Comicsphere: 100 Bullets

The best ideas tend to be the simple ones — high concept is fine but has to be cooked with as much delicacy and precision as a souffle. This story takes a simple premise — a person who has a reason to want revenge is given irrefutable evidence that their target committed the crime, 100 untraceable bullets and carte blanche to act how they want. From there we see how the whole thing plays out for each character.

You have to then start wondering what Agent Grave\’s motivation is for giving people this power. Then you have to wonder who exactly is he an agent for? The art works to, at points, let you see inside his head just through the medium of his face — and damn if it doesn\’t look like a deep dark abyss in there. So pretty soon the simple idea of a 100 untraceable bullets and revenge with no come back start to look less simple. It takes power to pull that off. Big choices, life changing choices — they are never simple. Split Second Chance the second volume starts to show more of what is going on behind the scenes, more of who Graves might be and what exactly he is trying to achieve by moving these pieces around on the chess board.

The whole story is grounded because he takes real people (and they do seem real) off of the streets and lets them work their story to some kind of closure. Graves is the man with the plan — these are people who have had something wrong done to them being given a chance to bring balance to the universe. The whole picture will reveal itself in time. Each story stands alone perfectly well, being self contained, working to build tension for themselves as much as servicing the larger arc. They drive hard and they drive fast, pulling not a single punch in their delivery.

You can read these books easily — you slide right along through them, almost as if you are absorbing the body blows they deliver in passing. They have ideas that stick with you, make you think, and resonate afterwards. They offer something different to a lot of other crime based things I have read and they are definitely a breath of fresh air when considered alongside the tropes that govern the super hero comics which bloat the market. Art and story mesh to bring you something that seems complete, not lacking a single ingredient. Go check them out.