ZVRC: Zombies Vs. Robots Classic #4 - Image Comics

ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC No. 4, June 2022

Providing its readers with a story taken “from the only Zombies Verses Robots Annual”, as well as the ten-part “Tales Of ZvR”, this super-sized reprint certainly contains plenty of content for those fans new to Chris Ryall and Ashley Woods’ vision of a post-apocalyptic world where large, heavily-armed automatons wage an eternal war against large hordes of the walking undead. Indeed, despite its relative brevity “Winter” tells such a disconcerting tale about a team of subsisting scientists cold-heartedly sacrificing their less-intellectual brethren to a mass of flesh-hungry cadavers in a supposed effort to save Humanity from the plague, that it is probably worth this publication’s cover price alone.

Furthermore, the narrative is told in such a clever way that it initially appears that the semi-malfunctioning machines who locate the underground laboratory are going to be the villains of piece rather than its inhabitants; especially when the ‘idiotic’ androids completely blow up the bunker’s reinforced steel entranceway rather than permit the coverall-wearing survivors the time needed to open it manually. Such a subversion of expectations genuinely adds to the horror of the situation as its slowly revealed to the gun-toting machines that the researchers are murderously feeding people ‘without doctorates’ to their ghoulish experiments, and any sympathy generated for the frustrated professors in having to negotiate with their paranoid programmed rescuers quickly evaporates.

Disappointingly however, unlike this limited series’ previous three instalments which contained an enjoyable combination of both fresh material and stories that haven’t seen the light of day in a decade, this periodical perturbingly feels simply like the “Eisner Award-nominated duo” just haphazardly grabbed some of their newer stuff and sixteen of the Australian artist’s splash-page illustrations in a desperate effort to pad out a fourth book. So seemingly desperate a sales ploy will be genuinely frustrating to those bibliophiles who already own the pair’s “ZvR” title from 2015, particularly as the selected tale about a boy aimlessly wandering around his featureless local landscape with his pet droid is probably the least interesting of the storylines seen within that series; “No c’mon, boy, time to go be brave adventurers! I bet we won’t run into any trouble at all…”

The regular cover art to "ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC" #4 by Ashley Wood

ZVRC: Zombies Vs. Robots Classic #3 - Image Comics

ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC No. 3, May 2022

Somewhat moving away from this mini-series’ purely science fiction-based narrative where the modern-day world has been ravaged by a post-apocalyptic battle for survival between gun-toting automatons and hordes of the hungry Undead, for a much more science fantasy storyline, “Group Sects” certainly seems to contain far more bodily mutilation and flesh-devouring shenanigans than the reprint’s previous two instalments. But whilst this particular “sixty-six-page saga” catapults its audience into the semi-mythical world of Ancient Greece and a race of scantily clad Amazons that have somehow managed to survive being “decimated by nukes”, it still contains Chris Ryall’s usual enthralling combination of edge-of-the-seat dramatics and silly, laugh-out-loud moments.

Foremost of these fascinations is the speed with which the “Grecian Isle filled with warrior women” fatally falls to the zombies following Princess Dhysa’s innocent opening of the community’s protective barrier during a misguided demonstration of adolescent angst. One moment the reader is arguably as shocked as the seventeen-year-old is at her discovery as to what Queen Leolyta’s mysterious ritual actually is, and then in the next, most of the unsuspecting and unarmed Amazons are being eaten alive by a veritable swarm of walking cadavers: “No… My Queen… The seal to the catacombs below, it’s been broken wide.”

Equally as nerve-wracking as this shameful slaughter is the sudden appearance of the sole robot responsible for peppering the planet’s surface with atomic missiles, and his subsequent battle with an Undead minotaur. This pulse-pounding clash genuinely helps ‘break-up’ the potentially overwhelming amount of graphically depicted killings occurring inside the ‘Royal Palace’ with some genuinely amusing moments; most notably when the self-serving, bullet-shaped android realises that the savage creature is perfectly capable of head-butting him into electronic pieces if he doesn’t get some much-needed help from the children he’s been trying to protect.

