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The Walking Dead Compendium Volume 1 |  | Authors: Robert Kirkman, Charlie Adlard, Cliff Rathburn
Publisher: Image Comics
Category: Book
List Price: $59.99
Buy New: $37.79
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Seller: Amazon.com
Rating:  38 reviews
Sales Rank: 925
Media: Paperback
Pages: 1088
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 5.1
Dimensions (in): 10.1 x 6.7 x 1.8
ISBN: 1607060760
Dewey Decimal Number: 741
EAN: 9781607060765
ASIN: 1607060760
Publication Date: May 6, 2009
Shipping: Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 3 to 5 weeks
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Product Description
Introducing the first eight volumes of this fan-favorite series collected into one massive paperback collection! Collects The Walking Dead #1-48.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 38
 The Definitive Book of the Dead! May 11, 2009
Sky (New York)
54 out of 57 found this review helpful
Most of the folks here already know that The Walking Dead saga is a compilation of stories by Robert Kirkman that expand on the story that is well know to any zombie movie fan. The main story. The one started in earnest by George Romero in 1968 with Night of the Living Dead [and was later remade in 1990 (the version that I prefer) by Tom Savini (with Romero oversight)].
This Walking Dead "Compendium" is a compilation of Volumes 1 through 8 (or call it Books 1 through 4, or call it issues 1 through 48), and it continues the story of (former) Police Officer Rick Grimes and his band of normal-world-refugees across a world suddenly infected by a Walking Dead sickness..
The group finds a new home after a perilous Georgia countryside journey at the start of the story only to find out that zombies may be the least of their problem, and what is deemed a safe haven is only as safe the protection it offers against zombies. Yes...venturing out into The New World is dangerous. Outside the gates of the new home awaits unfathomable chaos and horror; hordes of the undead, along with other survivors in desperate situations that do the unthinkable to stay alive (or entertained).
As the story matures, it is much less about zombies and more about what happens to society, its morals, laws and standards when government is lost and the planet becomes mostly uninhabitable. There's real, heartfelt emotion in The Walking Dead series combined with believable scenarios.
I'm not a regular comic book reader, but I was drawn to The Walking Dead by the Book releases that bring the convenience of being able to get many chapters of the story without the month to month or volume to volume waiting. And I am now hooked. Now I subscribe to the issue releases.
Each chapter of The Walking Dead is like reading a screenplay with storyboards of a version of Night of the Living Dead that began simultaneously, but in a different part of the country. Sure...The Walking Dead is kind of a rip-off of a story (stories) already told, but the key is that it's done very very well. The zombies are true to the original Romero creation: slow and stupid as opposed to the Rage-infected people in 28 Weeks Later / 28 Days Later) or the fast zombies in the 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead.
So anyone in need of a very well done zombie fix that you don't put into your DVD player should absolutely get down with The Walking Dead sickness. Add this one to your cart if you're new to The Walking Dead...you won't be disappointed at its length because the story never gets tired.
absolutely amazing June 28, 2009
Benjamin A. Ford (Arizona)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is an amazing collection of all the issues released up to the 48th. It is a great way for new readers to get quickly caught up on an amazing story that I hope never ends. When I first got this book it was a day before amazon had put the book under review. I got my copy and was a little bit nervous. I thumbed through it a bit and read through the whole thing and there seemed to be no problem at all. Anyway, this collection is to die for, however, I feel that you do get the whole story when you read the collection but having to wait every month for the new issue really helps the story's time line from feeling so jumpy. But that is really nothing that the book could have helped. Get this book. If you like Zombies, if you like stories, if you like anything. This book is for you. wicked cheap too.
Undead in the Head book review March 6, 2010
Lyle Perez (Anza, CA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I really wanted to have "The Waking Dead" be my first review on my blog but I didn't want to write anything until I read trade #11. It was due out a few weeks after I started the blog so I had to postpone my review. I finally had a chance to make it to Sky High Comics (my local comic book shop) to pick up a copy. This is a comic book and it has been running since 2003. There are no plans on ending the series anytime soon so I'll be reviewing every trade hereafter.
