What the LAW & ORDER franchise does for TV, the independent CRIME WAVE ANTHOLOGY VOL. 1 wants to do for comics: Create a world of various do-gooder cops and other enforcers of the law, and let them loose in a set of stories that stand alone, yet hold crossover potential.
This issue — the first in a planned biannual series — is comprised of three stories, the first two of which feature FBI agents Chase and Hunt. He’s black, she’s white, and in “Above the Law,” they’re dealing with a case involving a murdered stripper and a corrupt politician — elements that go together like PB&J.
It’s a procedural, albeit one told in eight pages. That’s not much room for a plot to pack a lot of surprises, so it doesn’t. However, it’s still fun and fast-moving, and a nice prelude to the more action-oriented “End Game.” This one struck me as a hybrid of SAW and GAME OF DEATH, in which a serial killer with the unimaginative moniker of The Game Master has taken over a correctional facility, forcing Chase to make his way through level by level, encountering a different rough-and-tumble baddie on each.
Coming in last is the only story that’s not entirely self-contained, “Safe House.” Its main characters are a pair of DEA agents known as The Enforcers. As such, they’re bedecked in cool, G.I. JOE-esque costumes with accompanying weaponry, which will come in handy in protecting a witness against a crime boss and his for-hire assassination team. It ends in a cliffhanger, which will make the six-month wait for VOL. 2 all the more rough.
Carl Herring Jr. writes all three tales with economic storytelling — at times a tad too economic, but certainly running at too quick a clip to be boring, which you can’t say for many mainstream singles. Art is good all around, starting with a bold cover from Norm Breyfogle, to interior work by Scott E. Ambruson and the more painterly Chris Torres.
CRIME WAVE ain’t perfect, but its heart is in the right place. Passion goes a long way; in this case, it’s mildly infectious. —Rod Lott
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