Honestly, when I saw that we had two Ellis books, two Ennis books AND a Morrison book this week, I considered doing a bit of a theme week for reviews "Great Writer Week" - but then I saw all the other great writers who had books out today and since I really did not feel like differentiating between them all, I'll just leave be with looking at those five books without any sort of grand theme.
Planetary finally ends with today's issue, and it's really an excellent epilogue to the series that will undoubtedly read beautifully when read in a collected Planetary book, but still reads quite well as a one-off issue.
Besides some cute references to what has happened in the world now that the Four have been defeated (and their efforts to suppress the advancement of the human race have been quashed), writer Warren Ellis uses this last issue in a very interesting fashion - he both resolves one nagging plotline (from all the way back in Planetary #9 - 18 issues ago, but also NINE YEARS AGO) and pretty much expressly states that other unresolved plotlines will NOT be addressed. I thought that was clever - follow up one string, but make it clear that there are plenty of other strings that could be followed (of course, this basically serves to just make us miss Planetary even more, but what can you do?).
In any event, the string that is followed is the ultimate fate of Ambrose Chase, who we last saw seemingly dying in Planetary #9, but, of course, things are never quite that simple.
Ellis really brings the story to a slow boil in this one, as Elijah, Jakita and Drums theorize about how they could possibly save Chase's life.
There are a lot of pages like these three sample pages...
But as Ellis continues, the slow boil eventually comes to a head with the fabulous (awe-inspiring even) ending of the search for the hopefully still alive Chase.
It's great seeing Cassaday on interiors again, and really, with this issue, it makes you appreciate just how much Cassaday has grown as an artist from when this series began - the facial expressions of the characters are key to this issue, and Cassaday NAILS them all - I don't know if that would have been the case had this issue come out 10 years ago. And, of course, WOW! WHAT A COVER!!!
This truly was a delightful send-off to these characters, and I liked that while this was not exactly a story for Jakita, Ellis still managed to
A. Give her something important to do
and
B. Give her a nice character moment
Definitely Recommended.
6 Comments
At October 8, 2009, Xian wrote:
i stopped so many titles in my pull over the years, and yet have kept up with certain previews and ...
At October 8, 2009, Crash-Man wrote:
Planetary 27??
Surely the apocalypse is upon us!!
At October 8, 2009, dhole wrote:
I hear so many great things about this series. Does it get better after the first trade (which I guess ...
At October 8, 2009, Mizike wrote:
@dhole: You should definitely check out the second trade. The first few issues are (more or less) stand alone ...
At October 8, 2009, Jeff wrote:
My only exposure to Planetary is the Planetary: Crossing Worlds collection. I thought those were excellent stories and I look ...
At October 8, 2009, WildStorm: The Bleed » Blog Archive » Planetary #27 - The Reviews wrote:
[...] "The slow boil eventually comes to a head with the fabulous (awe-inspiring even) ending… This truly was a delightful ...
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