Creative Staff:
Story: Gail Simone
Art: Nicolas Daniel Selma & Juan Gedeon
What They Say:
Lara’s journey leads her to a place she thought she would never return to—the place of her nightmares—Yamatai! Can Lara survive long enough to find out the truth of the danger that stalks her?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The concluding chapter to the Yamatai arc hits here and in a lot of ways it does work well enough in that kind of barreling rush to the finish approach that makes sense for a property like this. In other ways, I feel like it’s missing something to really make it work for me, but that has me wondering if it’s my lack of a connection from not playing the game. Events have moved towards placing all the characters on Yamatai for most of its run and bringing everyone there has resulted in a lot of odd situations. Where things started to feel like they were coming together was the introduction (in the comics) of the followers of the Solarii and their apparent goal in reviving that cult/group in order to gain the powers that they had. It’s a simple enough goal and we’ve seen it in other stories, but this one has worked a nice kind of chaotic logic following the events of the game with the artifacts that Lara had apparently been involved with.
The island is certainly getting a little more crowded as Lara arrived before in order to get Sam back and deal with whatever it was that went down, but not we also get Jonah and Reyes finally making it there after recent events. Neither are keen to be there and with all the death and chaos that has come since they first went there, the dread is certainly palpable. The main focus is on what Matsu is up to and the guy, who was already kind of off in some ways, has that reinforced in a big way here. His goal of gaining the power through sacrifice looks to be long in coming as not only has he messed with so many people to gain it, he’s even screwed over his own daughters to achieve it. The two young women are both wrapped head to toe in mummy-like cloth and have been hypnotized into believing they’re done up to be figures from Hindu mythology in order to provide the scare but set the tone for the sacrifice that’s to come. They’re fully under his thrall in this way and seemingly have no clue as to who they really are. Which is good, since they don’t last long in the attempt to bring back the sun queen as Matsu ends up sacrificing them along the way.
While we do get some side material with Reyes and Jonah making their way to where Lara is in order to be useful at a critical moment, a lot of what we get is inside with Matsu and his threats, the toying with Lara and setting the stage for Mathias’ revival. We do get the clarity in how the various events that Lara went through with all the weirdness in the earlier parts of this arc being explained and it helps to settle some of that into a reasonable piece. But it all turns towards the action as Lara is focused on saving Sam and then stopping Matsu that it all goes pretty wrong in spectacular fashion. It has a little Lost Ark feeling to it as Matsu ends up getting his taste of power, but what he does with it shows just how far gone he is. God complexes never go well and it has a pretty good climactic series of moments with an escape that has the right touch of danger. The book does take a bit of an odd turn when it comes to Danny and his true purpose in the series, but it really just fell flat for me and I can only attribute it – and the past thats’ brought up in regards to Lara’s father – as material from the game. It fits here, but it doesn’t feel like it belongs within this particular story arc itself.
In Summary:
The concluding issue of this arc does a lot of familiar things in solid fashion as we see Lara struggle with her captivity, the arrival of others along the way to help out and a few revelations about the past that will fill in a few gaps for those that are more deeply involved in the franchise as a whole. The arc was one that definitely had its ups and downs for a variety of reasons and getting used to who this new Lara is was definitely one of them, but there’s a lot of room to grow and things to do with it. The arc had its weird moments though and that left me feeling a little unsettled with it. I’m definitely in for another arc though since the team here did a solid job on both writing and artwork but felt like it was dealing with some constraints in being the continuation from the game and what was established there.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Dark Horse Comics
Release Date: July 23rd, 2014
MSRP: $3.50
