Scarlet ratchets up her vendetta against the Portland police department after bringing her dead boyfriend's best bud into the caper.
The Good
The sequence recounting the two guys' lives in a series of stark snapshots was absolutely virtuoso. Like, it was seriously one of the most memorably stylistic choices I've seen in comics in a while. I'm really enraptured with the daring tone of this book - - how a good portion of it's about Scarlet just talking to the audience, speaking with the kind of no-tomorrow conviction you'd think only a young man full of piss and vinegar could write. Brave to Bendis on this girl's distinct voice!
The Bad
While I do appreciate stylistic experimentation, I wish Maleev had abstracted his background as much as he stylized his figures. I don't have a problem with using photo references, per se, but I feel like the world would've been a little more unified if the settings didn't look so often like solarized photos that had been composited under drawn figures.
The Verdict - 4.5/5
I never got into any of Bendis' pre-Powers crime noir stories, but I'm so glad to see him returning to the genre with this book. More than anything, I'm just so pleased to see a genuinely provocative and experimental comic with the kind of presentation and production value that's usually mainstream book's sole purview. I'm a little hesitant about the potentially-volatile "cop killer" message of this book, but I suppose I'd rather it push some buttons than not even approach them at all.
