DIE!DIE!DIE! vol. 1: Collector’s Edition

Out of all the crazy power moves Robert Kirkman has made over the years — launching “Oblivion Song” with a trade paperback to retailers, surprise-ending “The Walking Dead” — the one behind this series has to be the craziest.  The first issue of “DIE!DIE!DIE!” showed up to retailers completely unannounced last year as part of a regular shipping order. Having a comic from a (mostly) A-list creative team show up out of the blue without any hint that it existed prior to showing up on comic book store shelves and digital storefronts is quite frankly unheard of.  That Kirkman was able to pull it off is a testament to his overall power level.

So the arrival of “DIE!DIE!DIE!” was a really neat surprise.  How’s the actual comic, you say? It depends on the kind of story you’re looking for.  As well as your political leanings…

The basic concept behind this series isn’t all that new:  There exists a secret cabal within the United States government dedicated to using extralegal means to achieve its goals.  As the opening pages to each issue let us know: If you’re standing in the way of the U.S.’s efforts to make the world a better place, then someone could be giving the order for you to DIE!DIE!DIE!

At least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.  Some people aren’t above using the cabal’s power for their own ends, or to try and do good in their own individual way.  Someone who falls into the latter category is Senator Connie “Not Elizabeth Warren” Lipschitz who details her elaborate plan to murder a U.K. official because he’s secretly a pedophile.  Normally the plan would be to use that fact to extract all sorts of favors from him, but Connie is past all that. She just wants him dead.

So she hatches an elaborate plan to make that happen, which we’re told all about after the fact, which hinges on one of the cabal’s top operatives:  A master of armed and physical combat named Paul. He almost pulls it off until a car chase turns into a gunfight turns into a hand-to-hand brawl with a mercenary (who is certainly NOT Jason Statham, why would you even ask) turns into Paul getting his nose cut off and handed over to some people who want to sell him to the highest bidder.

This leads to Connie getting her right-hand man, single father and explosives expert, Nate to track down Paul’s brother John, who’s also a master of combat, to get her man back.  At the same time, Paul and John’s other brother, George, is hatching his own plan to get John and assume his identity. This is as Connie is fending off an internal attack on her position within the cabal from Barnaby “Not Mitch McConnell” Smith, the kind of guy who’s all about using the power he has for his own ends.

And yes, there is a Ringo.  No, you don’t want to know what happened to him.

This is a bare-bones summary of all that’s going on in the first two issues.  When I say bare-bones, I mean I’m not going into detail about the many speeches and action scenes you’ll also find within them.  “DIE!DIE!DIE!” is a very dense comic crammed to the gills with incident and something that you’ll probably want to take your time with or read it twice to let the craziness sink in.  I took the second approach, in case you’re wondering.

That said, there’s a very real chance that you could start reading it and bounce right off of given how full-bore crazy it is.  Not only is there a lot of over-the-top action and ridiculous behavior and speechifying from the politicians, but there are many, many times that “DIE!DIE!DIE!” feels like it was written by someone very much in touch with their inner 15-year-old.

There’s the constant dropping of snark and one-liners during fights.  The gratuitous amounts of blood seen during every fight scene. Bits involving Nate where he tries to replace the derogatory use of “Pussy” with “Ballsacks” and uses a code phrase subliminally implanted in episodes of “Sesame Street” to make people crap themselves.  There is A LOT of stuff like this throughout the eight issues collected in this volume because the writers clearly have a fertile imagination when it comes to this kind of juvenility. While I’m fine with (most of ) it, your mileage will certainly vary.

Now if you’re wondering what I meant by “writers,” this series isn’t entirely Kirkman’s baby.  It was co-created with former “The Walking Dead” showrunner-turned-brand manager Scott Gimple, who’s also credited with co-plotting these issues.  When I said earlier that “DIE!DIE!DIE!” comes from a (mostly) A-list creative team, Gimple is where the “mostly” part comes from. There’s no denying that was responsible for some of the best episodes and seasons of the show.  As well as some of the worst as his last two seasons (7 & 8) could best be described as entertaining very much in spite of their general dumbness, and the episode featuring Rick’s departure from the series, which he co-wrote, was a black mark on an otherwise improved ninth season of the show.

So what influence does Gimple bring to this series?  Compared to Kirkman’s other books there’s far less moral relatavism and decompression.  For better and worse, “DIE!DIE!DIE!” is a series with clear heroes and villains who spend most of the first volume shooting, kicking, and cutting off bits of one another.  There are some rare nods to acknowledging the moral complexity of the real world, but it’s really just a wish-fulfillment power fantasy where the problems of the world can be solved with guns, knives, and martial arts.  And spaceships.

I’d be lying if I didn’t say all this carnage didn’t look GREAT on the page, though!  “DIE!DIE!DIE!” is illustrated by Chris Burnham, a man who had no trouble keeping up with Grant Morrison no matter how crazy “Batman Incorporated” and “Nameless” got.  Here, he’s called upon to draw some crazily elaborate action scenes and delivers every single time. We get Nate and John shooting their way through a castle while Paul and George fight hand-to-hand on the roof.  Later, George and Paul’s girlfriend have a brutal, emotionally-charged throw-down in her apartment. Later still, operatives Bonnie and Clyde wind up betrayed by George and have to fight their way out of a palace.  There’s more where those scenes came from and they’re all rendered in the same lavish detail that Burnham brings to all of his projects. Rampant immaturity has never looked so good.

By this point you probably have a pretty good idea whether or not this first volume of “DIE!DIE!DIE!” is for you.  If not, then be advised that Kirkman and Gimple have envisioned a world where the outcome of the 2016 election was quite different.  Different in the sense that Obama gathered up the army, took over the country, gave himself a third term, made racism a felony offense, freed all non-violent drug offenders, and did a whole lot of other cool things that weren’t able to be mentioned here.  Some will roll their eyes at this. Others will swear to never buy another Kirkman-written comic again. Others still will look at it all misty-eyed and go, “If only…” Feel free to guess which camp I fall into. I’ll admit that it’s pure wish-fulfillment delivered in a decidedly unsubtle way, but it’s executed in an enthusiastically dumb way that looks great.  Which is as good a way as any to sum up the appeal of the series so far.