This is issue #2 of the 12-issue maxi-series, but it could just as easily be issue #1. Everything's set-up generally fast, and the story is concluded in this one-issue story. Warren Ellis and Glenn Fabry should be enough to get you to check it out, but here's some more info if you aren't convinced.
What's it about?
Well, a U.S. officer tells us on page one. "The Global Frequency is a civilian rescue operation run by a woman of questionable background and compromising a membership of a thousand and one freaks, geeks and security risks."
In this issue, we've got a squad of undesirables, flawed soldiers -- most former members of different government institutions. Their job? To dismantle a Bionic Man built by the U.S. Air Force. A murdering Bionic Man powered by six nuclear motors, loose in a government base known as the Big Wheel.
Ellis does a really amazing job of setting up the scenario, characters and -- most importantly in this case -- the stakes. What happens if they can't stop him? What is this thing capable of? What's he programmed for? Where's he going next? It's all laid out quick and effectively.
The characters are also defined in a handful of lines, my favorite being a former designer for the Pentagon's non-lethal weapon team. His reasons for joining Global Frequency are compelling and, again, put across in only a few panels.
Ellis's take on the effects of bionic parts, as seen through another member of Global Frequency who has been blessed/cursed with a bionic arm herself, is truly chilling. Makes you squirm just hearing how your spine has to be "reinforced", computer chips in your brain to download and deliver the commands to the bionic parts, etc.
Fabry's visuals, combined with Ellis's dialogue spewing forth from Captain Quinn, create an extremely horrific cyborg and an extremely cool comic.
