What was I thinking, Steve Niles could write a proper 28 Days Later book? Of course he can't! He can barely write his own vampire series.
This has the What was I thinking, Steve Niles could write a proper 28 Days Later book? Of course he can't! He can barely write his own vampire series.
This has the same problem as the Boom series - it fundamentally misunderstands what makes the first film work so well (we will pretend the sequel doesn't exist). Small stories, about normal people, encountering the most frightening thing possible: the collapse of society and loved ones turning against you.
Niles goes for the regular Hollywood bullshit, with bad faux-British dialogue. So now the Rage virus isn't just a science project by short-sighted scientists, no, there's a conspiracy, and the lead scientist is a psychopath.
The characters all pop up in eachother's stories, which isn't helped by using different artists, which makes those characters unrecognisable from story to story.
The collapse of society moves at breakspeed, there is no subtle creep of doom.
We finish with survivors in a quarantine camp, who then decide to violently escape, with absolutely no plan what to do next.
A terrible sequel to the film, it completely misunderstands what actually made the film tick.
28 Days Later works so well because it's very British, itA terrible sequel to the film, it completely misunderstands what actually made the film tick.
28 Days Later works so well because it's very British, it's quite realistic in tone, very gritty and character moments and decisions are kept small. For example, after finding out what has happened, Jim wants to see what has happened to his parents - this is a very realistic and moving idea, it tells us something about Jim, and above all, it isn't flashy. It isn't something you'd normally see in a zombie movie. And that's why it works.
Michael Alan Nelson decides to go the more American, flashy route, with a lot of cliched storytelling. Characters keep saying subtext out loud. Characters make uncharacteristically stupid decisions to move the story along.
There is no horror here. There is some ruthless killing of characters, but it never gets under your skin. The pacing is terrible, throughout each volume. The stories for each volume invariably are too big for a four-issue arc, so you get this stunted storytelling with weird, rushed endings.
Selena could've been an interesting character, but she quickly devolves into the cliche of an Angry Black Woman, reacting to everything in anger first. This is not the intelligent survivor from the film.
For some reason, Nelson keeps it a secret why Selena accompanies the wet fish journalist in the first place. She has just escaped the hellhole that is the infected UK, and now she wants to go back in - and get this, she has to travel from the top of Scotland dooooooown to London. She needs a pretty strong incentive to do that, right? (Spoiler: she hasn't got 0ne.) So you're reading six volumes wondering why she even is doing all of this.
To top it all off, of course there's a forced love story, because: flashy American movie writing.
Also, if you don't have a firm grasp of UK colloquialisms, just... leave it. I kept thinking of the Adam Buxton character Famous Guy doing a UK accent.
OF COURSE Selena falls in love Pclaulnt, the ridiculously bad journalist (who has supposedly won a Pulitzer!!! lol), because that's one cliche that wasn't mined yet.
"Thank you for making life worth living again."
HA HA oh god
So we find out that Selena had to kill her own husband because he got bitten, and she wants to bury him with all the terrible jewelry he has given her.. THAT'S why she went on this trip? TWO months after she barely got out of the place? That is not NEARLY a strong enough incentive to do any of this!
(We also get an origin story for her machete, which: no. Not everything has to have an origin story.)
And then they go to Paris and she leaves her machete there, sticking out of the ground in a park, with lots of people around, because that's something you'd do with a large, dangerous weapon like that.
Why is everything so overwritten? Why does everyone keep saying subtext out loud?
And here things really go to shit. Firstly, the art is now actively bad. Characters' faces change every few panels, most of the time looking like someAnd here things really go to shit. Firstly, the art is now actively bad. Characters' faces change every few panels, most of the time looking like someone scrunched up the paper.
Secondly, the writing, which wasn't stellar to begin with, really takes a nosedive.
Captain Terminator, who has been following Selena, and who has had zero (0) character development, has super powers, because he can take out a squad of US Marines that have rifles trained on him.
Everyone who has half a braincell has already guessed why Cap T has it out for Selena, although I expected there to be another layer, him being family of the related character.
And then we get the last few pages, which are excruciatingly bad. Again, pacing! It feels as if the writer forgot how many pages were left in this arc (again, wrong story for the amount of issues!), went "oh shit!" and "uhhh, this'll do!".
Why the ID tag thing. Why would Cappy Term want to pick them up. Why do so many people think this shit ending is at all satisfying?
How can you take something like 28 Days Later and write such boring stories with it?
Why are the characters moving through cities at all? That's where How can you take something like 28 Days Later and write such boring stories with it?
Why are the characters moving through cities at all? That's where you have the biggest chance to encounter infected, that's where most dead bodies will be, and dead bodies mean vermin and disease. You should be barely able to move through the city in a car (although the comic doesn't seem to think so.)
(We still have the thing where we don't know why Selena is even on this journey.. guess it's something to do with her husband..? Why keep that secret from the reader?)
Had a hearty laugh at the writer suddenly remembering that Paul aka Clint is a journalist. Oh shit, better make some notes..!
