I like Warren Ellis' writing and I like Ben Templesmith's art so when my husband added Fell Volume 1: Feral City to my pile (that doesn't actually seem to be shrinking thanks to books he thinks I need to read right now) I figured I'd enjoy it. I was actually a little disappointed. Ellis seemed to be falling into something of a stereotypical cop story.
The stereotypes may be a little bit augmented by the weird but they're still stereotypes. Fell is a broken down detective who's too perceptive for his own good, Mayko is the sardonic barkeep that he tells all his troubles to, the lieutenant is just trying to make it to retirement and the secretary's husband has just left her. Sure, Fell doesn't exactly go into why he can't cross the bridge out of Snowtown, Mayko cuts herself, the lieutenant's on anti-depressants and the secretary's husband left her for the dog but it's not the sort of weirdness I expect from Ellis and Templesmith.
I will say that the story got better as it went along. Fell and Mayko are getting better developed and there's actually some long term story telling at work. The actual cases that Fell works were interesting to me (law and order junkie that I am) and the final story was the strongest. It let the pictures do the work as it was told through photos that Fell had taken of his night's work.
If Jason picks up the next volume, I'll probably read it but for me it was mostly just OK, so I'm going to give it a 3.
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