This issue takes place three months after the end of the first issue. Max, Case, and Denny have been working on their first issue of The Escapist and are finally finished. Max has a lot riding on this, as he’s now spent all of his inheritance money on getting the rights to the character and paying Case and Denny to help make it, so he is now broke (a fact which he is hiding from his friends), and really needs this series to succeed.

Once the comic is officially solicited by a distributor, Max feels like it is time to get the publicity machine started. Among the items he inherited from his father is an adult Escapist costume, which fits Denny. Max’s plan is to have Denny do some kind of public stunt while dressed in the costume, but he isn’t sure what. Case comes up with an idea, as there’s this big retail store that she heard locks the nighttime cleaning staff in overnight to ensure they keep working, so she suggests they help Denny break in and then have him “free” the cleaners. Despite some hesitation about breaking the law, Max and Denny agree to it and set the plan in motion. But when they get to the store that night, they find out that someone has already broken the lock and gotten in, a group of three men who are robbing the place while holding the cleaners hostage at gunpoint.

Denny slips in and manages to disarm and knock out the three crooks and save the cleaners. And the whole thing is caught on the store’s security cameras, and the footage is aired on the local news.

Another great issue, ending on an understated but compelling cliffhanger. Writer Brian K. Vaughan manages to give Max, Case, and Denny their own unique voices, and there’s an earnest sincerity in the way they each are dedicated to making their comic a success. There’s also a hint of a budding romance between Max and Case.

There’s a new art team, Jason Shawn Alexander and Steve Rolston, but the comic doesn’t say who’s the penciler and who’s the inker, so I don’t know who did what. The opening sequence, which is meant to show some pages from Max’s comic, are drawn in a completely different style than the main story, so maybe they split the penciling duties and inked their own pages? I don’t know. Either way, it’s good and not too different from Philip Bond’s style in issue one, so at least the tone remains consistent.

Chacebook rating: FIVE STARS

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