The Walking Dead returns with deluxe color editions

(Image credit: David Finch/Dave McCaig (Image Comics/Skybound Entertainment))

Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, and Charlie Adlard's seminal zombie series The Walking Dead returns this October with new deluxe editions of all 193 issues - this time in full color and with bonus material.

Announced Saturday as part of the Skybound Xpo panel 'Skybound: Past, Present, and Future,' the reprint series The Walking Dead Deluxe will launch October 7 and then begin a twice-monthly release schedule in November.

Colorist Dave McCaig has been enlisted to color the original black-and-white series that was adapted into the smash hit AMC TV series, including re-coloring the original covers. Here's a look at pages from the first issue, now in glorious color:

Image 1 of 5

(Image credit: Tony Moore/Dave McCaig (Image Comics/Skybound Entertainment))

Each issue will also include a section titled 'The Cutting Room Floor' featuring Kirkman's handwritten plots, commentary on abandoned storylines and plot points, and more. In 2015, Image/Skybound published a volume of similar material also called The Cutting Room Floor; it's unclear if the material in the new colored series is repurposed from that book, or if it will be brand new to readers.

In addition to the recolored original cover on each edition of The Walking Dead Deluxe, each issue will also come with variant covers from Moore, David Finch, Julian Totino Tedesco, Arthur Adams, and more.

The series will also premiere a new logo for The Walking Dead comics, designed by Skybound art director Andres Juarez.

This is the second time the originally black & white The Walking Dead has been colored. For the series' 10th anniversary in 2013, Image/Skybound released a new edition of The Walking Dead #1 colored by Dave Stewart.

Skybound has no plans to collect the new color reprints of the single issues into collected editions "any time soon." While The Walking Dead collections have been some of the bestselling graphic novels in comics shops and bookstores for the last 15-plus years, the new colored series seems designed to get people into comics books shops for the the individual issues a la the recent one-shot The Walking Dead: Negan Lives.

Chris Arrant covered comic book news for Newsarama from 2003 to 2022 (and as editor/senior editor from 2015 to 2022) and has also written for USA Today, Life, Entertainment Weekly, Publisher's Weekly, Marvel Entertainment, TOKYOPOP, AdHouse Books, Cartoon Brew, Bleeding Cool, Comic Shop News, and CBR. He is the author of the book Modern: Masters Cliff Chiang, co-authored Art of Spider-Man Classic, and contributed to Dark Horse/Bedside Press' anthology Pros and (Comic) Cons. He has acted as a judge for the Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, the Harvey Awards, and the Stan Lee Awards. Chris is a member of the American Library Association's Graphic Novel & Comics Round Table. (He/him)