The series starts off with a small town police officer Rick Grimes being under attack by a crazy guy with a gun. The man has really no relevance to the story but he does get a shot at Rick. A now hospitalized Rick wakes up to a world now over run by the undead. He has been in a coma for weeks and has no idea of the horrors around him. Making his way around the deserted hospital trying to understand the mayhem, he finds himself coming face to face with zombies. The only option he has is to flee back to his home to try to find his family and understand what's happening
When he makes it to his home he finds his wife, Lori and son Carl are no where to be found. As he wonders around outside he is caught off guard as a kid hits him over the head with a shovel. Rick is met by a father and his son taking refuge in a neighbor's home. The father begins to explain to Rick what has been going on. Unable to believe what his ears were hearing, he was sure his family has already died. The man gives Rick a glimpse of hope saying the government has told all survivors to make it to Atlanta where they will be taken care of.
Now the real story begins, Rick makes his way to his old police station and loads up on weapons. Saying thanks to his new friends Rick gets into his police squad car and heads for Atlanta. What happens to Rick? Does he find his family before they're turned into one of the undead? In order to find out you have to get your hands on all 11 trades.
Ok, to sum everything up in just a few words, this is the best zombie literature I have laid my eyes on. It is a wonderful well told story. It gives you the sense of what life would really be like after the dead rise. There is nothing bad I can stay about this comic. This may very well be the best zombie story out there. I enjoyed it with every turn of the page. It made me laugh, cry, stress and pretty much experience every emotion possible. It's so hard to say how much I enjoy this comic.
The illustrations are great. With the artist changing so did the characters. They did start to look somewhere different once Charlie Adlard took over. One great thing is that you can really see in the images how much these characters have changed over time. Not because the artist changed but just with all the stress the characters are under. This makes the comic more believable.
I don't want to spoil too much (don't read this paragraph if you don't want to) but I also don't want anyone to be caught off guard. This comic is a very, very tragic story. The things that happen to these people is very disturbing and it kind of makes you feel sorry for them. Even though they are fictional characters it still touches you, that's how much of a good comic this is. That being said, if you like horror and scenes of violence then you'll defiantly love this comic.
There is a television series in production about "The Walking Dead". As of now there isn't too much information on it. It is said that the series will begin this year 2010.
Overall "The Walking Dead" is a great piece of literature and I do recommend it to anyone looking for blood and gore. This is a well told story; pretty much everything about this comic is wonderful. I'll have to give "The Walking Dead" 5 Undead Heads out of 5.
The greatest possible tribute to George Romero. July 8, 2009
trashcanman (Hanford, CA United States)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This review is for the entire comic series up to issue 61. The Omnibus on this page collects the first 48 harrowing issues in one very affordable collection. It's very much worth it.
I don't know about you, but after I watch a Romero zombie flick, I always want to know what happened next. Where did they go after escaping the mall? Was the island really uninhabited? To find out what happens next as the ultimate ongoing cinematic zombie apocalypse shuffled on, we've always had to wait for the next film and a whole new set of characters. "The Walking Dead" takes everything that the master horror director did right with his unparalleled vision of a zombie invasion that reflects the true nature of mankind and have stretched it out into an ongoing comic book series that is showing no signs of slowing down after over 60 issues. And let me tell, you guys: this series is DARK. In fact, I don't believe I've ever read a darker story of this type, nor have I seen one on film. Trust me on this: this book is absolutely horrifying at times, and that fact has very little to do with the zombies who lurk in every corner of the landscape and march on an endless quest to devour the flesh of the increasingly few humans left alive. The zombies themselves are window dressing, a force of nature, a natural disaster, just part of the landscape of this brave new world. The real horror comes by our own hands as a reaction to the utter destruction of civilization as we know it.
The premise is ridiculously simple. Zombie apocalypse. That's all you need to know. The story simply meanders from there. Now, normally when I say that it's a bad thing, but in this case it is not because everywhere the characters meander, death, destruction, heartbreak, horror, action, sex, and brilliant character moments follow. Is there a point to it all? Depends on how you look at it. The series has no outstanding metaphors or political commentary of its own, it simply restates a lot of Romero's own observations in print. But if the point is just an engrossing, addicting, and intelligently-told survival horror tale that pulls absolutely no punches and always has something that will shock and disturb you coming up around the bend then that this is as good as it gets. The pages are in black-and-white which may turn a few people off, but those people would be robbing themselves of something amazing by passing this by based on that. Truth be told, the gore and violence of this comic might be to much for most readers to handle if it were in full glossy color. "Walking Dead" is perfect exactly as it is. At this point, I wouldn't even want color.
