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The Walking Dead turned 20 earlier this month. Robert Kirkman, Charlie Adlard and Tony Moore's game-changing zombie horror comic ran for 193 issues and in that time garnered a well-deserved reputation for pulling the rug out from under both its characters and its readership.
The Walking Dead often traded in shock, whether that came in the form of sudden character deaths, unexpected injuries (there's a weird amount of eye trauma in this book) and the sheer depravity that its antagonists would often indulge in.
While we've avoided any truly gruesome art, it goes without saying that we're going to be discussing some fairly violent events here - and with full spoilers.
10. Carl protects his Dad
This moment comes at the end of the comic's first arc, just six issues in, and sets the tone for much of what is to come in The Walking Dead.
Shane Walsh was Rick Grimes' best friend and a fellow cop. After Rick is hospitalised he develops strong feelings for Lori Grimes. When Rick shows up very much alive, however, Lori chooses him over Shane. Bitterly jealous and just generally stressed by, y'know, the apocalypse, he threatens Rick, forcing nine-year-old Carl to shoot him dead.
A more conventional comic might have strung this plot out for months or even years - indeed the TV show keeps Shane in the mix for two full seasons - but The Walking Dead liked to play rough. It's a small moment in the grand scheme of this epic comic, but it's one that lays down the rules for what's to come: no one is safe and even the most valued allies or dangerous foes are just one bad day away from a permanent ending.
9. Michonne takes her revenge on The Governor
The Governor is a truly detestable villain and arguably no one has more reason to hate him than Michonne. She finally gets her revenge in #33 in one of The Walking Dead's most brutally violent moments, first biting him then tying him up and torturing him in ways too varied and graphic to describe here. It's a sequence that lasts for an agonizing 12 pages and while it's satisfying to see the villain suffer some consequences, it also leaves you shocked and disturbed that one of the comic's heroes would go so far.
8. Douglas shoots Carl
Carl is accidentally shot in the face by Douglas Monroe in #83, leading readers to think that the younger Grimes had been killed. In fact, he survives and while he initially covers up his injury, he eventually comes to accept that it is a part of him.
This moment is both a great fake out ("Oh my god, they killed Carl!") and also a turning point in the character's growth.
7. "Tainted meat!!"
Many of The Walking Dead's most famous - and infamous - moments are character deaths. Few are so bitterly triumphant, though.
The Fear The Hunters arc is one of the best in the comic's entire run - it's a well-told mini-arc that sees the survivors lured into a trap by a gang of cannibals. Dale is captured and these "hunters" begin to feed on him while he's still alive. His response? He laughs maniacally in their faces and declares, "I'm tainted meat!"
You see, Dale has been bitten by a zombie, making his flesh toxic. It's a bitter moment of dark humor and triumph in a terrible situation. Dale is eventually rescued by Rick and the other survivors who slaughter the hunters, before succumbing to his wounds.
6. Rick finally defeats Negan
Negan is The Walking Dead's best known and most loathsome villain. A true thorn in the side of the survivors, Kirkman and Adlard do a fine job of making him feel almost unbeatable - but that just made Rick's eventual triumph over the leader of the Saviors that much more satisfying and surprising.
In The Walking Dead #125 Rick confronts Negan and proposes a treaty, suggesting a barter system of sorts that would put an end to the all-out-war between his people and the Saviors. Negan seems to be considering this, but the reader is primed for him to turn the tables on Rick yet again. Instead, Rick uses this moment of quiet to catch him off guard and cut his throat.
It's a surprising moment, and a bloody one, but it also shows how far Rick has come. Rather than leaving Negan to die, Rick shows him mercy - something he absolutely would not have done earlier in the run. Negan is patched up and slung in jail, marking the start of his eventual redemption arc.
5. Rick loses his hand
Before there was Negan or the Whisperers, there was the Governor. The Walking Dead's first big bad made his debut in #27 and quickly cemented his position as a truly dangerous foe by chopping off Rick Grimes' hand in the following issue. It's a pivotal moment in the series as it establishes that not even Rick is safe, and its timing - a few pages into the issue, rather than right at the end - is classic unexpected Kirkman pacing. And because there's no resets or robotic hands in this world, Rick lives with this injury for the rest of his life.
4. Lori and Judith are killed
There are several moments in The Walking Dead's run that provoke a horrified "too far Kirkman!" from the reader, but probably none-more-so than this scene from the blood-soaked #48.
While fleeing the Prison, Lori and baby Judith are gunned down by Lilly Caul on the Governor's orders. The moment is so bleak that Lilly snaps and turns on the Governor, shooting him and pushing his body into a horde of zombies.
In a comic full of dark moments this is one of the worst. Lori is one of The Walking Dead's foundational characters and killing off a baby proved a step too far for some readers.
3. The death of Rick Grimes
The potential death of Rick Grimes hangs over all of The Walking Dead. It's clear from the very start that Kirkman is not afraid to kill off his characters and that Rick is not invulnerable. Indeed, the fact that he makes it all the way to #192 is an impressive feat, but death comes to all, especially in this comic, and it was only a matter of time before Rick too met his end.
That Rick's death comes not from a zombie bite or the machinations of some big bad like Alpha or Negan, but from an angry young man with a gun lashing out, feels chillingly believable. Cruel, too, is the way that Carl is deprived of a final goodbye with his father - he walks in the next day to find Rick's corpse reanimated as a zombie and is forced to shoot him.
'How can The Walking Dead move on from this?' readers wondered. The answer was: it couldn't. The following issue #193 was the comic's last.
2. Alpha draws a border
Although not as big as the Commonwealth, Alexandria, the Hilltop, the Kingdom and the Sanctuary are all pretty successful attempts at rebuilding civilization. They provide some much-needed stability in the lives of the survivors.
All of that is shattered in #144 when Alpha - leader of the Whisperers - infiltrates the community, murders 12 people and leaves their heads on spikes. These aren't just random civilians either: main characters like Ezekiel and Rosita are among the people who are abruptly written out of the series.
Part of the shock here is that much of the violence is committed off page. We're with Rick and co when they discover Alpha's gruesome "border", the heads of so many familiar characters laid out across a devastating series of pages, the panels designed to look like gruesome exclamation marks.
1. Glenn's death
It couldn't be anything else in the number one spot really, could it? Glenn's death is, remarkably, not the most violent moment in the comic (see several of the entries listed above) but there's no denying that it's one of the moments that The Walking Dead will be most remembered for.
Glenn was introduced in the second issue of the comic and made it all the way to the landmark #100 - at which point he was cruelly chosen at random by Negan for execution, simply to prove a point to the rest of the survivors. Negan then beats him to death, popping out an eye in the process. It's a genuinely disturbing moment and had a lasting impact on everyone from Rick and Maggie to Negan himself. For some it was a step too far, for others a reminder that The Walking Dead would go places few other comics dared.
All of The Walking Dead is available now from Skybound / Image Comics. The series is also currently being republished in deluxe editions in full color.
The comic and show may have both ended, but The Walking Dead lives on in various TV spin-offs, including one focused on Rick and Michonne. Find out about The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live and see the trailer here.
