Love and Rockets is ready to be rediscovered

Gilbert Hernandez, one of the most influential comics creators of the past three decades, has a new zombie-themed epic called Fatima: The Blood Spinners headed for publication in June. The four-part series, which centers on an anti-narcotics cop battling a drug that turns users into flesh-eating ghouls, features many of the same traits that made Hernandez's seminal comic Love & Rockets so groundbreaking: namely, strong female protagonists and moments of graphic mayhem.

For those who can't wait until Fatima: The Blood Spinners becomes available from retailers, we recommend checking out Love and Rockets Library: The Complete Vol. 1 from Fantagraphics, which collects every issue of the landmark alt-comic series between 1982 and 1996. In Love and Rockets, Gilbert and his brother Jaime Hernandez wrote stories ranging from satire to political intrigue, and introduced such noteworthy characters as Luba, the temperamental, full-figured mayor of a Central American village, and Maggie Chascarrillo, a punk rock-loving Mexican girl who becomes a solar mechanic.

With Gilbert's new series on the horizon and a compact L&R collection available, there's no better time to become a Los Bros Hernandez zombie than right now.