When Army buddies ask about serious military-themed story-telling, I hand them “The Activity” in trade paperback. Personally, however, I’m not willing to give up the month-to-month chase of reading this title in issues. It is the only title on which I double-dip. (Or should that be … “double-tap”?)

This issue of “The Activity” is dense with interrogations, but the hard-charging military procedural is in no danger of losing its operational punch. As always, writer Nathan Edmondson manages to steer clear of clichés, even when executing a helicopter-borne variation on the Prisoner’s Dilemma. He even manages to wring a little character development out a slightly more problematic waterboarding storyline.

In depicting the tools of the trade—everything from weapons and vehicles, uniforms and briefing rooms—Mitch Gerads’ artwork is nearly without peer. Meanwhile, color assistants Andy W. Clift and Joseph Frazzetta help deliver not just scenery and mood-setting, but weather, illumination, and terrain you can practically taste.

Accurate, authentic, and packed with action, “The Activity” is a potential High-Value Target for any soldier’s pull-list.