6. The Goon
The Goon is a series of comic books scripted and designed by Eric Powell and currently published by Dark Horse (after a stint at Avatar Press and self-publishing).
The series is distributed around the world via Delcourt editor so everybody can buy it and read it, i highly recommend so if you are a fan of zombies.
Story
The story takes place in an unnamed city located between the sea and a haunted forest, “Woods Horses Eaters.” It recounts the adventures of Goon and Franky, his best friend – and additional psychopath – in a city infested with zombies installing the gang led by a man with no name, the zombie priest whose lair is in the infamous Street Lonely Street.
Eric Powell’s The Goon was created in a comic universe delirious on a dark frame. The comic starts in his first volumes of a series of crazy stories punctuated with a dark sense of humor and scathing replicas of the various protagonists. The first volumes are being accompanied by false advertisements or humorous skits featuring the characters from the comics or not (Valentin Pechu …)
“ Crazy stories punctuated with a dark sense of humor ”
Eric Powell introduced progressively complex and dark story that intensifies from Volume 6, Chinatown.
The Goon includes many classic horror cinema ideas by bringing successively zombies, monsters, vampires, but also mad scientists and werewolves. However, the angle chosen is not horror but derision, such as the appearance of vampires or gothic vampires that glitter in the sunlight. The Goon is kind of a distant cousin of Hellboy – it has even visited him in Volume 3, Pile of Ruins.
The first appearance was in 1995, in a book called Best Cellars #1, but made the real debut in 1998 in Goon #1. The series is very fun to read, with jokes similar to deadpool’s and others, with a mixture of comical and horror or violent atmosphere that puts the main character against all sort of creatures, zombies, apes with an unnatural hunger for pies aliens and many more.
5. Victorian Undead
I assume everybody heard of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson right? The stories and detective tales, well take that and spice it up with some supernatural.
Victorian Undead is a comic series with Sharlock Holmes and Doctor Watson and main characters, following them while they deal with the supernatural. The first series was released in form of a book with 6 chapters or issues named Sherlock Holmes vs Zombies and it was published by Wildstorm with Ian Edginton as the writer and in charge of the art work was Davide Fabbri.
The name of the series comes from Victorian England, the era the series is set it, where Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson are caught in the middle of the zombie crysis. Giving the success of the first series, it was immediately followed by the special Sherlock Holmes vs Hyde and the second series named Sherlock Holmes vs Dracula.
First release
We are going to focus on the first release because it involves zombies. The action takes place in 1854 London, when a comet is visible in the sky and few fragments remain intact near Broad Street near Soho. Few months later Soho appears to be suffering from cholera and Doctor John Snow (not from game of thrones) and Reverent Henry Whitehead are in charge of investigating the outbreak.
The series hooked me when Doctor Snow was searching for the cause of the outbreak and Reverent Henry was discussing a recent confession about dead raising from their graves the eat the living. Minutes later the Reverent Whitehead visits Doctor Snow and one of his dead patients is revived as a zombie in front of their eyes.
Our heroes make their appearance couple of years later in 1898 while searching for a man who hypnotized people into revealing secrets. The man turns out to be some sort of mechanic man as they find out the hard way in a brawl and in this time 2 men working on the railroad find a corpse that comes to live and bites them. I do not want to spoil further so grad the series and have fun.
4. iZombie
Giving the huge success of zombie movies and books, it was inevitable that comic books will appear too, in 2010 writer Chris Roberson and Michael Allred decided to make their own zombie comic and the iZombie (not to be confused with the TV series) series was made and published by DC Comics. The story is more about 4 characters: Gwen Dylan as the protagonist, her friend, a ghost from the year 1960 and a were-terrier named Scott, with the action taking place in Eugene, Oregon.
I like that the writers used the old brain eating idea for the zombies, Gwen being one of them but she looks normal as long as she receives her monthly dose of brains, without eating brains she would lose her memories and intelligence, but working as a gravedigger gave her lots of opportunities to consume brains and by doing so she would get the deceased person’s memories and thoughts.
Creatures
The creatures in the series are of 2 kinds: oversoul and undersoul. The oversoul is in connection with the brain, thought, memories and personality. The undersoul is in connection with the hearth, fears, emotions, appetite. There are exceptions too, creatures with both undersoul and oversoul called Revennants, Gwen being one of them which have the ability to infect others with their soul hence possessed and werewolves.
What attracts most readers is the use of real area location in Eugene, where you can see famous areas, buildings and zone like the University of Oregoncampus, the McDonald Theater, the Shelton McMurphey Johnson House, Eugene City Hall, and Ya-Po-Ah Terrace, Portland’s Oregon Zoo and Oregon Convention Center and the most seen location “Dixie’s Firehouse” by the real name “Fins” and resides in Springfield, Oregon.