Broken Frontier

Ten ships and 50 women must make their way back to home with the precious cargo that could save humanity. Without them, Earth is lost. Without a map, the women are lost. On their journey, they'll run into potential allies and enemies, and they just might learn that you can know a book by its cover.

On their way home, the girls run into a planet full of dinosaur-people. They'd skip over it, if it weren't for the fact that, without an assist, they'd all be wiped out by an asteroid. Oksana, the trigger-happy woman, is ready for things to turn sour. Given that the book promises babes in action, things naturally go askew.

The issue is easily a "done-in-one," with the previous issues having successfully set up some character traits, such as Oksana's naturally distrustful nature. Sometimes, as in this case, single issue stories can be a great, if light, read. Sure, there's an overreaching storyline focusing on the girls trying to make it home, and undoubtedly, issues will touch it every once in a while, and probably make a fair amount of use out of it. In comparison to the issues that build up and progress the story, it helps to focus on the here-and-now at times, and less on the future. Some of the best Batman stories of recent years, for example, had nothing to do with Grant Morrison's epic, but were single-issue stories by Paul Dini. Murray, Cho, and Medellin getting a chance to play around in the world they created is just a nice departure from a world filled with overreaching arcs and events.

Frank Cho is undoubtedly known for his art, primarily drawing women, and Axel Medellin picks up the style well. Humorously, despite the main cast being featured in full-body space suits, he manages to have the curves down. In addition to the self-imposed limit on the skin, the secondary cast of this issue are all lizard men. In no way are they sexy women with lizard scales or tails, they're full-on dinosaurs in business suits and the like.

50 Girls 50 has been an interesting experiment. Combining a writer who's primarily known for war stories with a writer who's more known for his art (and take him off the art), have them do a space travel story, and you get 50 Girls 50. At worst, it's a return to bad sci-fi pulp of the 1950s and 1960s, and if anything, that's a fun book to read. There's no pretenses of high-art here; this is a book about a team of women traveling through space in skin-tight suits. Sometimes you need a little bit of singular joy in a world of five-course meals.