Helping to present the sheer chaos contained within Ryall’s violent tale of destruction is Ashley Wood’s scratchily sketched layouts, which really help sell the grotesque nature of the human-chomping carry-ons taking place throughout this book. In addition, the “award-winning illustrator” adds a layer of sensuality and bare-faced nudity to its proceedings which ties-in with the stereotypical mythology of the female combatants. But may well disconcert those bibliophiles who don’t enjoy too much blatant sexual activity in their comics.

The regular cover art to "ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC" #3 by Ashley Wood

ZVRC: Zombies Vs. Robots Classic #2 - Image Comics

ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC No. 2, April 2022

For those readers encountering this particular “re-presentation of the oft-forgotten Zombies Vs. Robots series by Chris Ryall and Ashley Wood” for the first time, the creative duo’s adventure “Inherit The Earth!” will certainly provide them with a bit of a head-scratching storyline. In fact, this publication’s forty-one page long plot arguably leaps all over the place with robots sacrificing themselves so another automaton can start-up a television broadcasting company, the Undead’s infection supposedly being able to contaminate androids, and a doomsday droid deciding the only way to save the planet is to nuke its surface asunder with a plethora of atomic devices.

Happily however, whilst the logic behind many of these threads debatably don’t withstand too much scrutiny, they do help depict a horrifying post-apocalyptic world utterly devoid of both common sense and sound-decision making. Such stupefying chaos really does help ‘sell’ the dysfunctional nature of the robots’ desperate last hope to save our civilization from its flesh-eating threat, and also provides some genuinely intriguing notions as to just how mankind could endure so cataclysmic a conundrum through the multiple cloning of a single, surviving baby girl, with any semblance of sanity remaining; “The human child’s brain patterns can be used to preserve its consciousness in a robot form, and stabilize our circxxxuits at the same time.”

Perhaps this book’s most beguiling concept though sits with its notion that a single “drop of infected zombie blood” inadvertently falling upon a Guardbot’s sole, eye-like sensor, would be enough to instantly turn any machines connected to its artificial group consciousness into brain-chomping bezerkers. This idea is truly terrifying, especially when the disease-ridden mechanisms quickly become the only line of defence between the helpless infant and a fast-moving wall of Walking Dead - all of whom want to feast upon the final living morsel our world can apparently offer.

Undeniably providing the shambolic robots’ great plan with an even stronger sense of desperation are Ashley Wood’s incredible-looking layouts. The oft-times scratchy, rather undisciplined nature of the Australian concept designer’s artwork genuinely imbues this comic’s storytelling with an all-pervading sense of unapologetic bedlam, and also helps sell the sheer desolation on show across the entire Earth once the nukes fatally begin to fall in an almost homicidal effort to protect any remaining people from the innumerable zombie horde.

The regular cover art to "ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC" #2 by Ashley Wood

ZVRC: Zombies Vs. Robots Classic #1 - Image Comics

ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC No. 1, March 2022

Excitedly advertised as being “back in print for the first time in over a decade”, this over-sized compilation/anthology comic book certainly provides its audience with an intriguing origin story as to just how the Earth will become a post-apocalyptic battlefield of zombie-killing automatons. Indeed, Chris Ryall’s cleverly penned ‘chicken and the egg’ conundrum is well worth repeated readings, as a trio of massively egotistical scientists stupidly decide to venture through a top secret, self-built portal into mankind’s future, and subsequently set into the motion the very fate which they were supposedly investigating in the first place; “You there! What happened to this building? To our society? When am I, anyway?”

Surprisingly though, it probably isn’t Fritz Winterbottom’s short-lived exploration of a cadaver-infested building, littered with the discarded debris of its former occupants, which is the most enthralling aspect of this previously-published three-parter. But rather the excellently penned banter (or rather continuous criticism) which persistently takes place between the utterly unscrupulous inventors, and the rather blasé way they all approach blindly crossing over into a truly deadly domain wearing nothing more than a cumbersome space-suit.

Furthermore, the American author weaves a pretty engaging “all-new” secondary story with “Circuits Of Death”, which pays a somewhat fleeting visit to Weird War One, where the combatants fly bi-planes co-crewed with capsule-shaped robots. This particular four-page parable initially seems to be a tale of a dying pilot who, having fatally crash-landed, finally understands the destructive futility of the conflict surrounding him and resultantly yearns for his mechanical comrade to become a pacifist. However, Ryall ultimately provides this tale with a rather tongue-in-cheek twisted ending, when it is revealed that the automaton has actually injected his ‘fleshy’ master with a hallucinogenic serum to ease the mortally-wounded man’s suffering.

