Comic Review - Victorian Undead #4-6

Victorian Undead

The audio review:



And so we come to the close of the Victorian Undead series, a comic that has taken Sherlock Holmes and Watson into the land of the undead, and amongst the legions, we find that Holmes' nemesis Prof. Moriarty is behind the invasion. Picking up from where we left off is issue four, which features an opening flashback of Moriarty's transformation into a zombie who retains all of his faculties. This is wonderfully drawn in black and white by Tom Mandrake, who captures the gore of the scene within his noir-like art.


Then writer Ian Edginton takes us on a journey where Holmes and Watson are saved by the military with tanks and guns. At the end of issue four, Holmes has learned of Moriarty's plans, and issue five finds Holmes consulting with the Prime Minister on the issue of the zombie infestation, where Holmes concludes there is little more they can do than raze London and kill Moriarty once and for all. A fantastic sequence drawn by Davide Fabbri is featured in this issue, where the army is overtaken on both sides by a horde of the undead in violent, bone-tearing fashion.

And issue six concludes the miniseries, where Holmes and Watson venture into Buckingham Palace to confront Moriarty. The professor and Holmes duke it out in a grand battle, one that I can assure you is epic enough for the legendary detective, and then London is blown to smithereens and the undead with it. The art in issue six is full of blood and fire, and it's fittingly climactic for the series.

Victorian Undead has been an amazing ride, one that certainly overcomes any notions of what some may find an inane attempt at cashing in on the Sherlock Holmes universe. Yet the comic left me wanting a little bit more in terms of Holmes' detective work; the zombie action is certainly here in spades, but Holmes isn't as investigative as his legacy suggests. Edginton captures much of the Victorian age of writing, and he's certainly not doing a disservice to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's literature, but Holmes is lacking certain aspects of his personality. Perhaps one can chalk it up to the immediacy of the situation he finds himself in.