Also among this week's comics...

BERLIN #10 - Always worth drawing this excellent series to your attention.  If you're not already reading it, you should start with the first trade rather than jump in here.  Those already on board will get exactly what they expect - more of Lutes' fabulously convincing analysis of the spiralling apart of interwar Germany, a thorough social deconstruction held together by brilliant art and convincing characters.  One of the best books out there.  A+

BEWARE THE CREEPER #2 - Sticking with historical fiction set in mainland Europe, but throwing in an incongruous revival of a Jack Kirby character, Beware the Creeper really shouldn't work.  But somehow it does, as the Creeper sets about her campaign to make life thoroughly miserable for the anti-surrealist establishment.  It's a total reinvention of the character, of course, but taken purely in isolation the bizarre visuals do seem strangely at home here.  A strange book, but a surprisingly decent one.  A-

THE CREW #1 - Basically, this seems to be the book that Black Panther is going to steadily morph into, since the cast are moving over here once that title gets cancelled, and Crew is also written by Christopher Priest.  It's a street level crime story with only the slightest of superhero trappings, which plays to Priest's strengths. Joe Bennett's pencils are perfectly solid, but I'm not convinced by the curious decision to do about half the book in panels which span the whole page, which often descends into letterboxes when the story calls for more than four panels a page.  It looks a bit cramped to my tastes.  B+

DAREDEVIL #47 - Or, "What the Kingpin was up to during last issue."  Bendis is doing the routine where the Kingpin returns and builds up his empire from scratch.  I'm sure this has been done before, but Bendis does it very well.  The Kingpin has no resources besides the loyalty of his supporters, but after a few months of seeing what things were like without him, boy are they loyal.  Good stuff.  A-

RUNAWAYS #2 - The orders for issue #1 weren't exactly great, but then what do you expect for a series featuring no established characters at all?  It deserves better - even though it's going through the phase where the title is a bit of a clue as to what the lead characters are going to decide, there's enough detail in the characterisation and group dynamics to hold attention in its own right.  Good little book, and I encourage you to give it a try if you haven't done so already.  A-

THREE STRIKES #2 - The other book this week from the writers of New Mutants, and the better one.  A degree of political attack on the "three strikes" policy, but mainly a strong character piece following both Billy, who's on the run, and the bounty hunter who's trying to track him down.  Convincing characters, and a focus on the presonal, stop it from veering into didacticism.  A strong series, and I hope to see this sort of thing filtering through into New Mutants.  A-

On Monday, another Article 10 is still up at Ninth Art.

Next week, Mystique #2, Uncanny X-Men #424, Weapon X #9, X-Treme X-Men #26 and another mangaverse miniseries which I'll probably skip.  See you then.

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