Adding plenty of visual quirkiness and occasional grisly violence to this comic’s proceedings are the somewhat scratchy-looking layouts of Ashley Wood. The “award-winning” illustrator’s style has arguably altered during the ten years separating this book’s two adventures, yet still does a solid job in depicting either Winterbottom’s billion-dollar iron suit with some all-too vulnerable glass eyeholes, and a revenge-seeking robotic navigator who fully intends to “now go kill every motherf**ker I see!”

The regular cover art to "ZVRC: ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS CLASSIC" #1 by Ashley Wood

Zombies Vs. Robots #7 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 7, July 2015

Co-creator Chris Ryall has clearly imbued Issue Seven of “Zombies Verses Robots” with a very different vibe as to what has previously been printed before. For instead of consisting of a rather mixed ‘hit but mainly miss’ anthology of short unrelated stories, the Chief Creative Officer has instead dedicated almost the entirety of this book’s twenty-two pages to “The Man On The Moon”; an “incredible science fiction” story which may well “astound you!”

Set upon the very cusp of the undead apocalypse in America, during “the early days of the Zombie/Robot War”, the Californian writer’s engaging and somewhat sentimental tale concentrates on the survival of a father and daughter housed within a “deserted and converted” missile silo sealed deep beneath “rural Kansas”. Alone, except for the company of a couple of Warbots, tiny Ava’s “Daddy” quickly succumbs to paranoia and madness, and orders his automatons to murder “the next-door neighbours”, inadvertently causing his underground shelter to be “breached by zombies”.

Unfortunately, having mesmerisingly brought the story to the point where the little girl is fatally bitten, Ryall’s creativeness arguably takes a turn towards the absurd as the distraught parent not only injects himself with “Ava’s zombie blood” but has the limb immediately clamped within a bionic device in order to “prevent the virus from spreading past your arm.” Worse the man also illogically allows his robot doctor to enclose half his head within a metallic mask which bears a striking resemblance to a medieval torture decide; “It will hurt a great deal… But not as much as this mask will.”  

Paul Davidson’s illustration work is detailed and dynamic, and really helps convey the passage of time by slowly portraying a progressively dishevelled adult and increasingly tall Ava whilst the story develops. Disappointingly though, the comic’s editor jarringly interrupts the flow of the “Judge Dredd” penciller’s panels by including three double-splashes drawn by very different, and arguably less impressive, artists.

James McDonald’s Chibi-looking montage of the weaponry of zombies and robots is attractive enough, and highly suitable considering it’s meant to represent the thoughts of a child as her father talks about what is happening on the planet’s surface. Valentin Ramon’s battle scene showing that “the zombies truly had spread to every continent on Earth, in mass numbers” is also competent enough, if not exceptionally gruesome and gory. But James Kochalka’s atrocious sketch of a warbot punching ghouls besides a river bank whilst highly stylised, is reminiscent of Matt Groenig’s early work on the 1989 American animated sitcom “The Simpsons” and really breaks the atmosphere of what had been, up until its appearance, a thoroughly compelling journey through the opening months of the planet-wide catastrophe.

Just as disheartening is the seemingly pointless inclusion of “Tales Of ZVR” by Ashley Wood at the very back of this comic book. The Australian illustrator’s ‘two-page short’, unenthusiastically coloured in a variety of muted greys, pales in comparison with Davidson’s colourful artwork, especially as it proves impossibly hard to distinguish what is actually taking place within a couple of the Spectrum Award-winner’s pictures. In addition absolutely nothing of any consequence occurs within “A Howl Of Wind!” except for the decision being made by the young boy’s female companion for them to visit “Wilma, the zombie-stomper!”

The regular cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 7 by Mark Torres

Zombies Vs. Robots #6 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 6, June 2015

If any casual purveyor of comic books were to simply read this magazine’s back page blurb and buy Issue Six of “Zombies Verses Robots” blind, then they would undoubtedly be mightily disappointed. For whilst “IDW Publishing” promises “rotting zombies, invaders from the Moon” and “an all-out robot brawl of explosive proportions”, in reality this anthology offers little in the way of exciting entertainment except perhaps the very sad demise of Bot-Bot.

