Comic Review: The Walking Dead #190

The Walking Dead #190

Image Comics

Writer: Robert Kirkman

Artist: Charlie Adlard

To say that all hell broke loose in the previous issue of The Walking Dead would be a serious understatement. A quick recap for those who forgot: a riot started after Laura and her team broke Mercer out of jail. Rick rushed to get Governor Milton and her idiot son to safety. He wasn’t going to let the Commonwealth descend into chaos – not on his watch. Just as he was taking them out, Carl, Jesus and the rest of the scouting crew arrived. Jesus and Aaron got tasked with helping the Miltons escape, while Carl and the rest of the gang accompanied him back to the city. There, Rick was confronted by Mercer who asked Rick to lead them. Meanwhile, Eugene and Stephanie had to escape a herd of Walkers that had amassed after Governor Milton recalled all the guards back to town.

#190 picks on all of these threads, and then some. Rick is unwilling to start a revolution and ignite a new war – he wants to protect the good things the Commonwealth. It has its problems, sure, but they have to resolve them slowly. But all of that will have to wait, as the same herd Eugene and Stephanie had to outrun has found their way to the Commonwealth. Also, Michonne gets to remind us why she’s the most badass character in the series.

This issue is… surprisingly good. It’s pretty great, actually. It covers a lot of ground, things that could have easily been dragged out over a couple of months, and Kirkman manages to do so in a way that doesn’t feel (overly) rushed. There was a lot of drama, a lot of action, and quite a few surprises thrown into the mix. All the slow build-up of the last 20 issues-or-so is finally bringing the Commonwealth storyline to its breaking point. Rick has been trying to keep everything in check, but he might have bitten off more than he can chew. The cliffhanger caught me (and poor Rick) really off guard. It’s gonna be really interesting to see just how it’ll play out next month. Kudos to the team, they just might surprise us with a really great saga after all.

Over the years, Adlard has been nothing if not consistent. He regularly provides decent, detailed artwork. There isn’t anything breathtaking about it, but his action scenes are good and he conveys emotion nicely. Rick’s face is probably the highlight of this issue. It’s really easy to see just how scared and worried about the future he is.

The issue is a serious return to form for the long-running series and it makes me extremely happy. While we’re long past the scares and surviving post-apocalypse stories of old, there is still much left to explore. There’s a feeling of a renewed energy in this issue which will hopefully stick around for a while. And hey, no one ever said surviving a post-post zombie apocalypse would be easy.