SPOILER ALERT

* Much, much better this time around! I mean, seriously, that opening scene with Michael Rooker was almost like it was crafted as a way to say to that terrible character’s many many detractors “On the other hand…” (Yikes, no pun intended!) It put you right there with someone buckling and breaking under the weight of what zombies hath wrought, which is where you want your zombie fiction to put you.

* Similarly, while I understand Sean B.’s reservations about Ed the Wife Beater, I feel like he too was a case study in how to do things done wrong in Episode 2 better here. Sure, his stampede toward misogynistic epithets at the drop of a hat was a bit much, but at least he didn’t do it three or four sentences into his introduction, which is about how long Merle lasted last week before dropping the n-bomb. Instead, we meet him in the throes of a sullen little you’re-not-the-boss-of-me bout of passive aggression around the campfire the night before. Al Swearengen he ain’t, but nor is he Episode 2’s Merle Dixon.

* And I’m with Curt on how much more effective the zombies themselves were in this episode.

* There was also some welcome zagging where I expected things to zig. Lori’s brutally abrupt cut-off of Shane from her and Carl, and the apparent revelation that Shane told her Rick was dead in no uncertain terms–I didn’t see either coming, whereas turning what was (if I recall correctly) an ill-advised one-time thing in the comic into a full blown love affair in the show was more or less where you’d expect the adaptation to deviate if deviate it must. It helped that actor Jon Bernthal gave his all this week, believably portraying an equilibrium-upending emotional swirl of relief that his best friend and partner survived, joy that the woman and child he’s come to care about are reunited with the husband and father they love, guilt over what he’d said and done in Rick’s absence, jealousy of his relationship with Lori, fear that he’ll get found out, regret that he’s lost his ersatz “son,” and on and on.

* The “Hattie McDaniel work” bit was nice, and again, welcome. A smart show could return to the reestablishment of traditional gender roles often and weightily. We’ll see if that’s what we’ve got.

* Merle’s brother name is Daryl? Does he have another brother named Daryl too? Good gravy. Norman Reedus did a pretty good job, though–not unnecessarily belligerent, which is what I was worried about.

* I love Bear McCreary, but the music cues hit things a little hard, I thought. And knocked off 28…Later a bit too heavily too toward the end.

* If, goddess forbid, Christopher Lee dies before he can finish his role as Saruman in The Hobbit, have Jeffrey DeMunn grow his beard out and drop his voice a few octaves and blammo, instant White Wizard.

* I’d been dismissive of the idea that Merle would end up being the TV show’s version of the Governor at some point, but him losing his hand makes me worry, given all that easy eye-for-an-eye (so to speak) potential.

* In a way, I think that this series is a mug’s game. No no, bear with me, I’m not writing it off. It’s just that–well, okay, before it aired the show had three things going for it. 1) It’s based on the most successful, widely acclaimed, and influential horror comic of the past decade, and probably of a few decades before that; 2) It’s on the network that airs Mad Men and Breaking Bad, the two of most widely acclaimed television dramas currently on the air; 3) Less directly but still importantly, it bore the promise of being to its genre what The Sopranos was to post-Coppola/Scorsese mafia dramas, what The Wire was to police procedurals, and what Deadwood was to the Western–an incisive take on a shopworn drama that succeeds partially through genre revisionism, partially through intelligent application of genre, partially through a singular creative vision on the part of its creators, and partially through its ability to use the serial mechanisms of television drama to tell its story and explore its characters in themes at ruminative length.

But here’s the thing about point #3: Length and serialization aside, isn’t that stuff basically true of all the great zombie movies? I mean, the very first canonical zombie movie was itself an act of genre revisionism. George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead stripped zombies of their voodoo/hypnosis origin, added the cannibalism, made them an apocalyptic event, used them to light a fire under pressure-cooker human drama, and injected a healthy dose of social commentary into the proceedings. Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead, Land of the Dead, the Dawn of the Dead remake, 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, even Shaun of the Dead–these all already basically do what you’d want “The Sopranos of zombies” to do. I can think of very very few potentially canonical zombie movies that are simply “zombies run amok amongst basically flat characters, and you like it anyway because the zombie shit is so rad”–Zombi 2, perhaps? Return of the Living Dead, which I haven’t seen and which is probably not a good example because it’s a comedy? So anyway, barring some truly spectacular filmmaking, The Walking Dead suffers from a duplication of services problem with all the zombie material its audience is likely to have seen. After tonight’s episode I’m reasonably sure I’ll see it through to the end of its very short first season, because after all I feel warmly disposed toward zombie stuff, and this seems to be reasonably to quite well done zombie stuff. But it’s probably never going to be an hour of peak-level Romero- or Boyle-type material every week.

* Woo hoo, a new Girl Talk album! Unabashedly excited about this. I feel like as enthusiasm wanes for him in indie-rock-crit circles, we can better appreciate him for what he is: the best mash-up DJ, no more and no less.

* Frank Santoro presents his favorite comics of 2010. He counts 2010 as lasting from SPX 2009 to SPX 2010, which may be the single best year-ender list cheat I’ve ever heard of. He also has a special category reserved for the old lions of alternative comics, who between Sacco, Crumb, Clowes, Woodring, Ware, and Burns have had an astonishing 12 months. The post gets bonus points for illustrating how a strict no-nonsense, no-aliases commenting policy should be adopted Internet-wide when it comes to discussing the work of Blaise Larmee and his Comets Comets crew–including, if Sam Gaskin’s exasperation is any indication, at Comets Comets itself.