Admittedly “Inherit The Earth” starts out well enough, with co-creator Chris Ryall hurling his “surviving astronauts” up against a seemingly unending horde of brain-hungry ghouls “on an island that used to house Amazons”. In fact until the unexplained arrival of the automaton Virus and dramatic demise of Zeb, the eleven-pager provides plenty of frantic fast-paced action and laughs a plenty; especially when the cosmonauts use the reeking head of a zombified Minotaur to impale several of the rancid undead. But sadly the writing soon takes a turn for the worse as the “lightning-bot” somehow manages to instantly electrocute all the living corpses emanating from “the Mermen’s undersea base”, before being itself impotently “absorbed and dispersed” by Winterbottom the Warbot.

Perhaps as equally uninspired by the script as the title’s declining readership, Anthony Diecidue’s artwork dramatically varies from the humorously fun and detailed, to the childlike and inept. For one moment his highly stylised cartoon-like pencilling poignantly portrays the burial of Cesar and Zeb, and in the next purportedly presents an all-action firefight using stick men and vague inanimate shapes…

Equally as disappointing is Ashley Wood’s “Tales Of ZVR”. This double splash-page short story is as confusingly drawn by the Australian illustrator as it is badly-written and depicts the ever-questing boy with the small ‘bot encountering a rather overbearing foul-mouthed young woman. The Spectrum Award-winning art director is 'clearly' a 'talented' painter. But discouragingly none of that artistic ability is especially evident with this ‘minisode’.

Arguably the most dissatisfying experience of this comic however, has to be Steve Nile’s lack-lustre concluding instalment of “The Orphan”; a ten-page ‘swansong’ which whilst well-drawn by Val Mayerik, appears to be devoid of much of the charm and emotion which made some of its previous chapters such engaging reads. Indeed the entire plot to this ‘tearful tale’ is rather confusing, as Bot-Bot once again bizarrely faces the robot he’s previously destroyed on a couple of occasions.

Strangely it isn’t entirely clear how his foe has managed to reconstruct himself, nor why the murderous machine would send a multi-wheeled spy-bot to simply observe Rosemary and not just kill her. Bot-Bot’s decision to activate his own “self-destruct” in order to save his ‘human ward’ is also an odd resolution considering the resulting explosion resembles that of a nuclear bomb and the lonely girl was nearby when it took place. But there again in Nile’s post-apocalyptic future fruit trees can mature from seed within a year, so maybe children can withstand nuclear fall-out..?

The variant cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 6 by Mark Torres

Zombies Vs. Robots #5 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 5, May 2015

There is an awful lot going on inside “Issue Five” of “Zombies Verses Robots”, and whilst the majority of this anthology’s storylines are engaging zed-killing fun, the plot to Chris Ryall’s lead feature “Inherit The Earth” is arguably by far one of the most fantastical post-apocalyptic adventures ever imagined with homicidal human personas inhabiting robotic killing machines and astronauts being assaulted by Mermen deep under water. Throw in a long abandoned Grecian island once inhabited by Amazons, a zombie Minotaur and the living corpse of a naked female with a penchant for ‘popping’ men’s eyeballs with her teeth, and it’s reasonably clear that the innovative Californian writer is probably taking his role as Chief Creative Officer for “IDW Publishing” a little too far.

Such a ludicrously insane narrative however, does still contain some outrageously entertaining moments, and despite being utterly absurd, the ten-page tale is undoubtedly a fun read… Especially when the bombastic King Neptune is eaten alive by his own giant killer squid, following the multi-limbed sea-beast’s displeasure at having a zombie chomp into one of its tentacles. The American Editor-In-Chief also provides a most welcome return to this comic book title's basic premise, by having Warbot 7-G gun down a horde of hungry zombies within the story’s final few panels.

Disappointingly Anthony Diecidue’s pencilling fails to be as appealing as his illustrations are grisly and gory. Indeed the Los Angeles-based artist’s scratchy style is dishearteningly indistinct and makes it confusingly unclear as to whether the dead astronaut Cesar has bitten the Merman’s pet monster or one of the other of the ghouls depicted populating the sea-people’s aquarium.

