R.E.B.E.L.S. - D.C. Comics

The best book nobody knows about.

This is one of the very best comic book titles being produced right now. Tony Bedard is just flat out writing his arse off. Issue after issue he's creating perhaps the most original book to come out of the D.C. talent pool and he's doing it with a cast of characters no one else really seems to care about working with. Tony seems to have found a way to circumvent the stranglehold, Geoff Johns seems to have over the creative process at D.C. and is producing original work that is both engaging and entertaining. R.E.B.E.L.S. is a book you can read without needing a degree in molecular engineering to understand it. There is an elegant simplicity to Tony's story telling that is a breath of fresh air in the current age of convoluted obscurity that passes itself off as dark and edgy adult entertainment.

R.E.B.E.L.S. has managed to do in just eighteen issues what, Geoff Johns has failed to do in series after seemingly endless series of crossover events involving an average of thirty titles each. Tony Bedard has advanced his premise, developed his characters and provided genuinely poignant and compelling moments of story telling in the process. And most impressively of all, he's managed to do it without dropping the F-Bomb in every other sentence, covering up gaping plot holes with with bucketful after bucketful of T&A and offering more adult examples of creative problem solving than, "My powers-penis is bigger than your powers-penis!".

Before I journey much further along I'd like to point out how wonderfully the illustrations of the artistic team of, Claude St. Aubin (Pencils) and Scott Hanna (Inker) enhance this book. This team manages to flesh out more than breast size. The worlds and environments they create are beautifully rendered and a joy for the eye to behold. Theirs is a vision of the universe containing more than nipples, breasts and camel toes. Every time I turn a page I'm treated to alien landscapes filled with lush flora, fauna and architectural designs that spark my imagination and take my breath away. Truly this team engages the highest intellectual functions rather than stimulating the basest part of human nature.

Tony Bedard and his team are creating a genuinely articulate and intelligent piece of work. It is truly sophisticated and adult in every way. Unlike the elitist, pseudo-intellectual group of bohemian extremists currently in charge of the industry who're more concerned with force-feeding their vision of morality and artistic integrity upon the marketplace, Tony is doing what matters most to a real writer. He's telling a story in a manner that engages and entertains as many people as possible rather than alienating all, but the most narrow of demographic. Tony is using the art form to entertain, not to engage in some ludicrous, political crusade against the moral windmills of imaginary censorship.

If you're a reader seeking content more substantial than titillating pinup art to decorate your school locker with, R.E.B.E.L.S. is the book for you. This is a title that shows the very best of what comics can be. It may not be getting the push that some of the bigger projects at D.C. are receiving, but it delivers far more quality for the dollars you'll spend on it than just about anything else you can find in their catalog of books.