Apocalypse

*Apocalypse*

Author
Todd Dawson-Cooper

Universe
D-913

Country
Canada

Genre(s)
Horror, Action, Drama

Publisher
N/A

Publication date
N/A

ISBN
N/A

Preceded by
Nihilist Apathy

Followed by
Reawakening
The Winters of Cascadia

***Apocalypse*** (also known as *"Reawakening 2: Apocalypse"*) is a supernatural action-horror novel. It served as a crossover and prequel to Martin Kevil's web comic series *Reawakening* prior to the latter's cancellation.

*Apocalypse* takes place several months prior to the events of *Reawakening* and follows two separate group of survivors who escape from Cramburg, Montana and Madison, Wisconsin respectively, and cross paths with another in the small town of Red Cedar, Minnesota while in search of refuge.

## Synopsis

**Apocalypse** follows Lyla, Nick, and Liam: a trio of individually-troubled thirteen-year-olds whom find comfort in their hours spent together in the middle of a *40K* campaign or obsessing over geek culture. When the sanity of their daily lives is suddenly uprooted by the rapid and cataclysmic spread of a supernatural plague: the trio of friends are forced by circumstances to flee from their familiar suburban homestead and travel deep into the wilderness of Minnesota.

In seek of refuge, the trio stumble upon a mysterious ghost town, seeming to find safety in the company of a group of survivors, but in this forsaken place, a blood cult have begun to unfurl the primordial origins of the events that have befallen this world and the destined role our protagonists have yet in the events still to unfold. What befolds is a crushingly bleak series of events that leave the trio questioning if survival in this new world may be worse than death itself.

## Appearances

### Characters

#### Main

* Liam Kendall (first appearance)
* Lyla Painter (first appearance)
* Nick Brooks (first appearance)
* Derek Bradley (first appearance)
* Rachel Trau (first appearance)
* Wilfred Cunningham (first appearance)

#### Secondary

* Vishal Siddiqui (first appearance)
* Colton Ritter (first appearance)
* Amelia Burnham (first appearance)
* Kieran Marzec (first appearance)
* Melissa Nguyen (first appearance)
* Charles Dixon (first appearance)
* Joaquin Marshfield (first appearance)

#### Other

* Samantha Richards (first appearance)
* Jerome Campbell (first appearance)
* Tyler Malveaux (first appearance)
* Brendan Malveaux (first appearance)
* Joseph Stieker
* Ajay Siddiqui
* Meraj Siddiqui
* David Hammond (first appearance)
* Dalton Bradley (first appearance)
* Lori Vanover (first appearance)
* Kurt Heywood (first appearance)
* Janice Wellington (first appearance)
* Garth Denbrough (first appearance)
* Bianca Graham (first appearance)
* Ellie Heywood (first appearance)
* Olivia Williams (first appearance)
* Bruce Pham (first appearance)
* Kim Ayer (first appearance)
* Parson Ling (first appearance)
* Jeffrey Vanover (flashback)
* Ryan Thompson (flashback)
* Zelda Rosenbaum (mentioned)
* Phillip Johnson (mentioned)
* Michael Trau (mentioned)
* Lana Bailey (mentioned)
* Mark Ahlbright (mentioned)
* Hector Fuentes (mentioned)
* Andrea Van Dyson (mentioned)
* Calvin Liddiard (mentioned)

### Locations

* Cramburg, Montana
	+ Campbell Residence
	+ Calvin's Tavern (71 Union Street)
	+ Cramburg Township Union Hall (77 Union Street)
	+ Cramburg Township Police Department (12 Pioneer Way)
	+ John Robert Horner High School (mentioned)
* Snowden, Montana
* Madison, Wisconsin
	+ Kendall Residence (913 Cascadia Lane)
	+ Algonquin Heights Middle School (1402 Wyoming Way)
* Fargo, North Dakota
* Red Cedar, Minnesota
	+ Cass Lake, Minnesota
		- Lake Windigo, Minnesota (mentioned)
* The Nihil
* Ely, Minnesota
	+ Vanover Lodge
	+ Mitchell Lake
	+ Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses
* Al-Shatrah, Iraq (flashback)
* Gatlinburg, Tennessee (photograph)
* Great Falls (mentioned)
* Bemidji, Minnesota (mentioned)
* Boise, Idaho (mentioned)
* Valley of Hinnom, Israel (mentioned)
* Nasiriyah, Iraq (mentioned)
* Alaska, United States (mentioned)

## Development

### Pre-Production

Pre-production on *Apocalypse* began in August of 2010 with a series of e-mails between author Todd Cooper and *Reawakening* creator Martin J. Kevil: both members of the now-defunct *Jurassic Park Legacy* community. At the time, Cooper had been toying around with turning his latest written project: an action-adventure known as *Lost Island*, into a web comic, while Martin had already begun work on his own horror-themed web comic. As the two projects both played with the concept of "zombie dinosaurs" (albeit, with the origins of the creatures as well as the tone, plot, and settings being vastly different), the idea was pitched of doing a crossover between the two properties, whilst feigning a public rivalry.