A far simpler more straightforward plot is that of “Tales Of ZVR”. Having been saved from a group of ravenous walking cadavers by a half-dormant war robot, Ashley Wood’s unnamed boy makes his way to “The Dark Docklands” and there encounters a mysterious female and her “floating deathbot ball.” The Australian’s distinctive sketches are as depressingly bleak as they are abrasive-looking. But Minzy’s hut, precariously perched upon the back of a prone giant robot is wonderfully drawn.

Concluding this issue with a suitably grim and bloody zed-killing fun-fest is Steve Niles’ “The Orphan”. Whilst lacking the naïve charm of Wood’s aforementioned two-pager, Rosemary’s attachment to Bot-Bot nonetheless provides an endearing element to an initially somewhat tepid tale of searching for fruit tree seeds in the wasteland. Fortunately the walking dead soon turn up, albeit these mind-controlled zombies are more akin to Terry Nation’s Robomen than George A. Romero's flesh hungry corpses. But for a few pages at least artist Val Mayerik’s wonderfully dynamic panels portray the fiends being either torn apart with gunfire, battered by the large robot’s fists or extravagantly blown to pieces by a mini-rocket.

The regular cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 5 by Ashley Wood

Zombies Vs. Robots #4 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 4, April 2015

Anyone reading the “Mail-Bots” letters page at the rear of Issue Four of “Zombies Verses Robots” would undoubtedly believe that “IDW Publishing” Chief Creative Officer Chris Ryall has something of a success on his hands with this particular comic book series. For the column simply gushes with “well-received” enthusiastic quotes from numerous magazine review websites, all of which declare that the “compelling” and “thoroughly entertaining” title is “absolutely worth picking up.” However despite the American writer’s confident declaration that the Eisner Award-nominated series will run for as least seven editions, the sales figures, at least according to Diamond Comic Distributors, tell a different story and actually show a significant decline in copies being bought; dropping from 8,725 units down to a paltry 5,308 issues.

A possible explanation for this waning readership must surely be the fact that the twenty-four page anthology’s lead story “Inherit The Earth” is rapidly moving away from the initial pitch of depicting machine gun toting robots wrestling for control of the planet against a potentially endless horde of flesh-eating zombies. Indeed this book’s fourth instalment appears to offer nothing more than a token offering of ghouls hungry for brains, before Ryall’s narrative veers wildly off-course by introducing a moon-based automaton, who can transform itself into an electrical virus and a gigantic-sized sadistic King Neptune, who traps the last remaining human astronauts in an air-bubble on the sea bed just so he ‘soften them up as a delicacy’ for his pet sharks.

Admittedly such concepts do send “a breath of fresh air into the idea of zombies.” But the inclusion of such fantastical elements as “the Greek god” are a far cry from the ‘promised premise’ of a post-apocalyptic world inhabited by the living dead and murderous machines. 

Equally as disappointing, though more as a result of its seemingly half-finished artwork than its departure from its original narrative, is “Tales of “ZVR” by Ashley Wood. The award-winning illustrator’s double-splash story “After The Hands Appeared” is disheartening dire, and simply consists of a large drawing of a war robot gunning down a couple of zeds. The oversized picture isn’t even fully coloured with a good third of the Australian’s ‘pencilling’ simply consisting of rough-looking black ink scratchings.

Finally this supposed gestalt of gore concludes with Steve Niles’ “The Orphan”, ordinarily a well-drawn and competently crafted ten-pager. On this occasion however, despite some highly detailed panels drawn by Val Mayerik, little in the way of action actually takes place within the episode, once Bot-Bot has overcome a rival robot following a rather underwhelming fist-fight. Instead most of the plot revolves around young Rosemary simply building a new home and upgrading her robot with spare parts. Whilst none of the “roving zombies” the pair are supposed to “narrowly escape” in the comic's enticing blurb actually materialise on the printed page.

