Better Off ‘Dead’

There’s something to be said for horror stories that attempt to scare the hell out of you with an attack on the senses, but as issue 80 of “The Walking Dead” makes clear, the genre can also be very effective through nuance. This is actually part one of a narrative arc called “No Way Out,” which accounts for the expository dialogue that allows the story to set up its foundation before making its move. It throws its heroes into a whole new jam, and with all the developments here, they’re bound to run into a few complications trying to get out.

Of course, even dialogue-driven affairs need to demonstrate what kind of action they can deliver, and the wonderful thing about having zombies at the center of the drama is that their motivation is so simple that you can open with some conflict and not have to explain much. This one starts with a bunch of humans finishing a zombie hunt (they refer to the undead as “roamers”) and heading back to their walled-off community, only to find a bad time waiting for them at the entrance. There’s a gathering of roamers that’s so overwhelming that our heroes are just barely able to make it inside – but not before a roamer takes a chunk out of one of their own, Bruce. Abraham, understanding that what the roamers have is communicable, upholds the survival-horror tradition of Doing What Must Be Done, which in this case involves a blunt instrument to the skull.

That sets the tone for all that follows, including Rick taking charge as the new leader and giving everyone an update on the situation. With all the roamers they’ve got congregating outside, he says it’s best to limit activity that might stir them up, and that he’s opening the armory in case anyone wants a weapon. Since one of them happens to be his son Carl, Rick gives back the gun he found at the armory, warning him not to take it out of his belt unless he has to.

Right then, they get a knock on the door from Jessie, who’s brought her son along to see if they can stay with them tonight. She seems more comfortable with the arrangement than her son, who’s still coming to terms with the fact that Rick killed his father.

Most of the drama here is pretty low on zombies, but some of the best examples of the zombie subgenre give their starving stars less attention than we remember. George A. Romero, whose “Living Dead” series set a new standard for horror, often kept the zombies in “Dawn of the Dead” off screen so long that after a while, you forget they’re even there. If “The Walking Dead” is like Romero’s films, it’s bound to have plenty of scares in store – probably for when we’re least prepared for them.

This article originally appeared on AllMediaNY.com