Grifter is back……..Nuff said! Now anyone that knows me knows that I love WildC.A.T.S., one of the series that kickstarted Image into the powerhouse it is today, now I know it clearly states this new (volume 6!) Incarnation is by DC and yes it is.So a little history lesson…the CATS started in Image, Jim Lee started Wildstorm and took them there, Wildstorm became part of DC and here we are. In the time between Wildcats ending and now, Grifter was adopted by DC and has been a part of that universe ever since.
Roll on 12 years since volume 5 of Wildcats and here we are, we've got Grifter and Zealot in the covers that's gonna get us old timers all excited. Lots of questions are already in my head, how are they going to fold them into DC, which of the Wildcats will be coming back, who will be their 'big bad guy'? Will they do Lee and Choi the justice deserved for the great team they created?
The short answer is yes, yes they bloody did. I thoroughly enjoyed this first issue. It hit me with massive nostalgia.
First off, a great job is done to introduce the characters in a way that welcomes them to new readers and says hello like an old friend to those of us that know them. What it doesn't feel like is an introduction issue, it does enough to set the scene and BOOM! Right into the action. It's refreshing to have a 1st issue that doesn't just hold your hand through the motions.
The story is solid, it has the feel of a freight train going 100 miles an hour (maybe that's just Grifter) there's action and motion to the artwork that makes you feel like you're moving along with it, that you're a stowaway to the story of a news team following the battles. The colours are fresh and sharp, clean lines and bright pages. Stephen Segovia and Elmer Santos bring the CATS into the modern world, it's an update while still paying homage to the original. There's no groundbreaking art style here, but it honestly doesn't need it, it doesn't try to be something else. It's an action movie in comic form, with all the characters you'd expect, the sarcastic hero, the hard and dark heroine, the wildchild and the innocent that's hard as nails….it's got it all.
Overall, being a massive Wildcats fan I couldn't have been happier with Vol 6, it was fresh enough to drag me in and hold me and a great escape from the more serious storylines that we see a lot of in the last couple of years. Seeing the mainstream DC characters arrive in the story was also great and gives me hope that we can see the Wildcats have a larger role in the DC universe and maybe from there more of the Wildstorm characters leaking through and playing on our nostalgia, taking us back to the old day I, for one, would be so stoked to see that happen, though my wallet might not be too happy.
I've read the first 3 issues so far and bloody love it, it's my release from stress and the manic world, it's an action movie in a comic and sometimes, just sometimes that is exactly what we all need!
I might be biased, but I'm giving it a strong 9 out of 10
