Gail Simone and Nicola Scott are certainly having fun on "Secret Six." There's no other way to describe the bulk of this issue's fight between the Six and a virtual army of D-list villains other than fun, really. In many ways, the issue is lighthearted enough that it's a little hard to remember at times that this is a story about a fight involving a twisted murderer trying to get hold of a "get out of hell, free" card.

It's a strange line that Simone's script for "Secret Six" treads, really. On the one hand, you've got losers like Mammoth, Komodo, and some sort of pirate type villain all bursting onto the scene as everyone scrambles for the card. Having the Six get to thump away at the other villains is a pretty fun moment, and let's face it, most of these sorts of low-level super-villains are just made for beating up. At the same time, though, this is a book where a protagonist gets maimed in a pretty nasty way; it may seem like all fun and games but there is a real nasty side to this book as well.

In some ways I think that Scott's pencils slightly betray that nastier side of the book; I actually had to re-read the more brutal scenes in question to make sure I'd just read it properly, because her light, clean art style made those moments seem almost cavalier in nature. I think Scott's an excellent artist, but seeing those heavy duty scenes drawn in an almost soft manner in some ways seems to lessen the impact that they would otherwise have.

It's a mostly satisfying ending to the story, although one character's about-face at the end just didn't quite convince (although I'm willing to re-read the storyline and see if it feels a little less forced if all together), and what could possibly remove another character from the team entirely seems strangely swept under the carpet for the final scene. Only time will tell how Simone and Scott handle it down the road. Still, "Secret Six" is a fun book, and I'm glad it's around. Villainy is almost never this much fun.