Five Gears In Reverse: A Criminal Book
Writer: Ed Brubaker
Artist/Letterer: Sean Phillips
Colorist: Jacob Phillips
Publisher: Image Comics
Publication Date: May 2025
Ricky Lawless has been granted a weird lot in life. His father, Teeg, was larger-than-life in every way, a vile and turbulant man equally as respected as he was feared. His brother, his closest friends, have all gone on to struggle in their own ways to escape the lives they were born into. Ricky, however, has fallen into it willingly, a Lawless through and through, complete with his father’s uncanny knack for getting in trouble, but without the same luck when it comes to getting out of it.
The newest graphic novel in Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips‘ epic crime anthology Criminal, Five Gears In Reverse finally gives us a glimpse at the disastrous and charismatic Ricky Lawless we’ve heard so much about, this time as a grown man free to make all the mistakes he can in any way he wants. As the disasterous consequences of his actions are laid out before him, Ricky will have to figure out what truly matters to him in his life, if he can survive the mess he’s made.
When discussing the genesis of the book, Ed Brubaker stated the following about Ricky Lawless:
He’s always been the most tragic but entertaining character in the books, but we’d never spent much time with him. Now I wanted to correct that.
Inspired by adapting elements of Ricky’s life story for the upcoming television series, Brubaker finally revisits the character during the time period shortly before the ‘main’ narrative of the Criminal series begins. For newer readers, this means that Five Gears In Reverse is completely standalone and can be read in isolation without any additional context needed, providing a great jumping-on point for those interested in the comic. For readers more familiar with the larger series, it adds a tragic and melancholic undertone to what is a fun, thrilling adventure, as we are acutely aware of Ricky’s eventual fate by the time of the main narrative, and every step he takes closer to it becomes all the more intense. Brubaker and Phillips manipulate this wonderfully, sowing the seeds for what we know is coming whilst still focusing mainly on the story at hand, and making sure it’s as compelling as possible.
Art by Sean Phillips
The book’s first section, previously published as Giant Size Criminal #1 late last year, sets the stage for the book’s actual narrative itself. Five Gears In Reverse follows professional failure and thief, Ricky Lawless, as he works to try and get himself out of a substantial debt to a loan shark. Following a heist gone wrong due to Ricky’s own personal issues and mistakes, Lawless has to deal with the consequences whilst desperately trying to ensure the safety of both himself and his girlfriend Mallory, who also lives a life of crime. The book’s narrative sees Ricky dealing with a relatively under-explored element of the Criminal series, the gangs not entirely controlled by vindictive mobster Sebastian Hyde and his family, which functions both as a way to ensure the narrative doesn’t interfere too much in the main plot of the larger series, and ensure that it doesn’t feel repetitive or reductive either, as we encounter new larger-than-life characters in addition to the ones older readers know all-too-well at this point.
It’s similar in a way to After Hours, in that it follows one man as things go from bad to worse to even more terrible, but with a particularly acidic and exciting edge that is reminiscient of the earliest books in the series.
Brubaker’s plotting is tight and efficient here, as the book escalates seemlessly with an energetic and ruthless pace over the course of it’s 140 page narrative. In a total shift from last year’s The Knives, it’s almost entirely focused on Ricky and his singular perspective, with brief breaks to check in on Mallory. This focus allows the book a clean efficiency, where the dialogue and plotting really shines, as Brubaker gets to delve deep into the damaged psyches of our two main characters and how the two both do and don’t work together. There’s something oddly romantic about it, even as the two are clearly not good people for one another, which gives a levity and sincerity to some moments of the narrative that work brilliantly to counteract some of the more cynical and acerbic elements.
Brubaker’s dialogue is brilliant, with a great sense of dynamism and pacing that carries throughout. His knack for internal narration is even better, especially when it comes to crafting characters using their thoughts, one of the strongest elements of any Criminal book but one that thrives especially with Ricky’s witty and messy throught process throughout Five Gears In Reverse.
Art by Sean PhillipsSean Phillips delivers some of the best artwork of his entire career here, to the point where it’s deeply impressive to see how much care and effort he continues to put into this series, which has truly never looked better. Working alongside colorist Jacob Phillips, the artwork is astonishing, oozing style in every single page and every panel on top of that. There are so many casual moments of art, simple character beats and moments of intimacy and solace, that are almost even more impressive than any action sequences can be as they truly display the turbulent emotional reality of Ricky and Mallory’s situation. Each section of the book is broken up by stylish, movie-style posters, pictured throughout this article, that give the entire book an adventurous old-school feel that works in perfect tandem with the story being told. The whole book is just slick and effortlessly cool, in a way that matches Phillips’ artstyle and Brubaker’s sensibilities perfectly, and infuses the book with a personality that matches what Ricky often thinks he is.
