Queen and Country Definitive Edition Volume 3

Written by Greg Rucka
Art by Steve Rolston, Mike Norton, and Chris Samnee

I want to start by saying how much I like these Definitive Editions that Oni is publishing. They are very well-made, and look very handsome on the bookcase.

I really don't know why I didn't do a better job of picking up Queen & Country as it came out - I think its sporadic publication schedule kept me away from it, which I regret, except that I now own these three (soon to be four) beautiful editions.

This one contains Queen & Country at its best, and also deals with the biggest problem I have with the series, all in one book.

To start, the prologue for Operation Saddlebags, wherein Chace takes a few days off to meet up with her mother, has to be the absolute best issue in the series. Rucka has nailed Chace as a character since the first issue, but this one really helps to explain why she's as tough as she is. It's a terrific character study, and very well illustrated by original Q&C artist Steve Rolston.

The remaining chapters of Saddlebag, drawn by Mike Norton, tell the story of Chace's first mission as Minder One, which she screws up. All the usual elements of suspense are in play, and the story is gripping.

Now we come to my complaint, which is a common one from what I've read. Between Operation: Saddlebags and Operation: Red Panda (which closes the series), there is a novel, which I've neither ever seen or read. Now, I'd be okay with that if, like in most suspense novels, nothing happens to change the status quo, but instead, we see a huge pile of changes in Chace when we get her back in comic form. Personally, I think that her relationship with Wallace reads a little falsely - if there were hints of this coming, I missed them (maybe I need to reread the earlier editions). Regardless, a page of text to summarise the novel might have helped a lot. Instead, as you read through Red Panda, you have try to figure out what happened as you go.

Other than that problem, Red Panda is a great story, illustrated by the more than capable Chris Samnee. In many ways, this story is the most suspenseful to date, because of the fact that it ends off the comic series, meaning that anything can happen. Until you learn that there's another novel....

After this, the book is padded with the scripts for the entire first arc of the series. Personally, I found more than one issue's worth to be a little boring, and so I only read the marginalia provided by Rucka. But if you like that sort of thing, I'm sure this is right up your alley.