Sex Criminals
(Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky)



Sex Criminals tells the story of a young couple who discover they have the power to freeze time during funny business. They decide to use their power to perpetrate a "victimless" crime by stealing money from the bank the guy works at, but soon discover there are other characters who can breach their frozen world. The first three issues are mostly set-up, explaining how the characters discovered their powers, how they met one another, the background behind the crime they're planning to commit, and the shadowy characters that stalk them during the robbery. There's a lot of mature content, but it's mostly played for laughs. As further proof that we're living in the cinematic age of comics, Fraction and Zdarsky use a ton of film and TV techniques to tell the story -- flashbacks, flash forwards, voiceover, direct-to-camera narration, surrealist dance numbers, etc.

Will I keep reading it? Absolutely! For the first several pages, I was like, "Uh, what's this?" Similar to watching the first episode of a new TV show. But once I got used to how Fraction was presenting the story, I found it engrossing. Whether you find it funny or not is a matter of personal taste. It has a modern feel to it that may be off-putting for classic comics fans, but from an industry standpoint, I felt like I was reading the next big thing after Saga. I also thought it highlighted the possibility of being able to do work for Marvel or DC and still create your own content through publishers such as Image. Admittedly, this is easier for writers than artists, but unless you're absolutely fed up with working for the Big Two, I don't see why it has to be one or the other. 

Aren't most of the comics published in 2013 still less than ten years old?

Comics from 1993 are certainly more than ten years old.

Rat Queens
(Kurtis J. Wiebe and Roc Upchurch)



Rat Queens is set in a medieval fantasy world and follows the exploits of a band of all-girl adventurers. 

It's similar to Saga in that, even though it's set in a fantasy world, the characters use modern slang and speak like a bunch of sassy 20-something year-olds. That took some getting used to when I first read Saga, but I've come to realize how important vernacular is when appealing to a modern audience. Rat Queens has also won praise for its portrayal of LGBT characters and its strong female characters. I'm not a huge fantasy guy, however I do like some sword and sorcery/fantasy works like Conan and Elfquest, and I feel as though I have a basic familiarity with the genre and its tropes. Serious fans may be able to pick holes in Wiebe's presentation of a fantasy world, but for a casual fan like me, it seemed like a pretty good send up. 

Will I keep reading it? Sure, it was fun, and I liked the characters. The only reservations I have are that the creative team changed several times, including the original artist being dropped from the title after being arrested on domestic violence charges, and it appears to have a rocky publication history, so I'm not sure it maintains the same quality the whole way through.

High Crimes
(Christopher Sebela and Ibrahim Moustafa)



Another series that started out as a digital comic, High Crimes tells the story of a pair of climbing guides who rob the corpses of climbers who've died on the peaks of the Himalayas in a bid to have their loved ones pay for the bodies to be retrieved. When their latest find turns out to be a government agent with a bevy of state secrets hidden on his body, the pair become targets. Now, that's what I call a hook! High Crimes is a high concept crime thriller, not dissimilar to Whiteout, Greg Rucka's story of crime and murder in Antarctica. I wasn't blown away by the way the artwork looked, but you could tell the artist was working hard to collaborate with the writer on the storytelling, and I tend to be more forgiving of the art when I like the story. If you've ever read a Vertigo series, you'll know what I'm talking about. 

Will I keep reading it? For sure. It only lasted 12 issues, so it shouldn't be too hard to finish. I don't know if the payoff will match the setup, but it definitely grabbed my attention. 

Aside from Sex Criminals, the Harveys featured entirely different nominees for Best New Series. The Harvey nominations, if you remember, are voted for by professionals working in the industry, whereas the Eisner nominations are chosen by a panel of judges. I'm interested in the differences in preference between the creators and readers, and curious to see where the overlap in Sex Criminals occurs.

The Harveys nominees were:

Sex Criminals
Afterlife with Archie
Six-Gun Gorilla
Suicide Risk
Quantum and Woody

Since we have a lot of Archie fans around here, I'll assume that Afterlife with Archie is the book that most people are familiar with. It takes the Archie characters and throws them in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. I know some folks may be zombied out at this point, but I really enjoyed the debut issue, which not only plays with the zombie genre, but is a loving tribute to teen slasher flicks as well. I recommend this if you grew up on a steady dose of VHS horror rentals.

Six-Gun Gorilla is a sci-fi western story that makes use of an old public domain character, the aforementioned gorilla. Quite a brilliant mashup of genres and influences. The art wasn't quite to my liking, but the world-building was reminiscent of Moebius in parts. The writing was strong in the first issue with the author managing to kickstart the plot while still providing snippets of exposition. 

Suicide Risk is by Mike Carey of Lucifer fame. it's basically a different take on superheroes. Instead of being bit by a radioactive spider or being caught in a Gamma bomb explosion, people buy superhero powers off dealers and immediately turn bad. I'm a little burned out on alternative takes on superheroes, especially the same old take where the super-powered characters turn out to be assholes, but I'm willing to give Carey time. I didn't like his initial Lucifer mini-series all that much, but the ongoing series has been brilliant, so we'll see what he can do with this series with a few more issues under his belt. 

Quantum and Woody was a huge surprise. I was completely unfamiliar with the original version of this series, as I only ever followed Valiant from afar, and I almost didn't read it, as I thought the background to the series was too messy, but this is a complete re-imagining and doesn't require any prior knowledge of the characters. And to my great surprise, it's a goofy superhero book that's actually quite funny. There's one plot point that's a little weak, involving a detective who is immediately convinced that Quantum and Woody are guilty of a crime they didn't commit, but aside from that it was a charming first issue. 

So what generalizations can we make about the Eisners and the Harveys? 

I thought all of the books that were nominated were worthwhile candidates. I feel that the Eisner Judges lean more towards representation, not only regarding gender and race, but also different mediums like digital comics. The creators lean more towards superhero comics, and I suspect they placed more emphasis on visual style. Both sets of voters were attracted to high concept ideas, which I suppose is where the overlap occurred with Sex Criminals, which ticks all the boxes that the voters were looking for -- unique concept that's well-executed and visually appealing. I didn't find myself preferring one set of nominees over the other. My own set of nominees would probably be a mix of both lists. My overall takeaway from Best New Series was that there was a lot of talented people out there producing new books in 2013. Not all those ideas stuck and became long running series, but the creativity is undeniable.