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Nov 01, 2008 Year End 2008 - Best of 2008 By Mark Redfern

You would think that being the last man on Earth would have some advantages, the obvious one being all the women you could potentially sleep with (unless you were the last man on Earth and gay, now that would suck). But the reality may be much darker than that, if Y: The Last Man is any predictor. The first 10 issues of the acclaimed Eisner Award-winning series co-created by writer Brian K. Vaughan and artist Pia Guerra have been collected in a Deluxe Edition hardcover book.

A mysterious plague instantly kills every male creature on Earth except recent college grad and unemployed amateur escape artist Yorick Brown and his equally male pet monkey. The world is thrown into chaos. Most of the world’s leaders are dead, and if you think that the world would be a more peaceful and organized place when run by women, you’d be wrong. A cult of women dubbing themselves Amazons—who each burn off one of their breasts upon joining the cult—are on the hunt for Yorick when they hear of his existence. Many of the Amazons are women who were abused or raped by men and shed no tears at the loss of the male race and want to see the extinction completed by murdering Yorick.

Yorick’s beloved girlfriend, Beth, was visiting Australia when the plague happened and it’s his desire to somehow find her. Yorick’s devotion to Beth prevents him from impregnating every attractive woman in sight. What’s left of the U.S. government sends Yorick in search of the one scientist they believe might hold the key to repopulating the planet and to understanding how Yorick survived.

There are those rare comic books that just somehow transcend all the failings and clichés of the medium and capture something greater. Y: The Last Man is perhaps one of those works, one that creates a compelling and fully-realized world that begs further exploration. The Deluxe Edition doesn’t offer any new bonus material, but it is a handsome book. Now that Y’s 60th and final issue has been published, and with a film adaptation in the works, it’s a good time to catch up on this chilling and highly enjoyable post-dude alternate reality.

(http://www.dccomics.com/vertigo)

Author rating: 9/10