creators: Matt Fraction & Chip Zdarsky
release date: January 2014
publisher: Image Comics
The fourth issue of Sex Criminals gives us a peak into our villains, who seem like, forgive me, some sort of “Sex Police,” and we find new tidbits of interesting backstory for our heroes, Jon and Suzie–and yet while this issue feels full, we still seem to be inching forward towards the story at the slowest pace possible.
Fraction’s witty humor and Zdarsky’s often hilarious yet poignant way of bringing those words to life are still in full force here, even though this clearly feels like a bridge issue. We are further introduced to the “villains” who catch Jon and Suzie at the bank and attempt to apprehend them. But while we are treated to some sort of space-floating headquarters with an arsenal of sex police personnel–like some Justice League Unlimited episode gone way awry–we’re not sure how hilariously accurate it all is, since we remain in Suzie’s hypothesizing during this crucial moments. While we see the head leader (whom Suzie imagines as a soccer mom with an alter ego) somewhat dubiously alerted to Suzie and Jon’s shenanigans at Cum World, and then their plans to rob the bank, her and her team’s motives still remain a mystery. I assume a fuller explanation will be revealed in the next issue, which allows for both sillier moments in this installment, but also that frustrating feeling of plodding along as slowly as possible.
And in this issue Jon asks Suzie an interesting question: “have you ever used your ‘power’ to get what you want?”, or, in other words, has she ever taken advantage of the fact that she can stop time. While we see lots of moments where she’s done exactly that, the one Fraction & Zdarsky choose to highlight expands on Suzie’s relationship with her best friend Rachel – at once amusing and also sheds light on the dark side of sex. It also smartly ties into how Rachel doesn’t really repay Suzie at the end, either.
Zdarsky has a charming but totally authentic way of inserting “present Suzie” into the story as a kind of omniscient first-person narrator. She often wears amusing clothing–such as a professor outfit during the flashback to Rachel and Suzie in college–and, in the same way that Suzie and Jon’s childhoods speak of a nostalgic, earlier time, also feels similarly anachronistic.
A good issue but it still felt like a filler; it its a clear hint to one who prefers to buy in trade paperback, rather than in single issues.
Reading Art 