Containment

by Eric Red, Nick Stakal

Screenwriter Eric Red ("The Hitcher," "Near Dark") offers up a zombie story set in space. On a manned NASA space ship millions of miles from Earth, a terrifying malfunction occurs in the cryogenic hypersleep pods containing the hibernating astronauts, turning most of the crew into the violently brain-dead. In this debut issue by Red and artist Nick Stakal ("Hyde"), a handful of outnumbered astronauts awaken intact from their artificial slumber to find themselves pitted against murderous zombies running amok on the ship.

Genres: Comics, Horror, Science Fiction, Graphic Novels, Comic Book, Zombies, Graphic Novels Comics

104 pages, Paperback

First published September 14, 2005

About the author

Eric Red is a Los Angeles based novelist, screenwriter, and film director. His novels, an edgy Y/A book called DON’T STAND SO CLOSE and a dark fantasy called THE GUNS OF SANTA SANGRE and its sequel THE WOLVES OF EL DIABLO are published in hardcover, trade paperback and digital editions by SST Publications. Two other novels, a science fiction thriller called IT WAITS BELOW, and a mystery crime thriller called WHITE KNUCKLE are published by Samhain Publishing. The first two of his Joe Noose Western novels, NOOSE and HANGING FIRE, are published in Mass Market Paperback and digital editions by Kensington Books and Pinnacle Books. The next two Joe Noose Westerns, BRANDED and THE CRIMSON TRAIL, will be published in 2021.

Mr. Red directed and wrote the films COHEN AND TATE for Hemdale, BODY PARTS for Paramount, UNDERTOW for Showtime, BAD MOON for Warner Bros. and 100 FEET for Grand Illusions Entertainment. His original screenplays include THE HITCHER for Tri Star, NEAR DARK for DeLaurentiis Entertainment Group, BLUE STEEL for MGM and THE LAST OUTLAW for HBO.

His published horror and suspense short stories have been in Cemetery Dance magazine, Weird Tales magazine, Shroud magazine, Dark Delicacies III: Haunted anthology, Dark Discoveries magazine, Mulholland Books' Popcorn Fiction, among others.

He created and wrote the sci-fi/horror comic series and graphic novel CONTAINMENT from SST Publications and the horror western comic series WILD WORK for Antarctic Press.

Visit his website at www.ericred.com.

Reviews

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Space zombies.
That's all you need to know.

[Gianfranco Mancini · Rating 4 out of 5]

"... In space, nobody knows when you are dead "

"Alien" meets "Night of the living dead"!

A too short claustrophobic space horror tale from the screenwriter of "The Hitcher" and "Near Dark" cult movies Eric Red.
The art and the coloring match for good the story, and at the end you really find yourself wishing someone make a movie from this sooner or later.

A must read for sci-fi horror movies fanatics like me.

[Noeli Cobaya Debiblioteca · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ciencia ficción y terror, tiene un poco de todo claustrofobia y no tener algo firme que excede de adrenalina al lector.

[✨ Bookferatu ✨ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though quite redolent of Alien, this zombie story set in space was a fast, but enjoyable read, especially, if you love space horror fiction.

There is definitely a special kind of horror in connection with being millions of miles away from Earth, or from any help at all, while being confined to a space ship floating out in the empty vast regions of space. After their cryogenic containers are breached as a result of some mysterious glitch, a dozen crew members aboard the Explorer are released from their hypersleep early -- but not all are themselves.

My summary -

PROS: Creepy and exciting story with good illustrations composing an eerie atmosphere and lots of tension to the end, would make a great survival horror flick! Eric Red has great screenwriter experience, someone should let him run with this!! There are so few space horror niche stories that focus on trying to survive a zombie outbreak in space, so if you love the cool concept of zombies in space, you'll enjoy this!

CONS: Ended too soon! Wish this could have been expanded on, it could have benefited from more plot development.

WHAT I LIKED BEST: How can you beat zombies in space?!

Brace yourself --you're one of the uninfected crew members and that stark realisation has hit you that every waking minute of the remainder of your life will be left with no place to go, and alone with your undead crew mates.

[Aaron Martz · Rating 3 out of 5]

The art is there, the setup is there, and the ending is perfect, but what this comic is missing is character development. It jumps right into the action and runs full tilt all the way to the end, so at least there's that. It's creepy, it's scary, it has atmosphere to spare, and not a single panel is boring, but you don't get to know any of the characters before they get various portions of their bodies ripped off, so you don't really care when they do. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Red needed to slow the action down a few times and explore his characters more than just superficially. One of the characters mentions that she has a daughter that, due to the duration of their mission and that they will be in cryo sleep most of the time, will be an old woman by the time they return to earth. It's cribbed from Aliens, but it is one of only a few examples of what this comic needed more of. A sex scene toward the end shows some compassion between two of the characters, but you'd hardly know they wanted anything to do with each other before this exchange, and that's what keeps this comic from being a whole lot of fun instead of just fun.

[A.J. Bauers · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's 28 Days Later meets Apollo 13 in this space horror, featuring system failures, betrayal, and zombies. Pretty fun, but nothing really surprised me. And I didn't really believe in Trumbo's character, as NASA has pretty heavy duty psychological profiles.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fantastically gory horror set in space - the graphics were dark and creepy, and I enjoyed the storyline, great for any horror fan!

[Francesca Giardiello · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mediocre, prevedibile, cerca di attirare con un ritmo veloce, ma sommerge il lettore con spiegazioni inutili, mentre un equipaggio spaziale deve "solo" sopravvivere a degli zombie.

[SaintAnn's]

Eric (Durdaller) Red

[Rjboyer43 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty cool little zombie story. The art and coloring matched the writing well.