American Century #11

Vertigo's American Century #11 (March 2002) continues the "White Lightning" arc with part two of four, and Glen Orbik's painted cover sets the mood perfectly — a man in a loosened tie and suspenders stands close behind a woman in a white slip, both bathed in the pink glow of a hotel sign, while a cluttered table below holds a gun, scattered papers, and a rotary phone. The atmosphere is pure noir tension, all shadowed corners and uneasy intimacy. With Howard Chaykin and David Tischman on the script and Marc Laming on interior art, this mature-readers series continues to deliver the kind of morally complex, mid-century American intrigue it does so well.