The issue opens with a recap of the previous issues. Only it’s more confusing than anything else–DeConnick has so much going on, what with mixing a Western with the supernatural and all. The recap implies someone might actually be able to follow the comic… and, if one out there is following the story without taking notes, more power to them.
But I tend to think Pretty Deadly works so well because it doesn’t need to make sense necessarily. Not along the way. Along the way, DeConnick writes good scenes and Rios draws good scenes and they all add up to something in the end.
It’s still a Western after all. These guys are doing this thing over here, those guys are looking for the first guys and so on. The rest of it doesn’t matter too much. The details make Deadly different, but it’s a Western; a good one.
B+
CREDITS
Writer, Kelly Sue DeConnick; artist, Emma Rios; colorist, Jordie Bellaire; letterer, Clayton Cowles; editor, Sigrid Ellis; publisher, Image Comics.
I want to see DeConnick’s script for this comic, just because I want to know how much Rios comes up with on her own and how much is already in the script. Because there’s a lot I can’t imagine someone getting from just the text of a script. There’s a big action sequence too and that action is very straightforward (compared to the rest of the comic) but the scenes leading up to the action? They’re bewildering.
I think Pretty Deadly is off to a good start but it’s hard to say for sure. Kelly Sue DeConnick is doing a maybe supernaturally themed Western and, if she’s not, she’s doing revisionist Western. Or she’s doing both at once.