The regular cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 4 by Ashley Wood

Zombies Vs. Robots #3 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 3, March 2015

Naturally any reader of a comic book whose basic premise rests solely upon a post-apocalyptic world where walking corpses wrestle for control of the planet against robots, has already surrendered their judgement concerning the implausibility of the narrative. But unfortunately Chris Ryall’s writing for this title’s instalment of the “Inherit The Earth” story-arc stretches even that fantastic willing suspension of disbelief and contributes little to the “splice of horror/sci-fi excitement” “IDW Publishing” have been aiming for with “Zombies Verses Robots”.

Indeed the co-creator of the Eisner Award-nominated series really seems to have allowed himself to stray far too much into the mythical world of fantasy as his “space-faring humans” return to the Earth to find their immediate threat isn’t the zombies or robots, but Mermen and a multi-tentacled giant octopus which wouldn’t look out of place in a Doug McClure motion picture from the Seventies. Bearing in mind it has only been a year since the surface was ravaged by nuclear bombs, the presence of these fish-people somewhat jars with the planet’s semi-possible future.

In addition Ryall completely ruins the mystery surrounding the seemingly sentient gun-toting warbot 7-G by explaining that rather than being a glitch in the artificial being’s programming, the machine’s personality is due to the fact that it actually houses the ‘soul’ of Fritz Winterbottom. A situation the dying scientist was able to manufacture by turning his ‘essence’ into a wireless signal and transferring himself through a dimensional gate and into one of Throckmorton’s robots!?!

Anthony Diecidue’s simplistic illustration work is also rather disappointing, though the Los Angeles based artist’s more detailed depictions of the Mermen and their multi-limbed monstrosity are rather well drawn.

Fortunately this title is an anthology, and despite only being two-pages in length, Ashley Wood’s charmingly simple tale “Of Metal And Bones” is full of both sentimentality and foreboding in equal measure. Continuing the adventures of a small child and his mini-bot out naively looking for his long-lost mother, things appear to be about to take a turn for the worse as they decide to spend a night sleeping on top of a warbot whilst a zombie stirs nearby. The Australian’s artwork is as stylised and instantly recognisable as ever but genuinely seems to provide the double-splash story with an air of innocence.

“The Orphan” by Steve Niles continues to be this comic’s most satisfying read. Although some of the American author’s logic would appear to be off-key with this third instalment. Having provided the reader with an enjoyable series of panels depicting Bot-Bot enthusiastically clubbing and gunning down a horde of hungry zombies, the pace of the plot settles back down to the duo carefully picking their way through the derelict though dangerous landscape.

But before doing so Rosemary’s robot apologises to her for previously ‘slaying’ her zombified parents. Bearing in mind the hysterical reaction the young girl gave when this very recent event first took place, her causal “It’s okay. They were kind of gross” response is an annoying understatement of the child's previous extreme emotion.

Val Mayerik’s drawing style appears particularly suited to the gruesome scenes within which the undead are gorily dispatched; predominantly as a result of some grisly head mutilation. But there is little wrong with the commercial artist’s detailed pencils even when illustrating the less action-orientated panels, and he somehow manages to impart Bot-Bot with a personality which isn’t necessarily present in the actual writing.

The regular cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 3 by Ashley Wood

Zombies Vs. Robots #2 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 2, February 2015

When a ‘new’ title’s first issue only sells approximately half as many copies as the publisher’s ongoing “My Little Pony Friends Forever” periodical then comic book commentators may well believe “Zombies Vs. Robots” isn’t all that enthralling a purchase. But what this anthology of separate short stories does do is phenomenally improve as the page count goes by and almost by accident the reader encounters the exploits of Rosemary and Bot-Bot in “The Orphan”; ten-pages of compelling survival in an unfriendly world of the walking dead, written by Steve Niles and competently pencilled by Val Mayerik. 

Unfortunately in order to reach this ‘diamond in the rough’ the rather uninspiring, and certainly gaudy-looking “Inherit The Earth” has to be navigated first. A story which in many ways raises far more questions about the world’s fate following the dubious deployment of planet-wide nuclear bombs, than it answers. To begin with it is not at all clear how humans survived the apocalypse housed within the international space-station, and it certainly appears odd that the command pilot tasked with its well-being should set the orbiting habitat’s self-destruct as soon as his cryogenic sleep is interrupted? Perhaps he has gone cryo-thaw mad or possibly it is just a lazy excuse by Chris Ryall to create some ‘phony’ tension and force the crew to evacuate the safety of the computer-controlled environment for the potentially toxic atmosphere of the Earth.

