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QUEEN & COUNTRY #5
Highly Recommended (9/10)
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Oni Press
Writer: Greg Rucka
Pencils: Brian Hurtt
Inks: Bryan O'Malley
Letters: Sean Konot
Editor: Jamie S. Rich
Price: $2.95 US/$4.50 CAN |
What was originally going to be just the second arc of Queen & Country has become a little more high-profile given that the story's
focus is on the Taliban, and that the story was written prior to 9/11. Rucka's
anger at the Taliban lead him to writing the story, and while not all of his
readers may have been aware of the Taliban's various human rights violations
before, it's pretty likely that they are now. The story shines a light on a
criminal regime who went unchecked for a long time, and as a side benefit, due
to their attitudes about women, it allows Rucka to focus more on Tara Chace's
reaction to her last mission than her actions on this one. The artwork, a fairly
last minute change, is uneven in places due to the relative inexperience of
penciller and inker and no doubt the rushed circumstances of the job, but given
those circumstances, it's pretty impressive.
In Queen & Country, Rucka is coming at espionage from
a different angle. Rather than following the action movie style of James Bond,
he has chosen to show us the politics behind the espionage, as well as the
psychological ramifications. The interaction amongst the various Minders is
great, reminiscent of any office setting, but with the truth always lurking that
what these people do is not office work.
However, the most interesting
facet of this story arc so far has nothing to do with the operation in
Afghanistan, it's a follow-up to Tara Chace's assassination of Markovsky in the
first issue. The exchange between Tara and Doctor Callard is fun stuff, with
both women demonstrating a biting sense of humor and sarcasm. Underneath the
entertaining dialogue, though, there is some real important characterization
going on, and we're seeing how much the events of the past few issues have
disturbed Tara.
Which is not to say that the
espionage elements of this story are uninteresting. Rucka has done a nice job of
painting espionage as dangerous and sneaky work, but he keeps it grounded in the
real rather than going for the cinematic. The Taliban's persecution of
journalists while searching for spies is disgusting and all-too-believable, and
Rucka takes a real-world complication and uses it to enforce a rather unusual
choice for the story, leaving the protagonist out of the center of the action.
While I have to be honest and
say that I'm disappointed not to see Rebecca Woods's debut, I was quite pleased
by the work done by Brian Hurtt and Bryan O'Malley. Though the faces are often a
little inconsistent, in general I found their take on the book to be solid. They
do particularly good work on the interaction between Tara and Callard, playing
up the defensive stance of Tara and the professional, but almost amused, stance
of Callard to another reticent patient. Their work also continues in the
tradition of artwork that Steve Rolston began on the book, but a darker and more
ragged style of inking leaves it feeling rougher and less "cartoony," more
suited to the tone of the story.
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