* More depressing news out of the Direct Market as its monopoly distributor declines to handle a project of obvious artistic worth. When you’re the only game in town, I think you have an obligation to include as many people in that game as possible, especially when you’ve made plenty of room for people playing another game entirely.

* Today on Robot 6:

* Holy moley, Emily Carroll;

* I think I might…love these Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark images?;

* Mark Waid relentlessly hounds the person who stole his iPad;

* and by all means, bring Doomsday back and let him cut a swathe of destruction through the DC Universe. Seriously, I’m really happy about this! For one thing, The Death of Superman was a great time at the comics. For another, Doomsday is a great visual and a memorably relentless antagonist. And finally, I’ve long been of the opinion that it’d be great to tie tie-ins revolving around villains to dropping a real daisy cutter on your book’s status quo. Like, for example, back in the “Countdown to Infinite Crisis” days, I was always disappointed by how little the seemingly indestructible OMACs did when they showed up in all these books. They were programmed only to kill superhuman, but they did precious little of it when it mattered. I always thought a great way to drive home the threat and make readers feel like the crossovers were more than just a device to goose sales would have been to insist “Okay, Creative Team X, you can use Crossover Villain Y, but only if you kill off one of your major characters or otherwise totally upend business as usual.” Having Doomsday slaughter his way through the mildlist strikes me as a terrific way to clear out some dead wood and pave the way for a new direction. Y’know, like Cataclysm in World of Warcraft. (However, let me join the commenters in hoping that this doesn’t mean they’re gonna kill Steel, one of the great undervalued superheroes on a visual and conceptual level, to say nothing of the need for good non-white characters.)

* Speaking of which: Yep, still digging Bruce Baugh’s extensive pre-Cataclysm WoWblogging.

* A documentary about the early ’70s creative relationship between David Bowie, Iggy Pop, and Lou Reed called The Sacred Triangle? Sure, I’ll eat it. (Via Pitchfork.)

* Bookmarking these for when I’ve seen the episode: Curt Purcell and Sean P. Belcher on The Walking Dead episode 3.

* The Matthijs van Heijningen/Eric Heisserer/Ronald D. Moore prequel to John Carpenter’s The Thing has been yanked from the 2011 release schedule. Weird.

* Very excited that my new blogging platform allows me to place the proper accent mark when linking to Ron Regé Jr.’s Yeast Hoist #6 on What Things Do. Longer and more diaristic than previous installments.

* Somewhere between Ben Katchor, Jeffrey Brown, and Brian Chippendale lurks Victor Kerlow’s “Black Shit Monster.” (Via Floating World and Arthur.)

* Speaking of Chippendale, today’s Puke Force installment is a black-comedy kick in the face.

* And speaking of Brown, Aviv Itzcovitz repanels Bighead.

* Real Life Horror: Two stories about the increasingly invasive and pointlessly humiliating security theater at America’s airports; two stories about the Obama administration’s lawless imperial free-for-all approach to dealing with accused terrorists. 2 + 2 = ? (NOTE: Fuck Anwar al-Awlaki and Go Team Comics, but still.)

* Sheila O’Malley writes in praise of Jeremy Renner. I’ve said this for literally years now, but ever since I saw him in Dahmer I knew he was something special. One day I’ll finally review that damn film. (Via Matt Zoller Seitz.)

* Tom Spurgeon against poptimism, more or less.

* Finally, did Doug Wright invent the infinite canvas? More via Matt Seneca.

* Today on Robot 6:

* Nick Gurewitch unveils a new Perry Bible Fellowship comic and some old BBC cartoons;

* and Douglas Wolk unveils the secret of All Star Superman. Or does he?!?!

* Hobbit news: Bofur and Ori have been cast, Gandalf has not.

* Neil Marshall’s Centurion is now out on DVD after a blink-and-you’ll-miss it theatrical run (and some time on VOD, I guess). Marshall’s three-film track record runs “overrated/masterpiece/great time at the movies” for me thus far, so I’m really looking forward to this one.

* More behind-the-scenes sketches and notes from the new Morrison/Stewart/Clarke Batman & Robin hardcover, this time focusing on the new characters in the book.

* I love that “Genesis P-Orridge Quits Throbbing Gristle” is a headline that can be truthfully written in the year 2010.

* I’m always glad to see Brian Hibbs put on his reviewer hat; this time out he reviews a trio of midlist DC books and a pair of zombie television shows.

* If you’re not all Halloween-mixed out, you definitely want to check out Tim O’Neil’s contribution to the genre. This one focuses on the sinister ambient/industrial/electronic end of the spectrum, much to its benefit. I’d also forgotten how the otherwise pretty dire Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth was sprinkled with quotes nearly the equal of the iconic lines from the first two–thanks for reminding me, Tim.

* Finally, you’ll notice I’ve added one of those thingamabobs whereby you can instantly post my posts to the social network of your choice by clicking a button at the bottom of each post. My question is, which of these does anyone use? Twitter and Facebook seem like no-brainers, and the email icon seems to be gmail-specific, but I also put Google Buzz and Digg and Delicious and Technorati and StumbleUpon down there because I’ve at least heard of ’em. Do any of you use them? Is there anything you don’t see down there that SHOULD be down there? Please let me know what you think in our wonderfully fast, non-double-posting, non-spam-ridden comments!