July Book Club Review

Y The Last Man : Unmanned

Average Rating -8.68

Unmanned is the first of the complete Y The Last Man series by Vertigo. The story follows Yorick who finds himself as the last man left on earth after a disaster of unknown origins wipes out everything with a Y chromosome.

Pendants,  and Rings, and Blasphemy Oh My!

The story opens up to the world pretty much as it is today on what starts as a pretty ordinary day. Around the world wars are being fought, children are being born, secret agents conduct secret missions, and struggling magician Yorick Brown attempts to propose to his long distance girlfriend.

As the intro counts down to disaster the day takes a dramatic turn when men all over the world  simultaneously begin to bleed uncontrollably and die within seconds. The disaster affected all species killing absolutely everything male on a global scale leaving all life on earth on a doomsday count down to total extinction. The one exception to the disaster is Yorick and his newly acquired pet monkey Ampersand . Although the reason for their survival is unknown Yorick firmly believes that the magic ring he was holding at the exact moment of the disaster somehow spared him.

“ The premise was good but it was a slow read” - Mathieu

If Women Ruled the World

Months later the world is still struggling to deal with the death of half its population, on top of the loss of leaders and skilled experts countries struggle to clean up the 2.9 billion dead bodies. It is that struggle that gives Yorick his first look at the new world as he is discovered by a super model turned garbage woman collecting bodies in the street for canned food.

“It was a realistic take on a crazy situation” - Ryan

Despite what some might think Yorick quickly discovers that a world ruled by women is still plagued by the same problems it has always had. In the aftermath feminist hate groups called the Amazons rise up and kill anything left that even looks male and rule the streets with the same brutal closed minded cruelty as their predecessors. Upon finding his mother he is immediately caught up in a stand off between the Democrats  who including his mother, are currently running the country due to having the most female representatives and the gun toting wives of dead Republican senators hell bent on taking their husbands seats without an election. In the end Yorick along with the mysterious Agent 355 is sent in search of the ironically named Dr. Mann an expert in cloning who may be humanities only chance at long term survival.

“It reminded of The Walking Dead, except for zombies you had women” - Keenan

“ I really enjoyed that the world was shit regardless of who runs it” - Matt

Artwork

The art for Unmanned definitely took a back seat to the story in terms of quality. While the cover work for the books collected in it were beautifully done highly detailed paintings the internal work stood out as rather plain.

“The cover work was great, the regular work was bland” - Brad

That being said the art was by no means bad it was well drawn, proportionate, and had well done characters with a full range of facial expressions. All things considered the art was serviceable and left no one with any major complaints.

 

“ The flow of the art in the first issue was great” - Rene

“The art was bland but served its purpose” - Gabriel

Summary

Y The Last Man : Unmanned was a excellent read, and I’m not just saying that because it was my pick!  It set the stage for epic journey without getting overly bogged down in the details of what lead to the disaster by showing two unlikely but oddly timed incidents featuring the birth of a cloned child and the triggering of a cursed pendant as the only clues to what may have caused all the men to die at that exact moment. For a lot of us this was not the first read and in many cases The Last Man was the story that introduced them to the world of comics. If you want a change of pace from men in capes Y The Last Man should be on your shopping list.

“ A speculative scfi adventure with a poo flinging monkey”  - Colin

“ I really enjoyed it, a simple but original story” - Stephane

Ratings

Picked the book : Jenn - Rating 8.5

“ I wrote this review”

Harshest Critic: Rick - Rating 7.5

“ I enjoyed the book, but just enjoyed”

Besting Rating:  Ryan - Rating 10

 

"The book that got me into graphic novels" 

 

 

Next Months Selection : Planetary

Pick up all 4 issues and join us at the Tide and Boar August 29th for the book clubs 1 year anniversary