4 out of 5

A whole book primarily dedicated to the central plot – Jean Séverac’s internalized Chimera Brigade?  With the slow but worthwhile build-up of the previous two collections, by this point, I’m absolutely in.

Gess and Bessonneau continue to get all delightfully European over this book, with several pages stacked with tiny panels (12 panel pages) that swoop through story and symbolism with a graceful balance between blocky simplicity and grounded detailing.  Lehman and Colin finally give us some real background on the Brigade, which increases the excitement when they’re put into play for a battle in the second half of the book (and during which our art team breaks free of tiny panels to do some truly wondrous and imaginative splash pages).  Plus, our storytellers continue to drop tidbits of world-building alongside the Brigade payoff, which had me flipping back through previous issues (happily) and connecting bits together.  It’s an engaging read.  There are still definitely odds and ends that are not clear how they will fit in, but any lingering “is this worth it?” doubts I was having about collecting this are pretty much fully on hold in anticipation of the next volume.