To make matters worse, which apparently is possible, the artwork by Anthony Diecidue is entirely awful, especially when the cartoonist starts to illustrate the zombies being massacred at the Kirtland base. Stick-like figures which have been seemingly hastily drawn alongside a couple of ‘cross-shaped’ pencil scratchings is hardly splash-page stuff.

Far more pleasing, though just as ‘tough on the eyes’ is writer/artist Ashley Wood’s “Tales Of ZVR”, in which a small child, with his ‘pet meep robot’ leave their homestead to go in search of the boy’s Ma. At just two pages in length the story is simple, short and straight to the point. But strangely engaging especially as it ends with the infant venturing into the “spooky forest” whilst telling his questioning droid “I bet we don’t run into any trouble…” 

Finally “The Orphan” is a far more traditionally scripted and drawn zombie story, and one in which it’s clear just how mentally ‘disturbed’ Rosemary is. For having gleefully brought Bot-Bot to her parent’s home, the robot discovers they’re not only dead but are zombies chained by their necks to one of the living room walls. The lumbering machine’s response is as instinctive as it is swift, gunning down the ‘manacled couple’ before a wailing child’s very eyes. But the young girl’s tears are swiftly replaced with fear as she realises the noise of her robot’s machine gun will attract swift retribution from any passing undead walkers… and indeed the comic ends of the pair surrounded by an increasing horde of zombies.

The regular cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 2 by Ashley Wood

Zombies Vs. Robots #1 - IDW Publishing

ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS No. 1, January 2015

Though initially potentially inaccessible, there is something distinctly refreshing about this anthology. For rather than being the ‘standard comic fare’ “Zombies Vs. Robots” contains a collection of three ongoing strips, drawn by a pool of writers and artists. As such the stories are distinctly short, definitely different in their artistic styles and delightfully diverse in their viewpoints of the same world; one in which gun-toting poorly programmed robots have slaughtered not only hordes of zombies but decimated Mankind as well.

However in order to immerse oneself into this post-apocalyptic world, a reader must first persevere past the terrifically-stylized ‘oil on canvas’ cover illustration of a robot literally disarming a zombie by Ashley Wood. The title’s co-creator is both a successful fine artist, with sell out exhibitions in New York and Paris, as well as a consummate concept designer, and this really shows despite the somewhat grisly subject matter of his painting. But the picture is probably not what a reader would ordinarily expect depicted upon the front page of a comic; certainly not without being a variant cover such as those rendered by Alex Ross. 

Unfortunately the artwork upon turning the page, this time drawn by Anthony Diecidue, is perhaps not exactly encouraging either and whilst increasingly competent, the Los Angeles-based artist’s sketchings are arguably also an acquired taste. Fortunately though, Chris Ryall’s penmanship is absolutely ‘top dollar’ and his first tale “Inherit The Earth” swiftly becomes incredibly engrossing as it provides the backstory as to the calamity which has befallen Mother Earth. Namely a man-made portal to another dimension has created a doorway to a world of infected undead, who now unendingly stagger through into our universe. Robotic guards designed to cull the walking cadavers have proved rather over-zealous creations, as unable to differentiate between the living and the zombies they’ve essentially eradicated both from the face of the planet with just the occasional “Say goodbye, Pinky.”

“Tales of ZVR” is also written by Ryall, with Wood providing some heavily inked sketches for the tiny tale’s two pages. A simple tale of a boy and his bot looking for his Pa, the young lad quickly discovers his father did not actually get all that far when the man left to get help. It is short, sweet and sentimental but very nicely done. 

Finally Issue One closes with the far more ‘normal-looking’ comic book adventure "The Orphan", scribed by Steve Niles and proficiently drawn by Val Mayerik. Hunted by both the Undead and a seriously deranged rodent-killing robot, a long-haired youth scavenges the wasteland looking for parts to build his very own automaton. This is an extremely enjoyable concluding episode and one within which the reader can almost hear the haunting words and melody of The Ink Spots singing ‘I Don’t Want To Set The World On Fire’ in the background.

The variant cover art of "ZOMBIES VS. ROBOTS" No. 1 by Gabriel Rodriguez