David Lapham

William Christensen

Javier Barreno

Family Values

Geoffrey Froggatt

Lots of incest, lots of dead babies. After the first volume, I went into this fully knowing that it would be just as depraved and edgy. In this volume, we follow the Pratt family. Bonded together by generations of working, living, and learning together, they rely on Joe, the family patriarch, to see them through the apocalypse. But the Pratt family has a deep, dark secret, one that threatens to tear them apart, even under the constant threat of the murderous hordes. I admit that I found the anthology format to be a bit disappointing. The reason why people were so obsessed with apocalypse stories like The Walking Dead was because you got to follow these characters through the years and see them harden and change throughout the apocalypse. I admit that the characters in the last volume weren’t exactly my favourite, but I was invested in them and their story, and I wanted to see where it went from here, so it was a bit hard to adjust to this new setting and perspective. It’s are introduced to the Pratt family and their idyllic farm lifestyle, and once that peaceful setting is established, it is instantly subverted when we find out the father has been sexually abusing the daughters. I was surprised that the writers were exploring the idea of “humans are the real monsters” this early, then I remembered how that was also introduced in the previous volume with the serial killer character, so I understood that this was going to be a recurring theme. This story immediately established how awful it would be to be a woman or a child in this world. There were so many horrific things that were implied even if it wasn’t always shown, especially about the fate of kids and babies in this world. When we were introduced to a large set of characters and a family, I knew where this was going, but it was disturbing nonetheless. Despite all the typical Crossed madness, I grew to love this cast of survivors, especially the protagonist Adaline, she was a good leader. I admired how this group of survivors insisted on retaining hope and indulging in relaxing as a family whenever they found shelter, it showed how that despite everything that they were still a family. I liked all the survivors at the end, and the ending with Adaline finding a new hope was promising. I ended up liking this story far more than the previous one, and I hope that the survivors of this volume and the previous one return in future instalment. Or maybe it’s better if they don’t, then I can pretend that they found some sort of happily ever after.

Family Values

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