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Matthew Rosenberg, Eddy Barrows and Eber Ferreira’s Task Force Z #1 introduces a fun, undead team of villains in an action-packed first issue.
Heroes who join the Suicide Squad tend not to live for very long. The team’s heroes and villains understand that they are living only by the grace of Amanda Waller and a healthy amount of good luck. So it is no surprise that Task Force X’s next progression is recruiting characters who are already dead, or undead, to their ranks. The Red Hood leads a team of zombie Batman villains on a dangerous and thrilling mission in Task Force Z #1, created by Matthew Rosenberg, Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira, Adriano Lucas, and Rob Leigh.
Task Force Z #1 opens with the villain and former Arkham Asylum inmate Crazy Quilt chased by a grotesque Man-Bat. The colorful villain wards off the monster’s advances, only to find himself face-to-face with the undead Bane and a living and reluctant Red Hood. Powered by “Lazarus Resin,” several deceased DC villains are “brought back from the dead against their will to be used as undead weapons” as part of the new Task Force. Jason Todd and his zombie compatriots are hunting down Arkham escapees in the hopes of putting an end to an emerging crime syndicate. However, their mission puts them on a collision course with some of Gotham’s most formidable villains.
Matthew Rosenberg’s team of zombies is as frightening and bizarre as audiences would expect. This grisly take on the Suicide Squad definitely delivers on all of the action and horror promised by its premise, but Rosenberg also goes to great lengths to establish an intriguing plot. The precise origins of Jason Todd’s uneasy alliance with the team of flesh-eating villains remain mysterious, but it is clear that he has his reasons for participating. Rosenberg does a great job establishing this dynamic while introducing and briefly explaining the purpose of the Lazarus Resin and hinting at a Gotham-wide crime ring. The references to the infamous A-Day massacre tie the story into the DC Universe but leave plenty of room for new readers to catch up.
Penciller Eddy Barrows and inker Eber Ferreira have designed some haunting undead versions of iconic DC characters. The semi-decomposed Man-Bat and Bane are as recognizable and villainous as ever but gain an otherworldly and grotesque layer. The page layouts in Task Force Z #1 are particularly noteworthy. Panels overlap to create silhouettes of characters so that many pages function as both traditional comic pages and exciting splash pages. These compositions are visually stunning, and they help Rosenberg pack a lot of information into this first issue without slowing down the pace of the story. Colorist Adriano Lucas utilizes muted reds and sickly greens to bring a haunted atmosphere to the entirety of Gotham. But, as expressionistic as his colors can be, they also maintain a level of clarity that allows Barrows and Ferreira to experiment with page layouts without losing the reader.
At first glance, Task Force Z‘s premise might seem like a fairly predictable gimmick, particularly for a comic being released the week of Halloween. But, Matthew Rosenberg has used the outlandish premise to craft a sinister story with plenty of depth and surprisingly high stakes. Artists Barrows and Ferreira’s work is stunning, and the entire creative team works together seamlessly to make Task Force Z #1 a fun, fascinating reading experience.
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