Guilt and Rage: Steve Niles' Graphic Novel 28 Days Later: The Aftermath

"It's just horrible what people are capable of doing to one another." -Steve Niles, 28 Days Later: The Aftermath

Steve Niles' 28 Days Later:
The Aftermath

Sometimes, our best intentions backfire to cause harm where we hoped to prevent it.  Sometimes, we have too little faith in the world, in God, in our natures, and our attempts to overcome or set these things aside lead us to fall.

Sometimes, being sorry isn't enough.

Steve Niles' graphic novel 28 Days Later: The Aftermath follows several stories that fill in the details of what happened to cause the deadly zombie apocalypse depicted in the film 28 Days Later and its sequel, 28 Weeks Later.  The origin of the "Rage" virus that, in the movies, causes human beings to viciously attack one another with unbelievable strength and singularity of purpose is explained, and, as is sometimes the case, the combination of good intentions coupled with ambition is to blame.  The different sections of the text build three different stories that converge in the end to form a fairly pessimistic but satisfying conclusion; I wouldn't necessarily have hoped the story would end the way it did, but I can't think of a more appropriate way for it to have ended, either.

I have to qualify this entry by saying I have never been a huge fan of zombie books or movies.  That's somewhat ironic, considering how often such stories are meant to be metaphors for conformity, consumerism, all-consuming ideology, and other ideas I generally like to read about.  I did like Max Brooks' World War Z, but that book was much less about zombies and much more about how human beings react to and treat one another in the face of significant disasters.  But I felt that, if I was going to focus on horror this year, I had to slip at least one zombie book in, and it also gave me

The shadowy world of 28 Days Later: The Aftermath

the opportunity to get in a graphic novel--something I thought (and I was right!) would prove interesting

given the topic.  Illustrated by three different artists, each section has a slightly different feel or tone that reflects the events and emotions of that particular story, and the way they come together is entirely fitting and believable, juxtaposing different sides of the same event.

I haven't seen the 28 Days movies but was told that reading this book first would actually fill in some of the (intentional) gaps in the films, and, from the synopses of the movies I've read, I can see why.  Part of the appeal of the 28 Days movies is the sense of disinformation, of an overwhelming unawareness about what's happening in a city the characters have known their entire lives.  Like the movies released at the end of the most recent Battlestar Gallactica series, I'm never sure if I want to watch or read such pieces chronologically as the events in the stories occur, or if I want to trust the artists to reveal what readers need when they need it. 

Have you read any other graphic novel episodes or adaptations of books or movies?  Let me know which you enjoyed best--I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Happy reading.