What I’m Reading: The Walking Dead: Safety Behind Bars

I started reading with issue #69 in early 2010, although other comics nerds had been telling me for a long time it was a series I had to get into. I resisted because zombies were so trendy at the time and I was pretty much burned out on zombie stories. But when I did give TWD a chance, picking up an issue on a whim, I was hooked right away. The characters are so well-written, so flawed and recognizably people you could actually meet, that it becomes harrowing to see them put into the impossible and scary situations they encounter. At some point, I went back and got a couple of the early collections to see how they ended up where they were later.

At the beginning of this volume, Rick, the leader of a small band of survivors after the zombie apocalypse, has come across a prison. This appears to be perfect, because once the zombies inside are cleared out, there’ll be a double row of fences to keep others out, plus the prison must be well-stocked with canned goods and blankets and things. A complicating factor turns out to be that not all the prisoners have turned, and so there are four hardened criminals who have been living there for months, shut away in a part of a cell block that the zombies couldn’t make it into. At first they’re relieved to make contact with people from the outside world–but after awhile, they decide they don’t want to share the premises with Rick and his friends. At one point, one of the criminals, a convicted murderer, tells the others that their visitors are too damaged by the horrible things they’ve seen to live in a civilized way.