Superheroes Go Horror in DCeased #1 Review

Writer: Tom Taylor / Artist: Trevor Hairsine & Stefano Gaudiano, James Harren / DC Comics I don’t know why or how we’re getting a DC Zombies book. I can’t imagine that the particular cross section of superheroes and horror was chomping at a bit for an out of continuity story where the Justice League goes up against a weird techno-virus. And yet the combined efforts of Tom Taylor, Trevor Hairsine, Stefano Gaudiano, and James Harren have produced DCeased #1, a vividly nightmarish narrative that has already proven that this exceedingly specific niche has a place in DC universe. The entirety of DCeased #1 is punctuated by pessimistic narration. In light grey lettering from Saida Temofonte, an initially unnamed voice sets the stage of Darksied’s defeat with a paragraph that sent shivers up my spine: It started with something like thunder. I don’t know how else to describe it because it was a sound no one had ever heard before. It was the sound of a Superman breaking the jaw of a God. And mind you, that’s just what’s on the first three pages. This slightly larger than usual offering (26 pages) grabs you from the jump and you know that the creative team is going for the throat with this mini-series.

Tom Taylor is no stranger to dark timeline universes. As the chief architecture of the Injustice comics, Taylor has credibility when it comes to navigating beloved characters through exceedingly harsh universes. DCeased opens with the end of a week-long campaign against Apokoliptian…