On to this week's new releases.  Red is a three-issue miniseries by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner.  Ellis seems to have developed a fondness for the three-issue mini, which is a little ironic given that he's trained his audience to wait for the trade, and three issues is a bit short for a trade paperback.

Anyhow, Red is one of Ellis' action thrillers.  Retired CIA agent Paul Moses apparently did some very nasty things indeed back in the day, but is now living out a happy retirement looking after his orchard.  The CIA have left him in peace for years, but when a new director is appointed and finds out what Moses actually did, he decides that Moses has to go - just in case anyone else finds out.

Cue the action sequences.

This is not, then, one of Ellis' big idea comics.  It sets up its premise, sketches out the characters efficiently, and then brings on the action.  The hints at deeper characterisation and the contrast with Moses' pastoral set-up scenes give it a bit more weight, but really it's all about the action sequences and the thriller plot. 

The action sequences are particularly notable for the way they play with time.  One of the interesting things about comics as a medium is that you can have as much or as little time passing between panels as you want.  Red features several sequences where time grinds to a virtual halt, with whole pages covering tiny fragments of time.  As I write that, I realise that it sounds horribly like the overused "bullet time" gimmick.  It's sort of like that, I suppose, in that it makes a point of bringing out elements that would normally go by too fast to register (or, in comics, even be depicted).  But this is more about cutting between extreme close-ups, and the absence of written sound effects - Ellis hates them - gives it a curiously ethereal feel.

Hamner's art is more than up to the job of carrying this extremely detailed storytelling.  Not to mention hinting at hidden depths in the lead character and bringing out the comedy in the prologue scene, which is all about the acting.  This is a fabulously executed book.  Simple, straightforward, but very well done indeed.

Rating: A

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