‘Everything Dead & Dying’ Review: An Intimate Take on the End of the World

I’d been waiting for Everything Dead & Dying since its announcement, and now that I’ve finished the series, I can finally answer the question I’d been sitting with all along: was it worth the wait? (spoiler alert: YES!!!!).

The series is written by Tate Brombal, a writer we really connect with, and that connection made us especially curious to dive into this story. Brombal is an Eisner Award nominee and three-time GLAAD Award nominee, known for his work across Jeff Lemire’s Black Hammer universe and James Tynion IV’s Slaughterverse, as well as his creator-owned books Behold, Behemoth and Christopher Chaos, or House of Slaughter. More recently he’s been writing inside the DC Universe on titles like Green Lantern Dark and Batgirl, but Everything Dead & Dying actually marks his Image Comics debut, and it shows just how strong he is at writing characters and emotional tension.

What Is Everything Dead & Dying About?

Set in a rural farming community during a zombie outbreak, Everything Dead & Dying follows Jack Chandler, a man who appears to be immune in a world where everyone else has turned. Rather than destroying the undead, Jack continues living alongside them, including his husband and adopted daughter, going through the motions of daily life as if nothing has truly changed. The dead wake up, go to work, knock on doors, and gather for meals, driven by muscle memory rather than hunger. Jack maintains the farm, feeds his family, and holds onto routines that keep him grounded. That fragile balance is shattered when outsiders discover the town and react with violence, forcing Jack to confront the reality of a world that refuses to understand what he has built or why he refuses to let go.

What Worked

This series hit me hard from the very first issue. The way it mixes present day horror with quiet flashbacks is incredibly effective, and it immediately made me care about Jack and his family. Seeing him sit down for breakfast with his husband and daughter, knowing exactly what they are now, is both heartbreaking and strangely comforting. The idea that muscle memory keeps the world moving, even after death, is one of the strongest elements of the book. Jack feels content in this broken version of life, and you can tell that holding onto routine is the only thing keeping him sane.

As the story progresses, the emotional weight only gets heavier. The flashbacks to Jack’s relationship, his flaws, his past struggles, and even moments of homophobia and forbidden love add so much depth to what could have been a straightforward survival story. What really broke me is how Jack still sees the dead as who they were, not what they have become, and how violently the outsiders reject that idea. The final issue is bloody, painful, and incredibly moving all at once. By the end, it was clear to me that this is not really a zombie story at all. It is a love story, a family story, and a very human one.

The Art, Color, and Tone

Jacob Phillips’ art fits the mood of this book perfectly, and honestly, you can see that from the covers alone. Phillips is a Manchester, UK-based artist and colorist who self-published his very first comic at age eleven, and by the time Everything Dead & Dying came along, he already had a reputation built on That Texas Blood and Newburn, along with coloring work on books like Criminal and Reckless. This series was actually his first new project since wrapping up his breakout run with Chris Condon on That Texas Blood and The Enfield Gang Massacre, and it feels like a natural next step. His linework gives the rural setting real weight, quiet and worn in a way that makes the horror land harder when it finally erupts.

Pip Martin’s colors do a lot of the emotional work here too, leaning warm and lived-in for the domestic scenes and turning colder and starker the moment violence enters the picture. Aditya Bidikar’s lettering stays understated throughout, which suits a book that’s more interested in silence and routine than big, loud panels. It’s genuinely no surprise the series picked up a 2026 Eisner Award nomination for Best Limited Series, this creative team was clearly operating at the top of their game.

Final Thoughts

Everything Dead & Dying is a truly special comic book that proves horror can be just as powerful when it whispers as when it screams. The trade paperback will be out in May 2026, and we can’t say it loud enough: go and buy it.

More to Read

If Everything Dead & Dying scratched a particular itch for you, we’ve got more where that came from. For more zombie stories with real emotional stakes, check out our reviews of Bleeding Hearts #1-6 and The Walking Dead: Compendium One. And if it’s the queer love story at the center of this book that stuck with you most, our review of Wiccan: Witches’ Road  and our list of 16 Queer Comics Recommendations are both worth a look.

FAQ

Is Everything Dead & Dying worth reading? Yes. It’s one of the more emotionally intimate zombie stories we’ve read, and it earned a 2026 Eisner Award nomination for Best Limited Series.

Do you need to read anything before Everything Dead & Dying? No. It’s a self-contained five-issue miniseries with no required reading beforehand.

Who is writing and drawing Everything Dead & Dying? Tate Brombal writes the series, with art by Jacob Phillips, colors by Pip Martin, and letters by Aditya Bidikar.

Is Everything Dead & Dying a one-shot, miniseries, or ongoing series? It’s a five-issue miniseries, running from September 2025 to January 2026.

When is the trade paperback out? The collected edition is set for May 2026.