“If you add more weight onto the backs of the people here… if you push them just a little farther, someone might just… snap.”
Welcome to the newest season of Storied Arcs, where Mike and Alex are heading to small-town Wisconsin to deal with the not-zombie zombies of Tim Seeley and Mike Norton’s Revival from Image Comics. The guys dive deep into how the comic wastes no time in introducing the reader to the book’s premise (recently deceased come back to life), sprawling cast (over a dozen or so seemingly major and semi-major named characters), and supernatural undertones (glow-y demon spirit thingies in the woods), and how the storytelling decision might affect the reading experience of this book as a monthly release versus as a complete series binge. They also take a look at what Seeley and Norton are setting up with the Revivers as stand-ins for “otherness” and the role politics and religion will play going forward. Finally, they end by discussing how the comic doesn’t really look or feel like other horror and horror-adjacent books it often (fairly or not) gets compared to, and why that’s probably a good thing.
As per usual, we’re doing our best not to spoil anything about the story beyond what’ve covered thus far (it is a whodunit detective story at its core, after all). But you can remedy that fear by reading Revival Deluxe Volume 2 (issues #12-23 + Chew/Revival #1) and joining us again next week for another deep dive discussion!