DCEASED: UNKILLABLES #1 / WRITER: TOM TAYLOR / ART: KARL MOSTERT / FORMAT: SINGLE ISSUE / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Tom Taylor’s DCeased is barely complete, with the hardback collected edition only recently having hit comic book stands everywhere. Its alternate universe is in tatters; Darkseid’s Anti-Life Virus having wiped out almost all life on Earth, and almost all of its major superheroes dead. You can’t keep a good zombie apocalypse down though, and its sequel is already here – Taylor’s Unkillables.

Or should that be side-quel? The story picks up during the first days of the virus, with antiheroes Deathstroke and Jason Todd joining forces to ride out the first waves of the apocalypse. The plot moves quickly, being careful not to cover too much of the same old ground as its predecessor. Deathstroke and Red Hood hit the road, joined by Slade’s daughter Rose, Cassandra Cain’s Batgirl, and Commissioner Gordon. With the more popular heroes off the board for good (barring any major plot twists), this ragtag group of survivors make for interesting travel companions and a nice change from the tone of the previous story.

Karl Mostert provides the artwork this time around, with Rex Lokus on colours. This style of artwork is different from that of its predecessor, but fits nicely with its tone and feel – and Mostert and Lokus don’t skimp on the blood and gore, either. One would imagine there’s a lot more of that to come too, especially with Deathstroke and Red Hood leading the charge.

DCeased may not have been crying out for a sequel or spin-off, but Unkillables fills the void nevertheless. No lazy cash-in this, it tells a different enough story with an exciting combination of characters who didn’t get their time to shine in the original story. More DCeased was always inevitable – we should hope that it all manages to be as relevant, brutal and fun as this one.