The Man With the Getaway Face

It was just over a month ago that I finally got around to reading The Hunter, the first graphic adaptation featuring Richard Stark's Parker, and it was a surprise.

I hadn't read the original books, so after a quick skim it looked like a hard-boiled detective story. It has that feel to it, but Parker is not a heroic figure at all - he's a hardened criminal who lives by his own code, and uses his brains and his incredible toughness to overcome any obstacle.

Here we get the story of an attempt to rob an armored car, and the struggle to put together a team that can work together. It's not my favorite kind of story, but one thing guaranteed I'd be reading the story: it was adapted by Darwyn Cooke, one of the top writer/artists working in comics today.

And since Frank Miller seems to be taking an extended break from Sin City, it's good to finally have another testosterone-loaded story floating around.

If you were put off by the high price on The Hunter ($24.99), then here's a real bargain for you - The Man With the Getaway Face can be yours for a mere two bucks! It's 24 pages long, printed on oversized paper with a two-color process.

It's raw, hard-edged and impossible to put down. Cooke shows his storytelling chops by crafting a story with relatively little action, but loads of tension and drama, great characters and a story that will keep you guessing.

Cooke is that rare breed - few writers are good artists, and few artists are good writers - but Cooke does either craft with equal skill, and my rule of thumb is simple - if he's working on it as artist, writer or both, I'm buying it.

He hasn't disappointed me yet.

Grade: A