Nearly a year to the day after the last issue of The Walking Dead was published, Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard return for this unheralded one-shot: Negan Lives!
The last book in the series ended on a big time jump - this special takes place years before that. It’s about what happened next to Negan after he wandered away from Rick’s group but has a lot to do with that glimpse of what we saw his life had become in the future. He’s living alone, talking to his “dead” baseball bat Lucille and slowly going crazy - until a beautiful young woman shows up unexpectedly in his kitchen. And her name’s Lucy…
I wasn’t surprised that Kirkman/Adlard would return to the Walking Dead sooner or later, not least as the ending was so abrupt and left Negan’s story largely untold besides that brief snapshot in the last book. So I’m glad they came back with a more fleshed-out coda for this great character (yes, I’m a Negan fan!) and a hint that there’s likely more to come somewhere down the line.
It’s a fun, very-Negan story (lots of f-bombs and death), even if it’s predictable, and I liked that one of the attackers looked identical to early Rick Grimes and Negan got to do what I think he always wanted to do to Rick to a lookalike at long last.
Kirkman reveals in his afterword that he had originally planned to kill Negan in issue #174 (or Volume 30: New World Order) but got talked out of it by Adlard - he reprints their email exchange on the subject. Adlard turns out to be a very thoughtful writer making me wonder if he shouldn’t be writing comics himself.
Kirkman also mentions that this comic wasn’t planned until the early days of quarantine happened this year and he was talking to industry professionals and comics shop owners about what a return would look like post-everything shutting down and that they would need BIG comics to get customers back - and what bigger comics title than a new Walking Dead?
So you can’t buy a digital copy of this comic because comics shops don’t benefit from those sales - you can only buy a physical copy in your local comics shop. And hats off to Kirkman and Adlard for not just doing this comic for free but even going so far as to pay out of pocket for printing - that means all the sales of this comic go directly to the comics shop you bought it in. Well done, guys, really - what a cool gesture.
(The first issue of Kirkman’s new series Fire Power is also available as a belated Free Comic Book Day offering so even if you go to your shop with the intention of picking up a copy of Negan Lives and they’re out, you at least walk away with something.)
Considering the short production time to put it together, Negan Lives is a decent comic and worth checking out for fans wanting to see what this character got up to next and/or anyone wanting to help support their local comics shop. And I would definitely read a spinoff/miniseries with Negan if/when it happens. Comics Lives! - thanks in part to kind creators like these.
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