100 Bullets
If you could get away with murder... would you?

Alan Moore's Songbook
Delving into Alan Moore's non-comics work

The Blair Witch Project
If you go down to the woods today, you're in for a big rip-off

Congo Bill
An atmosphere-soaked story in an exotic setting

Dicks
A close look at Garth Ennis's and John McCrea's DICKS (no, really)

Goodbye Chunky Rice
Join Chunky the turtle on a voyage of emotional discovery

Hellboy Jr.
A savagely funny, alternative outing for everyone's favourite demon

Mr Majestic
Existentialism, exposition, and extreme violence for the Double Ms

Transmetropolitan: Year of the Bastard
Spider turns his attention to the last great spectator sport...politics

Sandman: The Dream Hunters
Neil Gaiman's first SANDMAN story in four years...can he still cut it?

Writers on Comics Scriptwriting
Some of the best writers in comics talk openly about their work

Retro

Sandman: The Doll's House
The book where Neil Gaiman "found his voice" and inspired a generation

Hello and welcome to another round-up of the great, the good and the occasional waste of trees. This issue has more of an "indie" slant than usual, as the last few months have seen some excellent work coming from left field.

We kick off with an excellent story arc from 100 BULLETS, a powerful tale of greed, sex and power. Moving into more surreal territory, we also take a look at the exemplary GOODBYE CHUNKY RICE, proving once and for all that turtles are cool; HELLBOY JR. gives fans of black humour a shot in the arm; and Ennis & McCrea's DICKS, while not especially new, gets the laughs every time.

Equally big on laughs of a different kind is WRITERS ON COMICS SCRIPTWRITING, a series of frank and informal interviews with many of today's top writers. If you've ever wondered what goes on in the fevered minds of comics creators, give it a look.

November saw Vertigo celebrating ten years of SANDMAN, so we couldn't have gone this month without mentioning SANDMAN: THE DREAM HUNTERS, an original graphic novel from Neil Gaiman (of course) and the obscenely talented Japanese artist Yoshitaka Amano.

And to play our own small part in the celebrations, we've selected SANDMAN: THE DOLL'S HOUSE as this month's Retro review. Arguably the book that kick-started DC into producing the Vertigo line at all, 'The Doll's House' saw Gaiman "finding his voice" and inspired a generation of writers who would follow. Classic stuff.

Finally, well done to those who noticed that Gregory Dickens's review of MR MAJESTIC mysteriously vanished from last month's Reviews. Those responsible have been singled out for extreme ridicule, and we present it this month instead.

If you have any comments or suggestions, or just plain disagree with us, we'd love to hear from you. You can either email us or voice your opinions on our message boards.

Until next time,

Antony
Reviews Editor, antony@mostlyblack.com