The Other Dead by Kevin Eastman, Joshua Ortega, Digger T. Mesch and Qing Ping Mui

This is Book 18 started, book 16 finished

The Other Dead by Kevin Eastman, Joshua Ortega, Digger T. Mesch and Qing Ping Mui

Published by IDW Publishing, April 2014

NOTE: This book was provided by the publisher, through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.

This is a graphic novel combining the first 4 comics in a new zombie series, The Other Dead.  In this series, the twist is that animals, not humans, become the zombies, turn into crazed killers and attack all humans.  

This is another series riding the wave of zombie popularity.  To my mind, this one misses the mark.  It’s just not well done; it’s trying too hard. 

First, the characters in the book are mostly unlikable and uninteresting.  I found myself not really caring about any of them.  There is little character development - they are mostly there as place holders - and the dialogue is trite.  There is a President Obama character who just decides to head down to Louisiana in front of a hurricane with a couple Secret Service Agents and one advisor to personally check out these reports of zombies.

The idea of zombified animals has been done before in other universes and done better.  This virus affects all animals and turns them into angry killers who hunt for humans in groups.  Even animals who normally do not travel in herds become pack killers and animals that are otherwise non-aggressive become skilled hunters.  Humans are apparently immune to the virus that affects animals ranging from manatees to squirrels.   Even when one man bites a zombie squirrel to kill it, that isn't enough to pass on the virus to humans.

I enjoy a good zombie tale, but unfortunately, this isn't one of them. 

2 Stars.