I think they must have wanted to sell it to cable. Ennis does a great season one finish. Not, you know, like a good narrative finish or something. But a good commercial one. You can just see it on the TV screen.

But Ennis has lost his characters. They’re secondary to his big action sequence and it’s not a good one. It doesn’t play well in a comic. Ennis goes with short lines of dialogue and they don’t resonate when being read in a row. There’s not enough content. It’s all flash.

Cermak does a little better with the action. Except his art seems much slicker than before. There’s not as much energy to the comic and it needs a bunch for this last issue.

Ennis peaked early on this book but the conclusion is far worse than one would have thought. The ending feels tacked on and wholly artificial.

C- 

CREDITS

The Rules (Reprise); writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editors, Hannah Gorfinkel, Molly Mahan and Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.

It’s a bad issue. Ennis rushes through the entire thing, only gets in a single moment of personality. I guess he tries to open with personality, with the female cop apparently doing a mock eulogy for a terrible cop. But it’s way too forced. It’s Ennis on a soapbox and one he doesn’t care about. Red Team is not a deep rumination on the NYPD or police officers. Not sure why Ennis feels the need to pretend here.

Then it’s immediately into a contrived hurrying up of the resolution to the big plot twist. It’s like Ennis thought the series would go on longer and then found out, this issue, he had two more to go and then he was cancelled.

But it’s a limited series so Ennis should have paced it better. All of the personality is gone from the characters, even the supporting ones act rather differently.

Boo.

C- 

CREDITS

The Fallen; writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editors, Molly Mahan and Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.

Ennis sets up an obvious plot development for the end of the issue and doesn’t go with it, though he’s got time. Instead, he sneaks in a different surprise. He’s been setting it up for a number of issues, but very discreetly. It’ll be interesting to see if he goes with that first obvious one.

Now, neither of these plot developments are the big twist. The issue ends with a big twist. Who knows what Ennis will do with it, but it’s a definite fifth issue twist. He’s winding down the comic; the surprises will be limited from here on, just because he’s not trying to make the reader care about new things anymore.

The rest of the issue is decent. A couple really good little moments, some interesting talking heads scenes–not so much in content, but in Ennis giving them the time.

He’s having fun winding things down.

B 

CREDITS

The Night of Nights; writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editor, Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.

The issue has some of Ennis’s most ambitious ideas and he doesn’t connect with them. He’s got the female cop–darned if I can remember any of the characters names except Eddie the good cop protagonist and Duke the team leader–getting into an altercation with an attempted rape at a night club. It’s just after she’s had an argument with her sister. They’re in a bar. There are a lot of layers. And Ennis tries to move them all together, but it doesn’t work. His characters aren’t strong enough.

However, there are some really nice scenes in here. Even when the scenes aren’t entirely successful, like the talking heads between the female cop and good guy Eddie at the end. It’s a decent enough scene, paced really well.

Just not great.

Cermak can’t do the action either. He can’t maintain the figures for the fight scene.

Still, perfectly decent.

B 

CREDITS

The Bullet-Dodgers; writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editor, Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.

Ennis pulls Red Team up a notch with this issue. He’s got a lot on the killer cops, but they’re after a pedophile priest–and Ennis manages to restrain himself when they’re all talking about the Catholic Church too. It’s impressive.

But that sequence is actually awkward. It goes on too long, since the protagonist is doing the actual killing. So there’s got to be something special about it because this guy’s better rendered than his partners. Until the end, when the guy is talking to his partner–the single lady detective–at the bar and he’s whining about his life and so on. There’s nothing about the main plot; these two cops killing criminals in their off-time doesn’t figure in, it’s just a good scene.

And it’s the best scene in the series so far, because if Ennis is developing the main plot with it, he’s not showing his cards.

Very solid.

B+ 

CREDITS

The God Squad; writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editor, Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.

So Ennis is going to go through various interrogations, which surprised me. I sort of figured there’d be a big shoot out at the end, Reservoir Dogs style. Maybe he’s still got time.

Cermak still has issues with depth. His faces are all very detailed, maybe too much–they almost looks an etching sometimes–but they seem taped onto their background. This issue it’s slightly better, maybe because he doesn’t do so many close-ups.

Ennis continues the story, very rationally laying out the rules for the titular Red Team when they go out and kill people. There’s a really lame subplot for the good cop, who has a wife suffering multiple miscarriages and so on. Again, Ennis isn’t trying here. Some of his plotting seems straight out of a daytime soap. Not even a night-time one.

But the dialogue’s quite good and the issue works out well enough.

B 

CREDITS

The Rules; writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editor, Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.

Garth Ennis must have really wanted to write for “The Shield”. Or maybe Dynamite asked him to do something ready for Hollywood and not too expensive so he came up with Red Team.

An elite unit of cops decides to kill a bad guy. There’s one reluctant member and he apparently lives through the series because he’s getting interrogated. Not the most original narrative structure for this kind of thing, but Ennis is on auto-pilot. While there’s some decent talking heads stuff and good little moments throughout, Ennis isn’t going for anything special.

As a formula cop thing? It’s all right. Depending on the cast, I’d probably watch the show. He seems to be gearing it towards a mini-series sale–it’s weird to think independent comics weren’t always so desperate for the movie or TV option. Especially not a guy like Ennis.

Craig Cermak’s art detailed but shallow.

B- 

CREDITS

The First-Timers; writer, Garth Ennis; artist, Craig Cermak; colorist, Adriano Honorato Lucas; letterer, Rob Steen; editor, Joe Rybandt; publisher, Dynamite Entertainment.