With issue 6 of BOOM’s Smooth Criminals, we get moving. The book has been leaving us hanging, suspended, waiting for the other shoe to drop! Oh, the ups and downs!!

Kurt Lustgarten, along with Kirsten ‘Kiwi’ Smith and Amy Roy hand us a lively script, as two young women plan a jewel heist. It’s been a long time coming, and we have been holding our collective breath for a few issues. No more; this is the issue we have all been waiting for!

Leisha Riddel’s art seems to get better with every issue. There is further nuance in her renderings of the complicated inter-relationship between the two protagonists: one is a nerd, the other a cat burglar. They are sisters, colleagues, and foils for each other. Part support system, part ‘moody antagonist’.

Without revealing any plot details, let’s colour the dialogue (nice artwork colouring by Brittany Peer, by the way) by saying that this long-anticipated heist is no ‘pleasure experience’. No amount of planning can equal the intriguing treachery that is afoot courtesy of some closely connected characters!

BOOM, Smooth Criminals #6, $3.99 for 24 pages of content. Assume Teen rating

By Alan Spinney

After a career of graphic design, art direction and copywriting, I still have a passion for words and pictures. I love it when a comic book comes together; the story is tight, and the drawings lead me forward. Art with words... the toughest storytelling technique to get right. Was this comic book worth your money? Let's see!!