Marvel Comics is up to their arms in zombies with their latest installment, Marvel Zombies 2.  Yes, that's right - 2.  Marvel touched on this premise within the Ultimate Fantastic Four title and then released the first five-issue Marvel Zombies mini-series back in 2005.  With its success various related titles have cropped up and now a second mini-series has begun.  Both series are written by Robert Kirkman, penciled by Sean Phillips, with painted covers by Arthur Suydam.  Marvel Zombies 2 is rated Parental Advisory level which Marvel recommends for readers 15 and older.

Of course you're wondering how these superheroes with all of their powers became a group of ravenous and decayed flesh-bags, right?  Similar to most zombie stories there was an extraterrestrial virus on an alternate earth, specifically Earth-2149.  Magneto and his acolyte, Fabian Cortez wanted to reduce the amount of non-mutants, but unfortunately for them it also affected mutants.  Once the virus started spreading superheroes like Iron Man, Spider-Man, the Hulk and Wolverine become infected and the world now teeters at the whim of their appetites.  The Silver Surfer arrives to tell them all that Galactus is en route and will destroy the planet.  What do the superheroes do with their impending doom before them?  They eat the Silver Surfer.  Once Galactus arrives the Marvel Zombies eventually defeat him as well, and now infused with his cosmic powers they travel throughout the universe devouring everything.  There is a small glimmer of hope though.  Once the Marvel Zombies have left Earth-2149 survivors begin to crop up.  On Magneto's Asteroid M, Forge and Fabian Cortez survive as well as the Black Panther who was left on the surface.  The timeline then shoots forward five years and Earth-2149 is a veritable jungle with a small human remnant.

In the Marvel Zombies 2 five issue mini-series it's 40 years later and the zombies consist of Iron Man, Spider-Man, the Hulk, Wolverine, Giant Man, Jean Grey, Gladiator, Thanos, Firelord, and Luke Cage.  They arrive at the end of the universe having eaten almost everything in sight.  Still starving for more they look back toward home, where the Black Panther, his wife, Storm, Forge and a zombified Wasp (who is no longer hungry) are trying to deal with the diminishing human population and rival factions.  Hard times are definitely in the future for Earth-2149 during the next four issues with issue two coming out this week.

Now for a small aside and to give a bit of history of these "zombie-types" that everyone knows about. Really, they are more like ghouls from old Arabic legends.  Zombies were originally reanimated people who recently passed away and the voodoo doctor would use them as laborers.  The Wes Craven movie, The Serpent and the Rainbow gives a good representation of what they were like before Romero's influence.

The zombie premise is always an easy one.  The dead come back to eat the living or the living become the dead and then come back to eat the living.  Not much thought to it, but there are many subtle messages that can fit within.  George Romero used zombies to show the mindless consumerism of the average person with his second film, Dawn of the Dead.  I Am Legend shows how perspectives can change with roles being reversed between man and those who would destroy him.  Because of this I've always enjoyed a good zombie movie or book.  Not just because of the shock value or my morbid sense of humor, but the subtle things that these unreal creatures represent, such as despair and hopelessness.  What is there to look forward to other then immediate gratification if we're all going to eventually turn into mindless husks of our former lives bent on destroying the next person?  It sounds strange, but these things remind me of Christ.  I easily approach everything with thoughts of Jesus mixed into it.  I can enjoy a scary zombie flick because I know that I have something that is more.  There is something more to hope for.  Hey, I figure if Romero can give meaning to rotting minions then so can I.  I'm able to sit with Marvel Zombies 2 in hand and get a great chuckle from it.  Hopefully you can do the same.

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