Y The Last Man by Brian K Vaughn, Pia Guerra, Jose Marzan, Jr.

I picked up the first few trades of Y The Last Man because Whitney from Pop Candy (USA Today's pop culture blog) recommended it in a post about great comics to pick up and read. I read the first trade and then promptly put it down. I knew then that I couldn't read any more until Brian K Vaughn had decided to end the series. I knew I wouldn't be able to stop reading once I started, and you know, I was right. I picked up the last trade in the Y series a month or so ago, and then read them all as quickly as possible in two nights' sitting. I just couldn't stop, they were so good. 

In Y The Last Man, Yorick is just your average, out of work college graduate. Nobody special. He likes books (lit major, got to love it).He also happens to be the only surviving male on the planet after a plague wipes every other man or animal out that has the Y chromosome. Well, outside of Ampersand, the monkey he was training. For some reason he survived too. And now, Yorick and Ampersand join forces with Agent 355 (a government agent sworn to protect him) and Dr. Alison Mann (the woman who might have started the plague and hopefully can find a cure) to make it across country to Dr. Mann's lab to find out why Yorick survived.  It seems like it might be simple, except there are crazy ultra-feminists calling themselves Amazons running in packs across the country, and they want to see Yorick dead. The Israelis want him to help rebuild Mother Israel. The rest of the country can't believe he's anything but a myth. Yorick just wants to find his girlfriend, Beth, who happens to be trapped in the Australian Outback. Will he ever find Beth? Will Dr. Mann save the future of human kind? Will the world rebuild itself? Who started the plague?

The story really just pulls you along, but of course I really like armageddon, end of the world type stories. The Amazons drove me nuts, but you can imagine how society would fall apart when struck with something so random. (Now, I'm not saying the ladies can't take care of themselves. They most certainly can. It just shows you that it's not only the Y chromosomes of the species that can make you drink the Kool-Aid.) Yorick is a funny guy, and I love all of the literary references that end up in the different stories. The art in these comics is really lovely. 

Really, I can't recommend these enough. I loved them. Now I am just sad that it is over. The ending of the series was really the best way to end it, but now I am sad. I know Yorick's story had to end sometime, but I can't help but feel wistful. Phooey that it's over. Maybe Ex Machina (another Vaughan series) will fill the void.