Review: Plainer Jane
The collected edition from Broken Face Comics
It's here - the full, collected edition of the brilliant Plainer Jane from Broken Face Comics.
The darkly comic story of Jane Pearson, a seemingly ordinary teenage girl who becomes a brutally efficient killer for hire.
With no training or special skills, just her own cunning, brutality, and fearlessness, Jane leaves a trail of bodies behind her. Ultimately going head to head with the feared and secretive criminal gang The Nexus, in a war that could ultimately cost not only her life but the lives of everyone she loves.
A real world comic book set in modern day Manchester.
David Wilburn (Writer, creator), Samir Simão (Sequential art), Tim West (Logos, lettering, print layout), Ralf Singh (Front Covers, Colourist), Linda Scott Campbell (Colours) and Donna A Black (Rear Covers, Guest Art)
Featuring the protagonist, Jane, this is the story of a teenage assassin. Not only does she have to deal with school, friends and the rest we all do (or have!) but she also has an interesting interest - death!
As this gripping story progresses we get a look at who Jane is. What lead her down this path? And where is she going? This story combines the mundane life of a school leaver. She's got to decide what she does with her life, and as the story moves on there are some well-plotted moments as both sides of Jane's life crash together. When you add in the cast of victims, clients, foes, friends and everything in between this story captures you from beginning to end.
One thing I like about this story is at the beginning. We get a brief look at the early life of Jane, she certainly wasn't your normal child. As we follow this vein through, Jane gets onto the dark web, and starts her new line in the shadows. Things don't start brilliantly at the start, but we get to see these missteps and how Jane learns from them on the way. As we see, her jobs get bigger and harder. The more successful she is, you can see the stakes rising - not only in assassination, but also in her home and personal life.
Then there are the big boys in the underworld.
They are the big guns in the shadows, The Nexus, and there are some very interesting dynamics happening here too - killings and wars - and Jane is going to get caught up in it!
This is a brilliantly scripted story, the cast of characters is fantastic with some excellent fleshing-out of their motivations and a good eye for detail. There are some clever story ideas here with the comics medium being used well.
The art really gets a chance to show off the teams skills. Not only the art in the 'now', with some great use of angles light and colour. We also get a nice mix with flashbacks, lettering and splash pages. I also think it's great seeing the single issue covers, these are great too.
I loved the single issues as they came in, but to have this whole body affair as a collected edition is an excellent idea and now I have it all, and I recommend it to you too.
Check out Broken Face Comics and follow them on Kickstarter for their next series.
