28 Days Later: The Aftermath

As much as I would love to announce that I had found another 28 Days film, I’m afraid I didn’t luck out quite that much. Instead, I discovered 28 Days Later: The Aftermath, a graphic novel that illustrates a number of intertwining story lines leading up to the events of the original film, highlights the day zero to 28 days later period that Jim was in his coma, and offers a little perspective on the scenario as the timeline gets closer to the start of 28 Weeks Later.

Now I have to admit that I don’t have loads of experience when it comes to the quality of graphic novels, and may be setting my standards a little too high because of the awesomeness that is The Walking Dead, but Aftermath wasn’t the greatest of reads. The artwork wasn’t particularly exceptional, the characters were pretty flat and unrealistic, and to top it off, it was kind of pricey.

However, once I got past my initial poor impression, and reread Aftermath for the sake of jotting down some notes for this post, I actually did start to get a kick out of the author’s decisions with the story, and how it tied into the movie.

*Warning* Spoilers

[SOURCE OF OUTBREAK]

For starters the rage virus is created by a guy who is damn close to fitting the mold of an old school mad scientist. He and his Cambridge colleague’s intentions are to “isolate the specific neuro-chemicals that cause anger and excessive aggression”, which at first glance sounds like a honorable enough scientific endeavor. However, their methods quickly take a nose dive off the pillar of ethical practice.

Apparently believing their rage inhibitor ready for testing on live subjects, the lead scientist’s first order of business is to broker a backroom deal with a police captain to use one of his particularly violent prisoners as a guinea pig for their research. One out-of-control test subject, one fire extinguisher-crushed skull, one blackmailed research assistant, and one body buried later, the scientist comes to the conclusion that, hmm, maybe we should start with chimps first.

Don’t worry, it’s just getting started. Moving closer to where 28 Days picks up with chimps strapped into chairs, watching violence on little tv screens, our crazy-ass scientist is now working on the problem of how they will be able to deliver their inhibitor on a wide scale. Wait.. what? Um, so I take he’s not trying to develop a treatment for the criminally insane. Is this some sort of attempt at population control? Maybe he saw Joss Whedon’s Serenity and thought, hey that’s not a bad idea, those Reavers look manageable.

So then this nut’s line of thought brings him to the idea that a flu-like virus would be “an amazingly efficient delivery system”. Hm, what would be a good virus to experiment with? Oh, I know, Ebola!

Holy bloody hell. How freaking bat-sh*t crazy is this character supposed to be?

Wow, yeah, well anyways, a few twists and turns aside, and one disgruntled research assistant later, the Animal Freedom Front shows up and we’ve reached the opening of 28 Days Later.

[INITIAL CHAOS]

Next, Aftermath spends some time following a family around during the initial days of the outbreak (while Jim is still sleeping away in the hospital), and giving a small glimpse into the chaos that ensues. It starts with random attacks. Ambulance medics mention that the hospitals seem to be backing up for some reason. A report is heard on the radio that the Prime Minister is declaring a state of emergency, and that citizens are to stay in their homes and not attempt to approach major transit points. As can be expected, it isn’t long before all hell has been let loose.

As I would also expect many people to do, the family disregards the order on the radio, and, trying to find a means of escape, heads directly to a railway station. This, of course, proves to be a poor choice, as the scene is very much like that which Mark described in 28 Days, total chaos and infected everywhere. The family does manage to get away from the station, and formulate a plan to escape on a friends yacht (I guess they saw Dawn of the Dead 2004).

Unfortunately, as again can be expected, they don’t make it very far driving through the city. Abandoned barricades, wreckage, and mobs of infected soon force them to flee on foot, and it isn’t long before they find themselves surrounded and the parents sacrifice themselves so that the kids have a chance to jump off a bridge and escape down river on a boat.

I don’t think there is really much to say about this other than that I think it will be a very common fate that many will suffer. The family had the right idea in trying to escape the city as quickly as possible, however, unless you are aware of the situation long before everyone else, major transit hubs are likely to be swamped with people frantically trying to escape. Their situation also illustrates to hazards of traveling via automobile during an outbreak. However, in fairness to these characters, the rage virus scenario is one that erupts far toO quickly for virtually anyone to prepare for. I would guess that very few people near the epicenter of this type of outbreak have much hope of surviving.

[ZOMBIE PHYSIOLOGY]

The next stretch of Aftermath takes place in the 29 to 32 days later stretch of the timeline, and centers around a lone survivor who has made it his personal mission to rid the city of the infected, and, as he pledges to his missing wife, to keep “an eye on the ol’ neighborhood.” I don’t think this was a particularly thought out commitment, mostly just a means of coping with all the horror and loss, but he was making some interesting observations regarding how the infected identified the living.

As he observed through the outbreak, it seemed to him that the infected had something to help them track the living, and to not attack each other. It seemed that they were sniffing the air, when trying to determine where to go. This led him to suspect that it must be something about the way the living smell that attracted the infected. As the character states, “disease, anxiety, even rage affect the way we smell”, and “though we haven’t bathed in weeks, we’re (still) saturated with deodorants and shampoos.”

This seems quite plausible, but I won’t go so far as to completely endorse the theory. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that the undead utilize their sense of smell to some degree or another, but like I’ve mentioned in the past, I don’t think they’ll be bloodhounds. I think our infected attackers will be bound to the same sensory limitations as the living.

There isn’t a whole lot more of interest in the final stretch of Aftermath. We finally reach the point where a military presence has been established, surviving civilians are being held in quarantine, and the infected seem to be wasting away from starvation. Aside from some angry civilians making an idiotic escape attempt, and some cheesy drama that ends with everyone dead, thats about it.

As I said in the beginning, this was not one of my favorite examples of zombie literature, and certainly didn’t live up to the prestige of the 28 Days Later name. However it did prove to have enough material for me to ramble on for quite some time, and I do still get a kick out of the almost comically insane scientist that this author decided to pin the blame on.

I’d recommend reading Aftermath at the bookstore, borrowing it from a friend, or buying it if you can find it at a 75% off discount.

Read other “28 Days/Weeks” posts:

• See this is a really sh*t idea. You know why? Because it’s really obviously a sh*t idea!
  28 Days Later
• Return of the Two-Handed-Eye-Gouge-Death-Grip
  28 Weeks Later