Ricky Lawless is probably one of the strongest and most compelling characters that Brubaker and Phillips have crafted. We’ve seen him as a kid, as a young man, and now as an adult, watching his life develop in real time as he progresses from abused, neglected and empathetic child to a smooth-talking, disaster-inducing waste of a man. To new readers without the same context, he’s still fascinating, a man of many contradicitons as he both tries to be like his father and resents him deeply, as he hurts those around him that he claims he loves most, as he states he’s a professional yet messes up everything that goes his way. He just can’t quite get anything right, and it never makes for a frustrating character, in fact quite the opposite.
He feels grounded and realistic in this world of thieves, gangsters and hitmen, someone born into it who’s just not very good at it at all, no matter how hard he tries. It helps that, as a character, he’s very charismatic as well, with Brubaker and Phillips pulling out all the stops to make this mess of a man as charming and endearing as he can be, despite never letting you forget the broken, emotionally shattered person underneath.
Art by Sean Phillips
Mallory, then, serves as a counter to Ricky, one who is just as interesting as he is. First introduced in the series’ second arc, The Sinners, we finally get a glimpse of why she is the way she is here, the type of environment she grew up in and how she ended up with Ricky Lawless. There’s definitely enough left open in her narrative that one day she may be the star of her own comic, but even in a more supporting role here it fleshes her out wonderfully, down to what makes Ricky unique from some of the other disasterous, likeable men that occupy the same world as Mallory, and giving us insight into her actions both in this specific story and the larger narrative overall. Within the confines of this narrative, she’s hardly a damsel waiting for Ricky to save her, a refreshing change from traditional genre expectations as she fights back against her captors without needing Ricky to tell her what to do or do it for her. Brubaker and Phillips have gotten better over the years at ensuring their female characters have agency and importance, going beyond genre tropes, and the way they deepen Mallory as a character here is a testament to that, wanting to ensure she feels as fleshed out as Ricky is despite not being the point of focus in this narrative.
Supporting characters in this narrative include the mysterious crime boss Sebastian Hyde, and his loveable bodyguard and protector, Chester. Both have been introduced elsewhere previously, and whilst they don’t get a lot of presence or development here, it helps the narrative feel more real and connected to the larger story. We also meet the prideful and principled boss of the East Side gangs, Arno Santini, an interesting counter to Hyde as a supposedly ‘moral’ man who still lies, cheats and steals his way to the top in many ways. As Ricky attempts to work around his requests, he encounters minor figures like Santini’s rivals, his lawyer and his surgeon, all of whom are fun characters that work to further flesh out the narrative and make it feel populated with real living people as opposed to two-dimensional illustrations. Brubaker and Phillips are no stranger to this, but they’ve finessed it down to a fine art, maximising each character no matter how big or small their role in the story and making every moment they are present count..
Art by Sean Phillips
Thematically, as I previously mentioned, this is a story about two broken lives, what draws them to one another and why they both are the way they are. It delves into the repurcussions of childhood trauma in a realistic and emotional way, and shows us why Mallory and Ricky both struggle to have healthy emotional processing skills and can’t verbalise their feelings well. The contrast between dialogue and narration adds to this in a great way, showing the dissonance in their feelings and actions, and getting into some of why they both just can’t seem to shake some of the bad habits they find themselves repeating ad nauseaum. It’s definitely themes that Brubaker has explored before, especially in Cruel Summer, which also follows Ricky Lawless in part, but Five Gears In Reverse offers a new and striking take on it by explicitly focusing on how it impacts their romantic relationship with one another. At their best, they bring out the best, most nurturing sides in one another, but they can’t express it, which leads to their worst, where their needs are totally misaligned and they just end up as two selfish people trying their best not to be. There’s a beautiful and emotionally intimate element to the climax of the comics’ narrative, as Ricky tries his best to protect Mallory, and decides whether she is truly more important than himself or his own needs. It doesn’t come to a nice clean ending for either of them, and I love that, because it feels far more real and human.
Overall, Five Gears In Reverse is brilliant, a wild and unruly narrative about a wild and unruly man, an examination of how broken homes lead to broken lives and how these lives intertwine with one another. It’s also a hilarious and wickedly entertaining crime romp, with a fantastic and slick sense of style that brings it all together. Gorgeously illustrated by Sean Phillips, who is doing some of the best work of his career here alongside colorist Jacob Phillips, and incredibly well-written by master of crime comics Ed Brubaker, it stands out as one of the best entries in an already-brilliant series. Sometimes, all you need is an entertaining disaster of a man, and a wild and thrilling narrative caused by him, in order to craft a wonderfully compelling crime comic that will leave you at the edge of your seat and move you, whether you’re a new reader or a long-time fan.
That’s not to say there’s not a profound emotional undercurrent to the book, as it explores the reality of growing up in a life of crime, where you know no better than what you’ve seen and experienced and can’t seem to escape it or the repercussions of it on the people you love. Brubaker and Phillips continue to do some of the best work in all of comics right now, and I for one hope they don’t stop anytime soon, for they just seem to be getting even better somehow.
Five Gears in Reverse: A Criminal Book is out this month via Image Comics
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