The pair worked with colorist Mark Englert and cover artist Jenny Frison to produce the series, which was published by Image Comics as 47 monthly issues released between July 2012 and February 2017.

The story is centered on detective Dana Cypress and her revived sister Em as it touches on religious, moral and social themes.

A partnership between the local sheriff's office and the CDC creates a task force to process any crime that involves one of the twenty-three known "revivers" (people who came back to life).

Meanwhile, various townspeople begin to see glowing ghost-like figures in the surrounding woods (referred to as "creeps" in writer Tim Seeley's scripts).

Edmund Holt, a local man paranoid about government overreach, organizes a group to resist what he believes are unlawful actions.

General Louise Cale is installed as a temporary governor and uses her power to move all known revivers to the dairy farm facility.

However, Em's recent pregnancy provided additional life force and caused an imbalance that resulted in Revival Day.

[1] Seeley was interested in setting a story in a small town so he could write about the kind of crimes that happen in a place where people prefer to live far away from each other.

In the week leading up to the series announcement, Image teased the release in the form of fake newspaper articles and ads.

[1][6] Seeley and Norton both had heavy workloads when they began Revival, and the complexity of the story meant they needed to cut back on other projects.

[2][9][10] This setting meant religion would need to play a significant role in the plot because Wausau is a "very religious ... predominantly Christian" place.

[11] The conclusion of the series was determined from the outset, but the path to the finale was adaptable and there were enough ideas to keep the comic going for as long as sales would support it.

Early drafts of the first issue included scenes showing the worldwide response to Revival Day, but they were cut to focus on the people of Wausau.

[23][24] It quickly sold out at the distributor level and went through at least four printings by December 2012, including one as part of the "Image Firsts" line of $1 reprints in November.

[25] In January 2013, the Phantom group, retailers who commission exclusive covers to provide further attention to series they believe deserve more support, selected Revival to be part of the project.

On October 25, 2014, Screen Panel released four art prints based on the series created by Angela An, Randy Ortiz, and Frison.

[36] In 2016, an Em Cypress minimate figure was included in the first wave of the Comic Book Heroes series from Diamond Select Toys.

[46] Rich Johnston went further, saying it distinguished itself from traditional horror stories in general with "compelling psychological themes, undercurrents of religious fervour, and a slick medical detective veneer".

The series' specific focus on non-white people, such as the Hmong and Native Americans who live in the area, was appreciated by reviewer Ginnis Tonic.

[8] Slate columnist Dan Kois described the series as "grounded in the economic and familial realities of small-town life".

[48] Truitt found the mood and themes to be a mix of Elmore Leonard and the Coen brothers,[5] while Kois described Norton's art as "wonderfully specific and evocative of the rural Midwest".

[48] Englert's contributions were singled out by Comic Book Resources' Doug Zawisza, who thought the colors added an "edginess" to the story.

[53] Kat Calamia found the series had a "bittersweet ending that brings ... great closure to character arcs" and called it "a satisfying conclusion for longtime readers" in her review of the final issue for Newsarama.

[54] James Ferguson agreed in his review for Horror Talk, emphasizing the creators' success at ending "every plot thread that has been hanging out there in a satisfying manner".

[57] Jenny Frison, who has been called the underappreciated star of the series,[39] was nominated for Best Cover Artist in 2013 and 2015 in part because of her work on Revival.

[57][58] In October 2012, Seeley and Norton said major networks had approached them about developing a Revival television series, and later mentioned NBC specifically.

[3][59] Around this same time, ABC Studios was involved in a bidding war for the rights to The Returned, an unpublished novel by Jason Mott that dealt with similar themes.

He said the announcement was "unfortunate" because they had been working with talented people to adapt Revival,[3] but the television developments would have limited Seeley and Norton's creative input.

[59] In September 2013, A&E bought the rights for an American remake of the French television series Les Revenants (The Returned), which is also about dead people coming back to life as they were before.

[61] In September 2024, the main cast was revealed (including Melanie Scrofano in the lead as Dana Cypress) and that shooting has begun in New Brunswick, Canada.