[su_quote]“Carol, Jane, how long have you known your father is a heartless bastard?”[/su_quote] Knees were slapped when I read that line. Slab #5 is a little all over the place, but in the way “all of the place” should be done. The story is frantic. The importance of what Dr. Kifo and Dr. Grimes are trying to do has never been clearer. We see that this virus or whatever you want to call it, is extremely dangerous and that all of their precautions might not mean a thing. But they had it under control until Alien Dr. Kifo and Dr. Grimes’ daughters decided they wanted to rescue animals in the middle of the goddamn zombie apocalypse. Oh man, was I annoyed by them and their friends.
“What are you guys working on the cure for humanity's survival? Well you killed too many puppies so now we all have to die!”
Not saying that we need to kill puppies, but I hate when logic is completely removed from a situation. I didn’t hate the story though. In fact, it made me want to read more. Enter this issue in which we see the aftermath of the events and Dr. Kifo and Dr. Grimes just continue to be cool as ice. Alien Dr. Kifo also gives Human Dr. Kifo a bit of inspiration which will have huge effects on the universe. Not just this series, but the universe. It’s also really gross which was great.
I will admit that I’m starting to get a little confused by who is an alien, a venus probe mutation (aka zombie), and human. Sure Dr. Kifo is easy to figure out since one is wearing one color and the other is wearing another color. Though it does irk me that no one has pointed this out. Like, “Hey, you found your clothes” and then suspicion is cast upon her.
The art is really consistent and overall great for the story. There were some more traditional panels in this issue, but also some adventurous panels. For instance, seeing through the mask of one of the characters, but then also seeing the reflection of her face in the mask. It was visually interesting and clever. The coloring is spot on. It really captures the era in my opinion, but overall its just good solid coloring which is nice to see.
How does that first line fit in with the rest of the story? You’ll see. It’s pretty much the line of the book, but while it’s important to the character development, the real reason to show up is for Dr. Kifo’s discovery. That alone is enough reason to read this issue, but the rest is no slouch and makes this one hell of an issue.
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Slab #5 Story: Bill Jemas, Michael Coast Script: Michael Coast, Brian Finkelstein Layouts: Stan Chou, Allen Watson, Dean Kotz Pencils: Joel Carpenter, Marco Cosentino, Ricardo Sanchez Publisher: Double Take Comics Price: $2.50 Format: Ongoing; Print/Digital
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