"Ask any random group of people if they think an apocalypse is coming our way, and the majority say yes." - Jonathan Maberry

James Lowder presents for your edification fifteen articles examining the pop culture phenomenon that is Robert Kirkman's The Walking Dead. You also get a Forward by renowned U.S horror writer Joe R. Lansdale and an Introduction by Lowder himself. The book pretty much covers about any aspect of Kirkman's creature that you might be interested in investigating, as well as placing things in the context of the development of horror comics and zombie cinema. For fans of The Walking Dead this book is pretty much a must have.

While obviously the zombie, or at least the Romero version of the zombie, is currently in high circulation there hasn't actually been that much of a breakthrough for the shambling creatures. While Vampires have gone Emo successfully via the Twilight movies and in the process have pretty much given up any chance of scaring the shite out of people, at least your demonic element can ride high on the hog through the sensationally frightening Paranormal Activity franchise. Even lycanthropes can point to the odd movie making a splash, and I guess along with their vampire cousins can sharpen their fangs over the Underworld series. However zombies really haven't had that much to boast about at the cinema. We may get dozens of zombie movies being made each year, but very few are attracting the punters who regularly hang at dark genre releases. Which I guess is what makes The Walking Dead such a strange event. Here we have a televised zombie show that is out rating Dexter, Supernatural, and surprisingly True Blood, in the current crop of dark genre small screen staples.

At last report something like a 120 Countries have shown The Walking Dead, with Darabont's visualisation of Kirkman's apocalypse winning it's time slot in most markets. Clearly whatever makes The Walking Dead click isn't confined to Audiences in North America. Unfortunately here in Australia our television networks are prone to playing down to the lowest common denominator via reality TV and the like, and are not prone to taking a risk. Even the SBS, who did broadcast the Brit zombie mini-series Dead Set, found the price tag attached to The Walking Dead too rich for their multi-cultural blood. Long suffering local fans can look forward to a March release of season one on DVD, sucks to be us right? Australia aside, I believe even the Kiwis are all over Darabont's series, The Walking Dead continues to knock them dead, pun intended, in the lounge rooms of a world-wide audience. James Lowder's book, besides putting things into context, seeks to address why a small screen zombie series seems to have captured the beating heart of popular culture.

For those who may have managed to stay wonderfully ignorant of Rick Grimes adventures in the Deadlands of America the Writers included in Triumph of the Walking Dead (TWD) have your back covered. They give a full synopsis of where it all begins, and then some very tantalising glimpses of where things have gone in season one of the television series and on the pages of the hundred or so comic books thus far released. Where TWD really ramps things up however is via explorations of what it all actually means in a real sense. Why Rick Grimes, his family, and his fellow survivors have caught the public imagination.

Kyle William Bishop gets things underway with Bringing Terror Back to Zombie Cinema, don't worry I'm not going to cover every essay in the collection, that puts TWD squarely in the high beams of George A. Romero's body of work. Bishop points out that Darabont has brought the terror back to the zombie outing due to the emphasis being on the living and not on the dead. As Romero was quick to point out, the zombies might be a clear and present danger but you have more to worry about from your fellow survivors than the shambling dead. Bishop points out that after a lot of undead water under the bridge following Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later Darabont finally brings the fear back to the zombie.

Putting the Walking Dead into the development of the modern American comic book, Arnold T. Blumberg in Four-Color Zombies takes the reader through a history of the art form from EC's early attacks on U.S sensibilities, through the U.S Government commission and the self-regulation of the Production companies, to the breakdown of enforced censorship and the rise of the walking dead in the printed comics of modern times. TWD is worth purchasing on the strength of Blumberg's article alone.

Craig Fischer presents an interesting analysis with Meaningless comparing The Birds, Shaun of the Dead, and The Walking Dead, in terms of cause and desire. Why did the birds attack in Hitchcock's flick, will the Winchester always play a big part in Shaun's relationships, and exactly how does this relate to Kirkman's exploration of the zombie apocalypse. I would have liked things to have been expanded to cover a few more movies and novels but lack of space I guess.

And finally in our highlights package of the essays David Hopkins with The Hero Wears the Hat views things from Rick Grimes' son Carl's point of view. The adolescent growing up in the post-apocalyptic wilderness who has to toughen up to survive. Hopkins reiterates a theme of TWD, who is the real hero of the comics and television show, Rick or his son?

There's any number of other articles written to both entertain and inform, but naturally there has to be some flies in the ointment in terms of people over analysing things. Heaven forbid a zombie outing should be just a zombie outing when there are words to be written stretching long bows and the like. Kenneth Hite spends considering time dissecting the character of Edwin Jenner in Postmodern Merlin, which is kind of surprising considering Jenner appears in exactly two of the television episodes and plays an equally small, though pivotal, role in the comics. Jenner represents the final curtain coming down on the world Rick Grimes has lived in, there are no answers, there are no magic bullets. Reading more into the character is akin to trying to count how many angels dance on the head of a pin, over indulgent and ultimately futile outside academia. Sometimes zombie stories are just that, stories, not windows into high literature where every word has meaning. Suck it up Hite, this is horrorland baby not Penguin Classic Literature. Similarly Kay Steiger looks into race and gender politics during her No Clean Slate essay in stating the bleeding obvious. Darabont makes his position on both absolutely clear, while backing up Kirkman's writing, the end of Civilisation means the end of feminism and love thy neighbour, it's a harsh new world, learn to roll with the punches or you are going to be next on the menu at the zombie smorgasbord. Themes of sexism, civilisation is gone, and racism, us and them, abound in post-apocalyptic literature and films. It's a given, gearing up yet another essay on the subject is meaningless and a waste of resources. For most readers there's probably one or two other contributors that will be flicked passed rather than read, groove to it as there's still plenty more meat on the bone to sink your teeth into.

Besides a couple of professional Writers, and they live by their word processor, the majority of the book reads like a University text, sometimes dry and hard to follow as ideas are stretched around the subject matter. While this may be disconcerting to some, my suggestion is to run with it; the dark genre needs serious study if only to shine a light where half backed articles like this one darken the room. Get angry with some views, disagree with others, but join the debate, The Walking Dead warrants study. While I clearly disagreed with a number of Writers expelling ideas in TWD, I would be amiss if I didn't also mention that I gained new insight into the franchise via the book. In simple terms, I learnt me some deep, and that goes a long way in my book of counted sorrows.

While TWD might appear daunting it's certainly a requirement for both fans of Kirkman's "never ending movie" and the serious student of horror. At its heart Triumph of the Walking Dead is likely to generated debate and speculation, in essence Editor James Lowder has achieved what he should have set out to do. Overall I enjoyed the book, disagreed with some content, but gained some new insights into The Walking Dead, it's also got me hankering to slip season one on again and order up some more of the comics. This one gets a full recommendation, if you don't know what the fuss over the show is about, or call yourself a fan of Kirkman's wilderness, then you need to wrap your paws around this book. TWD will repay in spades time spent between its covers.

Naturally you will be after a copy and the best place to discover your options for purchase is via the Official Smartpop Site. I checked the Amazon price with approval, $10.91 USD for the paperback edition. I did mention Smartpop is an imprint of Benbella right? Anyways if Smartpop have similar books on either Supernatural or True Blood we're hitting up the credit card toot sweet.