Review – East Of West #13 (Image Comics)

Publisher: Image Comics
Writer: Johnathan Hickman
Artist: Nick Dragotta
Release Date: 2nd July 2014

So if you had your doubts about the last few issues of EoW due to it being somewhat politics-heavy and you’ve been wondering where our favourite man in white is, then this is definitely the issue you’ve been waiting for. If Death isn’t one of you’re favourite stories in the book then i’m sorry to be the one to break it to you but you’re wrong. Very wrong.

The issue opens with a bang, literally, as it follows on from the next split second since we last saw Death, Crow and Wolf. As a single issue, it’s exactly what you’d expect, and Dragotta does a perfect job of having the panels flowing seamlessly from one to the other with a level of expressiveness that would suck in even the most judgmental of readers. Even with something as relatively simple as character design, he has the Lawman being similar enough to death in design, but while Death is in crisp white and perfectly composed, the new bounty hunter is all chaos, with a massive bike and a dog/gun hybrid that would be the pride of any backwater, sci-fi hick.

Speaking of Hick, Hickman once again proves that he’s one of the undisputed modern day masters of his craft. While the rest of the story may have moved into more political grounds of late, being much slower paced, this is high octane, balls to the wall, all-out action. With almost the entire issue being a fight scene, you’d be forgiven for thinking that it would be light on actual substance, but not only would you be dead wrong (pun slightly intended), it actually gives one of the most heartfelt insights into Death than we’ve seen so far in the series.

If this book wasn’t on your pull list before then this should definitely be the issue to drag you in. Once again, the team of Hickman and Dragotta prove that they’re a force to be reckoned with, and I truly think that we could be seeing the start of something we’ll be talking about for years to come with this book.

Rating: 4/5.

Chris_Avatar The writer of this piece was: Chris Bennett
Article: And Now For Something Completely Different
You can also find Chris on Twitter.