of The Walking Dead before the first episode has even aired based on the quality of the material alone. Kirkman had previously received many film development offers but held out for a situation like the one AMC presented.

“I was not really looking for a feature film, because the core concept of the book is that it’s like a zombie movie that never ends.” Kirkman said in an interview with New York magazine. “So by design, turning it into a zombie movie that, you know, ends, would be kind of stupid.”

This is in keeping with the source material. The Walking Dead comic book, for which Kirkman recently won an Eisner award (the comic equivalent of an Oscar) for Best Writer, has run for 75 issues so far and has no ending planned according to Kirkman.

The hype surrounding the Walking Dead’s transition from the comic page to television has both long-time comic book fans and curious newcomers excited according to Tate Ottati, owner of Tate’s Comics in Lauderhill, who has stocked up on the graphic novel collections of the series in anticipation of increased interest after the show premieres.

“Everyone is excited about the TV show; someone talks to us about it every day,” Ottati said. “I think a lot of people are going to skip trick-or-treating on Halloween just to watch the premiere.”

With recent high profile successes like the video game Left 4 Dead, Max Brook’s novel World War Z, and now The Walking Dead, it seems that zombies have reached the pop-cultural zeitgeist status that vampires occupied a few years ago. This is a product of the uncertain time we live in, according to Mary Sheffield, lead singer of the local band Zombies! Organize!!, who use a zombie theme as a way to present their politically conscious message in an entertaining way.

“Zombies are, just by their nature, mutable. I think this is what allows them to move freely from genre to genre and from political outlook to political outlook,” Sheffield said. “You can use zombies to illustrate any type of message you’d like. They are such visceral representations of the grotesque that people just automatically react to them.”

The main message that Robert Kirkman wants to get across is that if you tune into AMC at 10pm on October 31st, you will be thoroughly entertained by The Walking Dead.

“I think people are going to be blown away,” Kirkman said on Comic Book Resources. “It’s not like anything you’ve ever seen on television.”