AHHHHH! Yo, this comic goes hard. The beauty of RunLoveKill is its ability to balance constant action with enough quiet. The frantic action scenes surrounded by calm moments of Rain’s reflection makes the pacing work without being exhausting. Any less action and the book wouldn’t be as fun, and any more action and it would be a Michael Bay film. Reading RunLoveKill is like doing speed drills at practice — you get a little warm up and then boom, high intensity. It makes for an experience that has yet to ever feel boring.

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As with every issue to date, issue #4 begins with a flashback — only this flashback is the lead up to the very first scene that began the entire series. The book’s use of flashbacks has been really well done so far, keeping them modest in length and each one having a particular insight into Rain as a character. Actually, almost all of Rain’s significant character development happens in those short few pages at the beginning of each issue, with the majority of action happening as real-time shit is hitting the Prygat city fan.

Our characters continue to fill themselves out — Rain, of course, but also Dey in particular as we see the depth of his commitment to her. The villains continue to drag a little behind the plot, still shown as the evil bad guy without very clear motive, but their objective is clear and it’s enough to keep Rain moving the issue along as she drives the story by desperately trying to escape them. And yo, it goes without saying at this point, but our girl is badass. Actually, even more than that, issue #4 is her at her strongest — more angry and determined than we’ve seen. Not to mention a significant twist in this issue that changes how we see her.

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And beautiful as ever is Eric Canete’s art, which will actually put this book on hiatus for a few months. Between this book and his regular job, Canete would rather take a short break and reevaluate the publishing schedule than to risking its quality. When it returns in about 3 months, RunLoveKill might be published bi-monthly, giving us a little longer wait time between issues until the whole miniseries is complete at #8. In the meantime, the first 4 issues are planned to be released in trade paperback with extra material.

In the meantime, catch up on the series — you can read previous reviews of RunLoveKill here.

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  • Jordan Calhoun is a writer in New York City. His forthcoming debut book "Piccolo Is Black" is a celebration of the common adaptations we made while non-diverse pop culture helped us form identities. He holds a B.A. in Sociology and Criminal Justice, B.S. in Psychology with a minor in Japanese, and an M.P.A. in Public and Nonprofit Management and Policy. He might solve a mystery, or rewrite history. Find him on Instagram and Twitter @JordanMCalhoun

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