SPLICED COMICS /
ISSUE 04
REVIEW / REVIVAL
Revival
by Ray Whitcher
Zombies are so year 2000
PUBLISHER / Image comics GENRE / Rural Noir WRITER / Tim Seeley ARTIST / Mike Norton
M
VERDICT / 8.5
ost of us have suffered the
devastating loss of a loved one
at one point or another, be it a
grandparent, friend or sibling - we
know the pain and the heartache
that fills the inevitable void that their death
leaves within us. What would you do
then, if that person came back
to life? Not as a brain-eating
rotting corpse, but exactly
the way they were when you
last saw them. They speak
the same, act the same,
everything, except that
you distinctly remember
them being dead.
Originally entitled
Thanksgiving, the premise
of Image Comic's 2013 title
Revival offers that exact premise
- the 'revivers' are not zombies; they
are living, breathing people that simply
and mysteriously stopped being dead one day
and resumed their lives. This has of course stirred
up a fervour of massive proportions, with people
believing that it's a miracle, others claiming it's a
curse and the US Government treating it like a
disease. All that the people of the small town of
Wausau, Wisconsin know, though, is that the
dead are now living again and that their town is
the centre of the world's attention, as well as a
quarantine zone.
" This is
high-tension
comic drama
at its best."
Written by the massively talented Tim Seeley
(Hack/Slash, Ant-Man/Wasp and WILDCATS)
and illustrated by Mike Norton (Green Arrow/
Black Canary, Young Justice and Battle Pug),
this relatively under-the-radar title grabs you by
the face and pulls you into the story, refusing
to let you go as you follow sisters Dana and Em
Cypress as they delve further and further into the
120
twisted underground world of the 'revivers', from
exploitation to murder and everything in between.
Dana is a young, single mother and policewoman,
whilst younger sister Em is a student; the former
trying to earn the respect she desperately yearns for
from her father, whilst the latter is a star achiever
with a deep secret that changes the life of
her sister forever. What starts out as
a simple encounter with a 'reviver'
sets off a chain of events that
will unhinge the town forever.
We soon discover that
'revivers' are essentially
invulnerable, so when an
elderly woman begins to
pull her teeth out because
of the sheer mental torture
that comes with being
dead and then alive again,
she simply grows them back,
only to pull them out again. The
rather disturbing scene culminates
in her sitting in a room filled with her own
teeth, not an easy sight, but it makes you wonder
what kind of mental torture it would be to come
back from the certainty of death. Meanwhile,
ghostly apparitions are being spotted in the forest, a
quagga-like horse inexplicably dies as blood gushes
from its mouth and a certain truck is desperately
trying to escape the barricade around the town.
This is high-tension comic drama at its best.
Seeley has crafted a world so engaging that I
almost read the entire 11 volume collection in one
sitting. His characters are beautifully crafted, real
human beings and the claustrophobic small town
American setting only serves as enrichment to the
macabre horror hiding within the idyllic, snowy
forests. The people are scared, distrusting of the
'revivers' and locked in their own town by a never
ending curtain of police, media and televangelists,
quick to claim the 'miracle' for their own benefits.