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A review by xterminal
100 Bullets, Vol. 13: Wilt by Eduardo Risso, Brian Azzarello
4.0
Brian Azzarello, 100 Bullets: Wilt (Vertigo, 2009)
If you've been following 100 Bullets, you've probably got the idea that when it came down to the last volume, Azzarello and artist Eduardo Risso were going to blow up the entire world. And they fulfill pretty much every expectation you have in Wilt, the thirteenth and final volume in the series. And while I adored it as much as I've adored every other book in the series, I found myself thinking over and over again that while everything is blowing up, the really big feeling I thought I was going to get from this volume just wasn't there. There's all the physical violence one would expect from the big finish of a noir series, to be sure, but the emotional violence feels...copped-out, I guess. We get it, as we always have, but to a scene, all of it comes from tying up loose ends in the series. (Ever wonder what happened to the thread at the end of The Hard Way that never got tied up? Don't worry.) It almost seems like the authors have spent so much time with these characters that they wanted us to simply cheer at the end. I kept waiting for that other shoe to drop, which has been an inevitability in this series, and it just never comes. (Though I'm sure an argument could be made that the last page delivers it; me, I kind of thought it had the feel of the scene from Hannibal that annoyed so many people and I thought was insanely predictable.)
Still, if you take that aspect away from it, this is as satisfying a series ending as I've seen in the world of graphic novels, and readers who have been following along won't be disappointed. And if you haven't been following along, well, the series is now complete; you can read it all in one gulp, if you like. One way or the other, 100 Bullets is very, very much worth your time. ****
If you've been following 100 Bullets, you've probably got the idea that when it came down to the last volume, Azzarello and artist Eduardo Risso were going to blow up the entire world. And they fulfill pretty much every expectation you have in Wilt, the thirteenth and final volume in the series. And while I adored it as much as I've adored every other book in the series, I found myself thinking over and over again that while everything is blowing up, the really big feeling I thought I was going to get from this volume just wasn't there. There's all the physical violence one would expect from the big finish of a noir series, to be sure, but the emotional violence feels...copped-out, I guess. We get it, as we always have, but to a scene, all of it comes from tying up loose ends in the series. (Ever wonder what happened to the thread at the end of The Hard Way that never got tied up? Don't worry.) It almost seems like the authors have spent so much time with these characters that they wanted us to simply cheer at the end. I kept waiting for that other shoe to drop, which has been an inevitability in this series, and it just never comes. (Though I'm sure an argument could be made that the last page delivers it; me, I kind of thought it had the feel of the scene from Hannibal that annoyed so many people and I thought was insanely predictable.)
Still, if you take that aspect away from it, this is as satisfying a series ending as I've seen in the world of graphic novels, and readers who have been following along won't be disappointed. And if you haven't been following along, well, the series is now complete; you can read it all in one gulp, if you like. One way or the other, 100 Bullets is very, very much worth your time. ****