The Recap Page: What You Need to Know Heading Into ‘Sex Criminals #15′

With so many great comics series to read, it can be difficult remembering what happened in a previous issue as we head into the current one. The Recap Page is here to help readers remember what they need to know as a new issue looms.

This week, Sex Criminals #15 drops, with Matt Fraction writing and Chip Zdarsky drawing, and both of them telling jokes. Everything’s coming (tee hee) to a head (tee hee) as tensions bubble over (tee hee, okay I’ll stop now) and the antagonists make their move…

The Story So Far: Where on Earth have you been? If you’re over 18 odds are you’ve heard of Sex Criminals, the comic about a woman who stops time whenever she gets off, the man she finally meets who could do the same thing, the ups and downs of their relationship, and the sinister forces moving against them and everyone like them.

If you’re not fully up to date, in recent issues we’ve met others who can do what Suzy and Jon can do, and found out that everyone’s manifestation is different. Some manifest as ghostly versions of themselves; some summon some kind of sexual anxiety avatar we can’t really show on a family-friendly website, and in one nice touch, there are some who don’t manifest sexually at all --- an asexual who enters the Quiet via adrenaline rush.

What Happened Last Issue? Suzy and Jon settled into their crummy new jobs and their relationship seems to be on the mend. In another nice touch, we find out that unsolicited pictures of strange men’s private parts does the opposite of turn Suzy on. We can’t show the full panel here, so just use your imagination.

This newfound harmony doesn’t last long, as Ana --- AKA “Jasmine St. Cocaine,” Jon’s first erotic crush, and a newfound ally in Jon and Suzy’s war against the Sex Police --- sees, via text message, what Suzy really thinks of her, and they have it out with each other. The page goes fully meta as Zdarsky and Fraction explain that Ana and Suzy are being judgmental where they shouldn’t be --- Ana of Suzy and Jon robbing banks, and Suzy of Ana’s past history as a sex worker.

Afterwards, Suzy realized that maybe Ana was right, and she doesn’t want to rob banks any more.

What's Next? Myrtle got found out trying to steal Jon’s files from his therapist in order to use them as blackmail, and this issue promises that, incredibly, Myrtle manages to pull the heist off anyways.

With the Sex Police turning to entrapment and Suzy looking at giving up bank robbery, there is a good chance that everything’s about to flip around and the titular sex criminals will be the villains. A swerve like that would be perfect for the series, which is at its best when routines get disrupted and nothing is set in stone, and where the fourth wall isn't so much "broken" as "in a permanent state of George Perez-ian rubble."

Sex Criminals #15 is due out Wednesday, April 27th.