CROSSED VOL. 6 (Avatar, 2013; Hardcover)
Collects
Crossed:
Badlands
Nos. 19-28 (cover
dates November, 2012- April, 2013)
Writers:
Garth Ennis (Nos. 25-28), David Lapham (No. 21-24), and Si Spurrier
(Nos. 19, 20)
Artists:
Raulo Caceres (Nos. 19, 20, 25-28) and Miguel Ruiz (Nos. 21-24)
Colorist:
Digikore Studios
This
volume collects three arcs. The Fatal Englishman takes place
five years after the whole Crossed event originally occurred. In this
story, Father Dennis Kingston and his flock of children are rescued
by a group of ragtag survivors armed to the teeth and on a mission to
rid the world of the Crossed once and for all. Garth Ennis returns to
the fold after a few years away to write this one.
Livers
is the most disturbing tale in this trilogy of terror. Amanda is one
crazy bird who has survived two years in the Crossed-infested world.
She stumbles across a guy who is just as crazy who goes by the name
Danger Montana. He takes her to their basement kingdom in the sewers,
where she meets Sir Killweather and The Great Kong. They have their
own little world hidden away from the Crossed and have been without
the company of a woman for a long time. They are all completely
insane, and things end as well as they can for folks in this insane
world. Some of the gore and mayhem in this series becomes white noise
after a while, but Livers has a few scenes that really shocked
me. Well done!
Conquers
All (Nos. 19 and 20) takes place two days after the initial
event. Serena Long is a police officer with the Los Angeles County
Probation Department. She and Mattias Vichnyak crossed the line
between probation officer and parolee just before the world went to
Hell in a hand basket.
What would you do if someone you loved became infected with a virus/plague like the Crossed? This is the most intriguing premise of this series. What would I do if my family fell victim to something like this? What would any of us do? Could anyone survive in a world gone mad? Would you even want to? It's thinking of scenarios like this that keeps my mind spinning and keeps me turning the page in these books.
There
was an article on Heidi MacDonald's The Beat recently which posed the
question “So what kind of person buys a “Torture Variant”anyways?” In the article and the comments section below, fans
of Crossed are portrayed as adolescent and/or mentally ill,
with folks coming this close to saying that the title
shouldn't be allowed to see print. I have bought every single Crossed
collected edition and don't plan on stopping anytime soon. The series
doesn't fill some “sick void” or provide me with “torture porn”
fantasies. It's over the top and is intended to be so. I find myself
cackling when I read every issue, not unlike Lisa and Bart Simpson
after watching an episode of The Itchy and Scratchy Show.
Crossed is sick and wrong and that is why I love it. It's
shocking and repulsive and everything that is wrong with Horror done
right. Why anyone is up in arms over a Mature Readers title that you
have to be 16+ to buy is beyond me. It's not like they have Crossed
toys or bedhseets on the shelves at Target that my 6 year old son is
begging me to buy for him.
Junk
Food For Thought rating: 4 out of 5.
The
OCD zone- The issues are arranged out of original publication
order. The Fatal Englishman arc is chapters 1-4 in book but is
issues 25-28, Livers is issues 21-24 and Conquers All
is 19 and 20.
They
read fine in the order they are collected in but thought that I would
pass this news along for those with an acute OCD about such things.
Here at The OCD zone we care because we understand...
DVD-style
Extras included in this book:
Some
of the variants are included in a cover gallery in the back. It is
difficult to track down the information as to what issue belongs to
which cover. Even the chapter breaker pages and images are of little
help. Suffice it to say that they are not all here.
Paper
rating: 4.5 out of 5. Nice weight glossy coated stock paper.
Binding
rating: 4.25 out of 5. The sewn binding is stiff due to the
casing being glued square to the spine. It does loosed up as you read
the book, and I am confident that the binding will be better after a
few reads.
Hardback
cover coating rating: 5 out of 5. The super-duper thick
lamination on these Avatar Press hardcovers remains the gold standard
for these dustjacket-free hardbacks.
The person that wrote the column obviously chose to target the book seeing an easy opportunity to accumulate web hits and traffic to his/her site. The column served its purpose but it now seems even some of the writers of Crossed (which do not include Garth Ennis) are also offended by the torture variants and were unaware it was going on. To say this is kind of like having the pot call the kettle black as these covers have been released for months. Its hard to imagine the writers not being aware of the practice, only to suddenly to disown it when others, i.e. the mainstream comic editors and press, show disapproval. The same writers that did Crossed, do work for Marvel and DC in the past well. I'm sure trying to keep their resumes clean for any future assignments that offer higher pay. Two faced is far from the right word to describe it.
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