In the past few weeks we've looked at some famous titles by some famous authors. So this week I thought we'd go off the beaten path a bit, and look at a less well known work by a well known author. If you've been reading DC at all in the last few years you're probably pretty familiar with Greg Rucka. From last year's smash hit 52, to such titles as Checkmate and Gotham Central, Rucka has been one of the top writers at DC. Before going to work for DC, however, Rucka produced two creator owned titles published through Oni press, one them being the inimitable Queen and Country.

Queen and Country is something of an entity unto itself, in that it is a spy comic, one of the most under-represented genres in comic books save perhaps for the long dead romance comic. Now when someone says Spy, your first thought is probably James Bond, and you really couldn't be further off base. There's no evil masterminds, no ticking time-bombs, and no rocket jet packs. What there is, is plenty of cloak and dagger: the shifting alliances, the political manuvering, the evils done in the name of good, and of course of the occasional incidence of balls-to-the-wall action.

The main protagonist of the series is 24 year old Tara Chace, an operative of SIS—the Secret Intelligence Service, British equivalent of the CIA—Special Operations Section, known in house as The Minders. We first meet Tara alone in Kosovo, where she is moments away from assassinating an ex-Soviet general cum black market arms dealer. Of course, this isn't just an action comic, it's a drama, and we all know that action becomes drama when “something goes wrong”. In this case Tara gets made (that's spy talk for 'found out'... don't you feel edgy for knowing that?), and suddenly a simple exfiltration (so very edgy!) becomes a race for her life. Just another day for The Minders, of course.

Inspired by 70s British TV show The Sandbaggers, Queen and Country is everything that series like 24 or The Bourne Trilogy try to be and aren't. Sharply written, with a strong attention to detail and a firm grounding in real world events and locations, Rucka has either done his homework very, very well or he is a master of verisimilitude. Perhaps the most striking thing about Queen and Country however, is the realness of the characters. When they take action, it's quick, brutal, and disturbing; for them as much as us.

Tara is, at heart, a broken woman. She finds the strength to do her in the blind confidence that the horrible things she does are for good, and at the bottom of a bottle; a belief that is tested early and often. Other characters have their own blemishes; and yet each comes off as identifiably... well, heroic isn't the right word. These characters act very much like real people, and they deal with the morally grey nature of their jobs in the way that people do.

Notable about this series is that Rucka chose to work with different artists for each storyline. Each artist uses a different style and emphasizes different elements of the characters. While some are better than others, as a whole it gives the comic an odd kind of surreal quality. The names stay the same while the faces change; like seeing different actors perform the same play. Intentional or not, it sends a message to the reader: "These people are not important. As individuals they mean nothing. It is the role that they play and the tasks they complete that matters. They will be used up and thrown away as needed."



The one static element in the artwork is the sharp inkwork in stark black and white. Not grey-scale mind you, but monotone black and white. Like a film shot in black and white, it emphasizes the emotional distance of the characters, and the black and white morality of the world they live in; although this is more the case with some artists than with others.

Queen and Country currently spans 8 graphic novels, a shorter flashback series collected in 1 trade, and 2 novels.