This is one of the best character crossover books I've read all year. It's not the best crossover, but it's pretty damn good. Waid is at home in the Rocketeer universe and The Spirit fits into that world perfectly! Seriously, the two were made for each other and if someone had a lot of money and was smart they'd pull a Dynamite Comics style of pulp characters grab and create a fictional world with them. It's like the DC Universe with each character having their own city, but instead it's pulply classic characters with similar plot constructions. Great stuff even if you're only a fan of one character or the other. Read Full Review

Rocketeer in Waid's hands is a full bodied story with a tremendous amount of fun thrown in and with the addition of the Spirit, it's like the fun and action doubles, which is an impressive feat on an already impressive story. Read Full Review

Paul Smith's artwork does a phenomenal job of making the book feel like something out of the 1950's. In a world where the majority of top comics article storylines that have world ending odds, it's nice to read a well put together mystery that is a little more grounded in real world affairs while peaking our imagination to the fullest. In other words, it's all out fun and a must buy. Read Full Review

Pulp Friction does a rare thing in team-up comics: each character gets a great story, it makes sense why they're together, and each hero gets a pretty equal amount of time on the page. Waid balances both characters well and we start to see hints of why they may work well against one another. Read Full Review

Devoid of the usual overbloated spectacle and hyperbole of comic book crossovers, “Pulp Friction” is good, classic fun, with a level of production value that puts the Big Two to shame. Moreso, Without bounds of continuity or years of backstory, this series is accessible to all. With a high caliber creative team, masterful presentation, a dream-come-true concept, and an engaging plot to back it all up, it has all the makings of 2013′s big sleeper hit. Read Full Review

The Rocketeer and The Spirit: Pulp Friction #1 was published by IDW and DC Comics and is our Comic of the Week " congratulations to all involved. I was fortunate enough to pick up the variant cover by Darwyn Cooke, who seemingly goes from strength to strength. Read Full Review

"Pulp Friction" is a great read and comes highly recommended. If you're a fan of both characters and their supporting casts then you'll love this and if you don't know them it's the perfect book to start with. Waid and Smith knock this one out of the park and I can't wait for the next issue. Read Full Review

I think this #1 issue stands on it's own as a #1 that can be picked up & enjoyed by people who have a history with one or both of the characters or someone new to them. Waid works everything you need to know to enjoy the story into the story and adds in lots of extra little bits that are superfluous to the basic understanding of the story but add extra extra flavor for people familiar with the protagonists. An excellent issue, definitely worth checking out. Read Full Review

There's something so fundamentally comic-booky about "The Rocketeer and the Spirit: Pulp Friction" #1, a heavy mass of talent that lives between the old and the new, that my mind remembered pixels on a screen as ink on dead trees, the virtual as the physical, the ephemeral as the real. This comic is an absolute blast, but it has a sense of love, care and history that raise it to the level of the truly great. Read Full Review

This issue is definitely a good way to start the series and obviously gets the story rolling right away. The only thing I wasn't impressed was the scope of the project. It doesn't seem too ambitious or ground-breaking. Read Full Review

Overall this is a fun book that I would recommend to younger teens and upwards. Teaming up a golden-age and silver-age character of two separate brands and keeping them both true to their nature and style was wonderful to see. In a world over-saturated by the superhero genre, it's great to see there are still routes out there, as dated as they may be, that can still be fresh. Read Full Review

So far, I'm enjoying it - the series is off to a fun start! Read Full Review

There's a lot of set-up in this issue, which is to be expected considering it's only the first one, but the strength of Waid's writing is enough to leave us wanting more. Read Full Review

My fellow Geeks and Ungrownups, I'd have to say that this selection was a great read. It's like pulling out one of your favorite movies when you were a kid and enjoying it almost as much as you did when you were younger. Ok, so here's the skinny…this is definitely a great selection for a fan of this Genre and these two superheroes. If you've never gotten into these, now may be the time. I'm curious to see if other's out there agree with me. Let me know what you think! –RLA Read Full Review

Some significant shortcomings in the character work and plotting, but otherwise an appropriate and entertaining tribute to the classic pulp era. Read Full Review

I'm glad to see Waid and Paul Smith bring these two characters together, but it reminds me of the vast library of great characters DC's New 52 has closed the door on (which I guess is better than the ones they've gotten completely wrong). Worth a look. Read Full Review

That's also the biggest drawback to the overall impact of the comic: there was always a dark core at the center of both of these strips, whether it was the sexual frustration at the heart of Cliff's relationship with the often downright unpleasant Betty, or the Spirit's frequent appearance in his own comic as a supporting player in stories of human weakness and folly that came right out of Saki, or an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. And given the inevitable need to streamline both characters for casual enjoyment, as well as the restrictions inherent in this kind of licensing, Waid and Smith can barely hint at the darker elements that kept these characters memorable, despite the passage of decades (in the case of The Spirit), or the tragically small output of Rocketeer creator Dave Stevens. What Waid and Smith might have come up with on their own, not shackled by the realities of corporate entanglement, is left just an enticing tease. Read Full Review

All in all, it's not the worst start in the world but, when bringing two characters together, there just aren't that many ways to do it in such a short amount of space and, at the same time, develop a story. Read Full Review