So here we get the first chance for some real horror, the cage Selena gets put in. And here we also hit the terrible pacing 0f this comic. Her standing in that cage, her starting to hallucinate the people she has lost up til now: this should've been a whole issue. But no, we get a couple of pages, it doesn't work, it's just another thing that happens to our protagonists, and the only thing they can do is react to it, never having any real agency. (Also, why is her hallucination basically a dream? Why aren't her hallucinations mixed with the real situation?)
The story arcs are too short for the stories the author is trying to tell, so the pacing tends to be really off, and the stories feel rushed.
ExperimenThe story arcs are too short for the stories the author is trying to tell, so the pacing tends to be really off, and the stories feel rushed.
Experiments! That should be creepy, but it never is, because things happen to quickly and there's no time for things to sink in.
Also, what is the CIA trying to achieve here..? Super soldiers? That makes no sense. The RAGE virus removes the conscious parts of the infected, and leaves hate and anger. Replacing the conscious part would just "cure" the virus. There is nothing super about the virus, the infected aren't stronger or quicker because of it.
(Slogged through this with Kadi Virus, these joke names aren't getting any better soon)...more
Woooooh did Dustin Nguyen's art make a hyperjumpAaaaand WE'RE BACK BABY!!! Reading again, with my partner in vamp-crime, miss Kadjulika P. Vampface!!!
Woooooh did Dustin Nguyen's art make a hyperjump from his work here in 2011 to his Descendererer work or WHAT - I mean, it's recognisable as Nguyen's work (we can see the seeds of Descenderbotface), but it's also not very good!
I literally can't remember what the story was. YES, this is because I'm frightfully old (although not neaaaarly as old as Anne!!), but moreso because I find it really hard to care about anyone in these stories.
And that is especially true for Pearl and Skinner. I'm done with those two. So booooring. And a forced tryst between Pearlie and Skinner, which felt like it came out of nowhere and only happened because That's What Happens In Stories.
I buddy read this with the inestimable Nataliya and I had high expectations for this book, seeing all the love it seems to be getting on GoodReads, anI buddy read this with the inestimable Nataliya and I had high expectations for this book, seeing all the love it seems to be getting on GoodReads, and I was really disappointed.
I've seen some people defending the book saying it is a novel of ideas, which I guess it is (although I don't find all the ideas that interesting), but did it have to be so badly written?
The characters are practically non-existant, the plot is oddly/badly paced. Characters hardly react to the curious things happening (although I have wondered if this is a cultural thing..?), do all sorts of stuff that feels wholly unmotivated.
There's a scene where a couple of baddies say they're supposedly holding bombs in bags, and there then follows a scene where the goodies shove a set of small electronic scales to the baddies, so they can demonstrate how much the bags weigh to prove the bombs are in there AND WHY IS THIS EVEN HAPPENING
Our main character one day wakes up with a numerical counter in front of his eyes, running down. He figures out how to remove it from his vision, and then never mentions it again. It's such straaange human behaviour. And variations of it keep happening.
I'm still not actually sure the main character was the main character. Or even a character.
I liked the bits in cultural revolution China, and the character we are presented with there, would've been a much more interesting character to have as our main.
I also liked the idea of (view spoiler)[tiny constructs that have their own little internal universes. (hide spoiler)]
Sorry to everyone who loves this book, but it quickly became a chore to read, so I'm OUT....more
This book feels like two thrillers smushed together, and the result is that neither story gets the attention it deserves. About halfway through, the bThis book feels like two thrillers smushed together, and the result is that neither story gets the attention it deserves. About halfway through, the book severely dips in quality. It feels as if Neiderman had a looming deadline, or he just lost interest in his own high concept book. The writing becomes very rote, the dialogue exceedingly cheesy (which is funny to read, at least), lots of plot short cuts are taken.
Up to about 60% of the book, you have yourself quite an intertaining little thriller. And then Neiderman drops the ball(s). And it's a shame! The concept of the book invites some fantastic opportunities.
(view spoiler)[So the book involves basically uploading someone's brain to a computer, and then 'overwriting' another person's brain while erasing that person. So you can copy a person into another body. This means you could make multiple copies of a person in different body. Imagine a small gaggle of a main character, all in different bodies, all working together. Even better, a group of the main bad, seemingly working together. but secretly working against eachother.
The second half of the book takes place in a small town - do a little time skip, after which large parts of the town community have been overwritten with either the main character or the antagonist, two armies constantly pushing against eachother.
There's a kind of secret institute, with a lot of security. Grab someone who works there, write their personality to a computer, put a copy of one of the protagonists in their body, so that protagonist can infiltrate the institute.
Just some ideas, off the top of my head. So much fun to be had! (hide spoiler)]
Neiderman doesn't do anything fun with it. It's a shame, because I've read other Neiderman books that show he can do much better.
Buddy read this tawdry little thriller with Anne, who is Better Than Sex....more
This series is so middle-of-the-road it hurts. The characters are meh. The worldbuilding is meh. The plot is okay. Nothing about it really grabs me. AThis series is so middle-of-the-road it hurts. The characters are meh. The worldbuilding is meh. The plot is okay. Nothing about it really grabs me. And I still think the art isn't very good.
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