At the time, *Lost Island* was to be the *fourth* installment of an ongoing series headed by Cooper, consisting of two completed screenplays and an episodic machinima series that had already released several episodes by the time *Apocalypse* had entered production. This multimedia franchise would ultimately serve as the precursor what would eventually become *The Placebo Effect* series, and likewise, the franchise's loosely connected mythos included the concept of a "multiversal Groundhog's Day", featuring a character of whom, upon death, would be reborn into an alternate universe. This concept, loosely inspired by the time loops of the *When They Cry* franchise, allowed the crossover with *Reawakening* to be realized, as the two projects had otherwise shared incompatible continuities.

However, as the scientific origin of *Reawakening's* zombie plague and prehistoric creatures had drawn confliction with the quasi-religious and mythological elements that had pulled the strings in *Lost Island's* weaved multiverse, Cooper would choose to abandon the previous installments and instead begin crafting a new canon: with this crossover (now christened as ***Reawakening 2: Apocalypse***) serving as the canonical second installment of both consecutive franchises. As before, the new franchise would tell the story of Liam Kendall's journey through the multiverse, however, the determinate force behind his cycle of rebirths and the recurring apocalypses therein, would not only be given more prescience in the story as a central mystery, but would abandon the high-fantasy elements. Cooper would pen the series, while Kevil would serve as a creative advisor and oversee the series continuity and adherence to canon, whilst also continuing his duties as the series illustrator for *Apocalypse* after production on the first series had completed.

### Production

The earliest production began for *Apocalypse* on September 8th, 2010, with a rough draft for the first issue. At the time, *Reawakening* would've told the story of The Fall of Cramburg, while *Apocalypse* would serve as a direct sequel, picking up directly after the events of the former's ending (which would see the survivors being rescued by the military and soon learning that the scope of the outbreak had extended far beyond the borders of their hometown). The refugee camp would become overrun shortly after their arrival and Joseph and his group would find themselves arriving in the ghost town of [[]]. The second issue would serve as a flashback that would introduce the reader to the new cast of characters from Cooper's franchise introduced in the ending of the first (such as Lyla Painter and Nick Brooks) and retell the events of "outbreak day" from their perspective. Cooper also created the concept of the virus being airborne in high-concentrations as a means to explain the quick spread of the virus and the collapse of major cities within days of the initial outbreak.

As both series were being written simultaneously, Cooper would frequently have to update and change elements of *Apocalypse* to accommodate the changes made to the characters, story and lore of *Reawakening*. This was partially addressed in the draft for the first issue, by having the primary protagonists of *Reawakening* (Joseph Stieker, Ajay Siddiqui, Meraj Siddiqui, Phil Johnson and Rachel Trau) become temporarily separated from the series' secondary cast, with the overall story focusing on the attempted reuniting of the two groups. This gave Kevil the freedom to continually alter and change the secondary cast and their fates without hindering Cooper's writing, allowing the latter to focus more on developing the original and non-recurring characters without fear that they would be retroactively killed off and, thus, their roles in the story needing to be reworked to suit a different character.

Over the following month, Kevil would begin drawing and inking for the first several issues of *Reawakening* whilst Cooper continued to write drafts and plot out the eight issues that would make up *Apocalypse*. This would see the introduction of many new characters and plot threads that would later be scrapped from *Apocalypse*: such as a third group of survivors who would learn of a "safe zone" in Washington, D.C. and would pass this information to Liam Kendall before dying -- who would then pass this information to Joseph Stieker, as well as a tangent subplot involving Kayla: a miraculously immune nine-year-old girl whose brain would be harvested in the desperate search of a cure. *Apocalypse* primary antagonists at that point would've been a rogue military faction led by *Lt. General Theodore Moore*, who would be hunting Joseph's group in the belief that that they were the ones who sabotaged the refugee camp.

By late-2010, pre-planning on a third series began, which would take place two years after the events of *Reawakening* and it's sequel. The story would follow the survivors of the original encountering a new colony of survivors at the base of the Appalachian Mountains in Kentucky, along with other colonies along the range. One of these would being a sadistic blood cult led by a charismatic half-zombified leader: this subplot merged with a similar antagonistic cult subplot established in *Apocalypse*, and this cult leader quickly dethroned the character of Lt. General Moore as becoming the main antagonist of *Apocalypse*.

## Influence & Themes

*Apocalypse* was influenced (to various extents) by numerous existing works and pop culture including the works of Stephen King (*It, The Stand,* and *The Mist*) and H.P. Lovecraft (The Shadow over Innsmouth, ), *Supernatural, [•REC]², The Wailing, A Quiet Place, Stranger Things, The Revolt of the Angels, When Cicadas Cry, Siren: Blood Curse, Pathologic, Darkwood, The Ritual, The VVitch, Lovecraft Country, Antlers, Evil Dead, World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, His Dark Materials, Until Dawn, Day of the Dead, Resident Evil 2, 30 Days of Night, The Walking Dead, American Gods, Star Wars: Death Troopers, Dead Rising 2: Case Zero, Shaun of the Dead, Bleach, Zombieland,* and *Highschool of the Dead*.