Summary:
Compendium 1 (Volumes 1-8)
Taking place in a post-apocalyptic United States, these graphic novels
follow the life and legacy of a former county police officer named Rick Grimes
as he and those he encounters learn to survive and thrive in a world beset by
zombies. The story begins in medias res as Rick awakens from a coma
after being shot on the job a few weeks earlier. He finds himself in a
seemingly deserted hospital and stumbles upon a sealed room, inside which walks
dozens of decaying, groaning human bodies seeking to consume him. He flees the
hospital to find a desolate landscape. In his home neighborhood, he runs into a
father and son who tell him that the last national broadcast said for people to
head to large cities for military protection. Thinking that his wife and son
may have heeded the advice, Rick gathers what he can from police headquarters and
begins toward Atlanta, the nearest large city. Galloping into Atlanta on
horseback, he is overwhelmed by a large number of the undead. A young man named
Glenn comes to his rescue, bringing him to a makeshift camp of roughly a dozen
people. There, Rick finds his wife and 7-year-old son Carl along with his former
police partner and a young woman named Andrea. Mishaps and death ensue, forcing
the group to travel in search of more secure housing and food. It is revealed
that everyone will become one of the undead upon death, bitten or not. They eventually find a prison after leaving
behind a small farm run by a tightknit, religious family with skewed notions of
the undead, one member of which, Maggie, becomes romantically involved with Glenn
and joins Rick’s group. After ridding the grounds of the undead, termed
Roamers, the group encounters inmates who had been holed up inside. Conflict
follows distrust, yet the leadership remains with Rick’s group. The group’s
numbers are bolstered when a middle-aged black woman named Michonne arrives
carrying a katana and accompanied by two jawless, undead guards. Soon after,
the group encounters Woodbury, a hostile community led by a man calling himself
the Governor. Members are taken hostage, and Michonne is brutally tortured and
raped. The group manages to escape and return to the prison, but only after
Michonne returns to claim revenge on the Governor, torturing, maiming, and
leaving him for dead. The Governor survives and leads an assault on the prison,
resulting in the separation of most characters and the deaths of many others,
including Rick’s wife and their recently delivered baby. Only Rick and Carl are
shown leaving the carnage alive.
Compendium 2 (Volumes 9-16)
Rick and Carl survive on their own for a bit until they encounter
three individuals in a large truck heading to Washington D.C. They are under
the false assumption that one of the new group’s members, Eugene, knows how to
cure the undead pandemic. Shortly after discovering his falsehood, the group is
introduced to and integrated into a walled community near DC known as
Alexandria, a haven of houses, electricity, and running water. Battles arise with
scavengers, resulting in compromised walls, injury, and more death. While
searching for supplies, the group encounters a man dubbed Jesus who is acting
as a recruiter for another walled off community called the Hilltop. Rick
ventures to the Hilltop with the hopes of rebuilding civilization, only to
learn that their community is plagued by a pseudo-mercenary group known as the
Saviors; “protection” from Roamers is forced upon the Hilltop by the Saviors in
exchange for half of all food and supplies. To free the Hilltop and gain favor
for trade, Rick agrees to challenge and eliminate the Saviors along with their
leader Negan.
Compendium 3 (Volumes 17-24)
Upon confrontation, the Saviors pin Rick’s vanguard, and Negan
savagely kills Glenn in front of a pregnant Maggie, using a barbed-wire-wrapped
baseball bat named Lucille to do so. Negan forces obeisance from Rick, albeit
under a vow from Rick to kill him. Returning to Alexandria, Rick’s group
returns to normalcy, appearing to acquiesce to the demands of Negan.
Unbeknownst to most of those under his care, Rick embarks with Jesus to enlist
the leader of another community known as the Kingdom in an allied war effort
against Negan and the Saviors. Rick’s arrival coincides with that of Negan’s
lieutenant Dwight who also seeks to overthrow Negan. The four of them begin war
preparations. Despite misfortunes, the allied group comes out victorious.
Rather than kill Negan, Rick vows to keep him prisoner for life so that he may
see how the communities rebuild civilization. The following new leadership is
established: Rick and Andrea, now romantically involved, as the heads of
Alexandria; Dwight as commander of the Saviors and their community, the
Sanctuary; and Maggie as the chief of the Hilltop. The four communities
effectively rebuild a functional society in the next two years, establishing a
safe trade route and taking in stragglers as they find them. Eventually the
communities face a new danger in the form of a wild group called the Whisperers,
who disguise themselves in the skins of Roamers and follow a wolfpack social
hierarchy, when they accidentally encroach on the unmarked territory of the
latter. The leader of this group, known as Alpha, infiltrates the first
community fair held by Rick’s people, covertly snatches away many members, and
uses their undead heads as signposts to mark the boundary between territories.
Compendium 4 (Volumes 25-32)
In the shuffle of Rick and his communities declaring war on the
Whisperers, Negan jailbreaks and manages to kill Alpha as a sign of good faith
with Rick. The established communities survive the war, suffering enormous
casualties in the elimination of the Whisperers. Meanwhile, Eugene discovers
the existence of another large community in Ohio using a repaired CB radio. A
team, including Eugene and Michonne, gathers for the long journey there. The
results are beyond reasoning: an incredibly large community dubbed the
Commonwealth. This community gives the appearance that an apocalypse never
occurred, relying upon the class system of the old, pre-undead world to
establish order. Amazingly, Michonne reconnects with one of her long-lost
daughters and chooses to remain in the Commonwealth by resuming her old
vocation as a lawyer. She attempts to mitigate underlying tensions between the
classes of this newfound community, but ultimately fails to quell the waves of
indignation and retribution from the labor classes towards their privileged
elite. Rick and his crew inadvertently add the final spark to the brewing civil
war within the Commonwealth, a war which is only narrowly stopped through
Rick’s diplomacy and abdication of leadership from current governor. Despite
the now solidified union of a new civilization, Rick is murdered by the
self-righteous son of the deposed leader, never living to see the fruition of
the new coalition. The story ends from the perspective of Carl living in a
civilized, nearly undead-free world decades after Rick’s death. The final
events reveal the glorification of Rick Grimes and his contributions during
what is now known as the Trials.
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