Okay, characters. Well, let's just say I wouldn't get attached to anybody if I were you. Nobody is safe in this comic and nobody is innocent, children included. Characters come, characters get brutally scarred, characters do terrible things to one another, characters die spectacularly disturbing deaths, more characters come, repeat as necessary. The sad part is, we really get to know these people. every issue has numerous character moments with endearing close-ups of the well-drawn facial features to capture the thoughts and emotions of these people even when no dialogue is present. You want the best for most of them. It ain't going to happen. What really stands out aside from the sheer bleak boldness of "Walking Dead" is the great writing. It's not even the dialogue or the twists and turns, it's the immense amount of thought that was put into this whole project. The comic is written so realistically that you will likely never experience one of those "nobody would do that, WTF?"
moments that plague lesser books and films. These people do absolutely everything they can to survive. A few commit suicide, but even that is understandable once it becomes accepted fact that there will be no rescue. These characters seem to live and breathe in this world and considering the circumstances, I don't think many real life folks would perform any better. And still they turn on each other like dogs and drop like flies. Did somebody say this was dark? And let me just say that when the inevitable zombie invasion hits my town, I'm looking forward to all the sex I'll be having. Man, those are some randy survivors!
Within the story so far I've seen the single most brutal torture sequence I've ever been subjected to in print or on film. And it was my favorite character doing the torturing. I've seen children, best friends, and brothers murder each other in cold blood, a man french kiss his zombified daughter after pulling out her teeth, and the single most disturbing and heart-rending illustration I've ever encountered. Dark? Yeah; little bit. This is just an amazing work of horror fiction. "Walking Dead" may lack the strong socially relevant metaphors and satire of Romero's works, but in every other way, it outdoes them. And you know coming from me that is the highest possible praise. It's expensive to invest in a lengthy series like this, and considering the lack of color, a lot of people may balk, but if you've got to beg, borrow, steal, or kill your spouse for life insurance money to get your hands on this compendium (an amazing deal, trust me) and/or the trade paperbacks as they are released, I say do it. Okay, don't kill anybody, but seriously: check this out. Personally, I've had to add yet another subscription to my monthly fortune in comics. Any zombie fanatic with a head on his shoulders will find nothing but sadistic brilliance in this series. I can only hope HBO or some other hardcore cable channel will turn this into a show. It'd be an undead dream come true.
The Zombie Genre is Merely a Means to an End Here November 23, 2009
GraphicNovelReporter.com (New York, NY)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Robert Kirkman hasn't exactly broken new ground in the zombie legends mythos with The Walking Dead, but then again, why would anyone need to? As any fan of zombie lore can tell you, you can't get too hung up on the hows and whys of them. What brought them about is rarely all that interesting. What you care about and want to see are still-living humans doing whatever they need to do to stay away from the undead...and then being horrified when the zombies still manage to attack.
And on that score, Kirkman has succeeded brilliantly. The Walking Dead is all about the living, the people who struggle to retain their humanity in the face of the unspeakable. So what does that mean? What good is being human when you're no longer the dominant species on the planet? And what's really left to hold on to? The Walking Dead is an examination of all those questions and more.
It's also a long, slowly unfolding story. There's no race to the finish here, no secret cure that promises an end to all the troubles quickly. That's well-evidenced by the sheer heft of this volume. At more than 1,000 pages, it collects the first 48 issues of the ongoing comic series. It gives the book a nice way to be read: over a long period of time, letting the horror of the entire situation truly sink in. This is humanity's last gasp, after all. Kirkman has ever been a sporadic pacer in his writing, sometimes racing through certain scenes and sometimes allowing subplots and side stories to linger long periods of time. (To wit: One fairly important human character in The Walking Dead is killed off relatively quickly in the series; one can imagine other writers would have kept this character around for a good long time, if only for the different storylines he could generate. That Kirkman doesn't yield to such temptations is encouraging and speaks to his overall sense of the larger story; it's promising that he doesn't need this character to stick around long after he's served his purpose.) Then again, because of that same pacing, the opportunity to read the series in long form, over 48 issues, is more appealing. Subtle nuances in characters and story that may have been missed in the serial format are more easily caught here.
Kirkman builds on previously established zombie tales (most notably George Romero's movies, of course), but neither an appreciation nor an understanding of those is truly needed here. The zombie genre is merely a means to an ends here, and as such, it's perfectly suited, because it gives Kirkman's true talents a venue in which to shine. And shine they do, even in the blood and sleaze.
-- John Hogan
Showing reviews 1-5 of 38
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