iZombie, Vol. 1: Dead to the World

I personally have watched the tv show before I picked up the comic and was very surprised to find out the big difference between the two. I loved the whole set up of this world and thought this book was a great introduction to a series as I can't wait for volume two. Nothing more I could have wanted from this (except more representation but hey, that happens a lot for me) so I throughly recommend to the tv show watchers and newbies to iZombie alike!

Color me underwhelmed.

I love the concept. A non-mindless Zombie has to keep eating brains so she doesn't become the shuffling, mindless kind. She's got a friend who's a ghost, and another who's a were-terrier (possibly the idea I enjoyed most), and works as a grave digger so she has easy access to “fresh” food. I enjoyed her friends, and wish we'd spent a little more time with them.

But the execution didn't live up to the potential. I thought the writing was slow and a little unclear a couple of times – but some of that was intentional, I realize, as Gwen's supposed to be learning what's going on, but some of the lack of clarity was just poor writing.

I don't demand dazzling art, I get that not everyone is George Perez, Mark Bagley, or Ryan Ottley, but I'd like something more than competent. People seemed stiff, generic and lifeless. I could only differentiate between two characters because of their skin tone! Not confusing at all.

In the end, it was good enough that given the chance, I'd read the next collection, but I'm not exerting a lot of effort to do so. I'm mildly curious about a few things – and can understand why some would be attracted to this, but it left me feeling cold.