written by Matt Fraction
drawn by Chip Zdarsky
Reading Sex Criminals, I was struck by how far Image has come from a bunch of ex-Marvel artists writing and drawing their thinly-veiled knockoff superhero stories.
It's basically the story of librarian Suzie and bank worker Jon who are quite unhappy with their lives, the former because her library is facing foreclosure by a bank, and the latter because he basically hates his life, but most of all, his job at the same bank that's about to foreclose on Suzie's library. Aside from their hatred of the bank, they have one other thing in common: when each of them has an orgasm, time stops moving. They hook up, and discover the fact that they share a gift, and do what any disgruntled working class heroes would do: they decide to rob the bank. The problem is, however, their actions are not without consequences, and as they soon learn, in terms of their strange gift, they are not alone.
I know it's been years since Image Comics have diversified as an alternative to the "big two" of comic books, but truth be told I still get taken aback by how startlingly original some of their new material can be. I still remember them as the publisher formed by a bunch of disgruntled Marvel creators who wanted to get rich(er) off their own highly derivative superheroes. They may be raking in the big bucks these days with The Walking Dead, but it's gratifying to see them still giving creators the chance to find their own voice without the constraints of handling someone else's intellectual property.
As original material goes, Sex Criminals is a really special book, and the good news for everyone outside the man-child set is that, despite the obvious opportunity for the creators to go off the deep end in terms of titillation considering that the word "sex" is not only in the title but an integral aspect of the story, they show remarkable restraint. Rather than depict Suzie in cheesecake fashion (though she isn't exactly the plain jane most people in real life tend to be), artist Zdarsky goes for something much more subdued, and Jon is barely attractive at all, as if to smack home the point that these people are anything but superheroes.
Zdarsky's art, however, isn't really all that stellar, and while he's a serviceable storyteller, the real star of the show here is Fraction, who has really created something special here. The comic book is funny and sad and honest, and just...works for me. Fraction's greatest achievement here is making these two characters, whose motivations are basically rather selfish (for all of their rationalizations in the contrary) utterly compelling. It's not always the easiest thing to do; Bryan Lee O'Malley, the creator of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World tried something similar in his original graphic novel Seconds (which I will review next) and basically failed.
The about it is that I, as the reader, could empathize with these people primarily because I believed that, put in the same position and given the same opportunity, I would more or less do the same thing.
My only hope for this series is that I hope that it is finite, as I don't see the conceit supporting a Walking-Dead-length epic without dipping into schlock at some point. Right now, though, ten issues in, there's still a lot Fraction and Zdarsky can do with this concept and I, for one, am looking forward to seeing what they've got.
8.5/10
