A hard-fought rescue.
Creative Staff:
Story: Marc Guggenheim
Art: Eduardo Ferigato
Colors: Natalia Marques
Letterer: Diego Sanches
What They Say:
Ben Caewood’s mission to save his daughter before the world ends has taken an unexpected turn when Ben finds out that the man she loves is being held captive in the most dangerous place left on Earth and threatens the already-shaky “alliance” he s formed with the military.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
With an easy sell concept that grabs me combined with a great cover, Last Flight Out continues to move at a solid pace even if it’s been too long between issues. The main change here is a new colorist but a three-month gap between issues does not help the storytelling at all, unfortunately. The comic definitely hits the right notes here even if my mind is mentally viewing it as storyboards, and I’m not exactly sure that’s a good thing. The comic definitely sets the right tone for me from the start and there’s a lot of appeal with the strong artwork from Eduardo Ferigato as he captures the near-future elements well while also ensuring the humanity of the situations and the cast figures large. It’s a very human story set against a terrifying backdrop.
With Burke and Caewood on the move, this issue opens first in showing us how Alex ended up being with the gang as they came in and threatened Sara. They just need any kind of doctor to help one of theirs that got shot, and Alex tries to deescalate things so that Sara isn’t threatened. It’s all quite reasonable and makes sense. With Burke and Caewood, they’re now moving through the building to get to Alex and slowly but surely dealing with the gang members inside. Which is only making more noise and causing more problems. Caewood does manage to defend himself eventually, though he’s still not keen on shooting. He does keep to a secondary position with Burke though, not trying to overrule him on anything at this point and to just get to where Alex is.
This sets up the bad situation here as they’re stuck in a kitchen after rescuing him (and killing the guy he was brought in to save and managed to stabilize) with lots of others trying to come and kill them. That leads to some chaotic material as they work to blow their way out of there in a big way, while we see how Sara and her guardian are making their own way out to get ready with some transportation. It goes big in all the right ways while also again reminding us that the world is ending as earthquakes are hitting now and everything feels like it’s about to fall apart. What’s really fun is that we get to the last page and see how Burke is following through on a threat Caewood made earlier and is going to just list Caewood and the others they were sent to find as dying in action during the rescue. It’s a beautiful bit of betrayal and self-preservation going on here that will be interesting to see how it’s unspun in the final issue.
In Summary:
I’ve really enjoyed this series overall and am looking forward to seeing how it all wraps up. The delay hasn’t helped it much but that won’t matter in the long run with most people discovering it through trades or back issues. This one goes for a lot of action, a little backstory, and then a big chaotic bit at the end that’s really well-delivered. The book continues to be a solid read with enjoyable artwork that captures everything really well. It’s still got that feeling where you can easily see it being part of a film of some sort, either the opening act or even a more fleshed-out full feature itself, and I kind of want to see it become that.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Dark Horse Comics
Release Date: February 9th, 2022
MSRP: $3.99
