Review - Runners #1

If the world were to end tomorrow by what means of the end could scare you the most? With so many to choose from like nuclear war, computers rising up, a giant asteroid, zombies and vampires, there are a lot of things that can end ourexistence. What if the world did end with a big zombie apocalypse going down, but vampires were thrown into the mix as well?

The folks at ComixTribe have envisioned such a scenario with the new series called Runners. Created by the duo of writer Steven Forbes and artist Mac Radwanski and published by Comix Tribe, Runners #1 pictures what this sort of world would look like as the remaining survivors are hunted by zombie and vampire alike.

I'm a huge fan of zombies pretty much in any medium from comics to video games to movies. If it's got zombies I usually check it out and seeing this new comic I jumped right into it. My impressions from this first issue were good as I do like the premise they came up with. You rarely see a world combine two fearful ways to die together into one.

On the zombie front from what I read it appears they are more of a background nuisance in addition to being the larger catalyst that set about the end of the world for everyone. Zombies themselves don’t seem to be the focal point of the story; rather, it appears to revolve around the survivors, a.k.a. Runners, and the vampires who can blend in with the humans. The vampires are trying to kill the zombies to save the humans for them to devour.

The zombies do have sheer numbers working to their advantage, but compared to the fast thinking and clever as hell vampires they don’t at the moment appear to stand a chance getting to the survivors before vampires do. In this issue didn’t get a chance to see how the zombies and vampires throw down, but hopefully in the coming issues will get to see a little more action on that side.

There's a good balance of art and dialogue and the comic is done in black and white panels that adds something to it. Even with the black and white pages the gore and action isn’t diminished any as severed arms and legs or mutilated bodies still look pretty cool with impact.

My one complaint is that the dialogue is, at times, a little too corny, where it goes from one extreme to the next with not much thought. On the flipside, sometimes the corny dialogue isn’t bad as there's one good line that jokes about always planning for a zombie plague to end the world and what they would do in that event.

This being the first issue, with hopefully more to come, I see it getting better over the series run. The story and characters will most likely be getting fleshed out more. If you're a fan of the world coming to an end, zombies or vampires, then Runners #1 is for you.