Y: the Last Man

Thought I'd start this, since it doesn't have a thread and so deserves one.


Let's chat.

Those who finished, what'd you think?
(Don't stress being redundant Flux, because I will be. )

I'm not sure what I can say that hasn't already been said. Fantastic book; highly recommended.

I read it a year or so ago. Amazing, amazing story. I started by buying the first 3 trades, and I was completely hooked. I tried to budget getting the next 7 trades, but by the end of the month I had the complete story.

It's funny, I actually bought the final issue separately when it came out without reading any part of the story before. I thought it was as good as it could be for not really knowing what happened. But after reading the whole thing, that last issue is so powerful.

It's definitely in my Top 5 stories of all time.

Does anyone feel they have a definite answer about how it all started?

I really loved this series. There were some things I would have changed and the ending was a little bit of a let down. But, overall it was a solid series.

Can we talk specifics about the books or do we need spoiler tags?

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:Can we talk specifics about the books or do we need spoiler tags?

I say go for it. This isn't exactly a new title.

Maybe a mod can add "Spoilers" to the title?

^ Darn, I should've done that.

LordD3r3k wrote: Does anyone feel they have a definite answer about how it all started?

No, I don't believe there was anything concretely given, and I believe that wasn't necessarily the point. I do want to know, but it's fine that it stays a mystery.

Flux and I were talking about the parallels of how Yorick was trapped in his straight-jacket at the beginning, when the epidemic happened, and how at the end, with things restarting and being dominated by women, Yorick (sort of standing for men) was free, with his straight-jacket fluttering in the wind.

We were trying to decipher the meaning of Yorick's escape, the clones and the somewhat vaguary of an ending by Vaughan. Not to quibble. Excellent ending, in my book. Sad-ass ending, but loved it none the less.

One of the best series ever.

BlueMaxx wrote:
No, I don't believe there was anything concretely given, and I believe that wasn't necessarily the point. I do want to know, but it's fine that it stays a mystery.

Well, apparently in interviews with Vaughan he claims the answer is in there. Though, he prefers that the reader choose the explanation they like best.

We were trying to decipher the meaning of Yorick's escape, the clones and the somewhat vaguary of an ending by Vaughan. Not to quibble. Excellent ending, in my book. Sad-ass ending, but loved it none the less.

Well, it's been awhile since I've read it so I'm not 100% clear on the details, but my initial thought was suicide. He served his purpose. Men were being recreated, no one from his life is around anymore. What more was there to stick around for?

***SPOILERS AHEAD***

Fixed.

BlueMaxx wrote:
Those who finished, what'd you think?
(Don't stress being redundant Flux, because I will be. )

I won't.

^ That works.

LordD3r3k wrote:

BlueMaxx wrote:
No, I don't believe there was anything concretely given, and I believe that wasn't necessarily the point. I do want to know, but it's fine that it stays a mystery.

Well, apparently in interviews with Vaughan he claims the answer is in there. Though, he prefers that the reader choose the explanation they like best.

See, I just took that as not really giving an answer. I suppose you could take it as all three?

Theory...sorta: The thought-transferrence/quantum theory of Dr. Mann's father and mother could play into the fact that men, the domineering sex of the world, has chosen to show how obsolete we are by a virus of the kills the Y chromosome. Being that we only excelled at destroying ourselves, the next step is absolution by our own design, which still plays into quantum reaction...thingy. (I'm interested in quantum, but I'm very layman. Heh.) The experiment of Dr. Mann would be the connector, having given birth to an individual without the need of a male. The cosmic coincidence collided and sent out a quantum wave, if you will, killing the "Y" population of all creatures. You could also throw in an unorthodox evolution of planet's organisms in the equation. Fits.

LordD3r3k wrote:
Well, it's been awhile since I've read it so I'm not 100% clear on the details, but my initial thought was suicide. He served his purpose. Men were being recreated, no one from his life is around anymore. What more was there to stick around for?

I'm not so sure. I told this to Flux, he's a free-spirit, and he just didn't want to be cooped up any longer. Seeing that women were cloning and possibly making the male population sustain itself again possibly added to his need to escape.

Oh, and, like Yorick, I loved 355. AKA Peace.

I now understand this cover. Heh. Go figure.

BlueMaxx wrote:I'm not so sure. I told this to Flux, he's a free-spirit, and he just didn't want to be cooped up any longer. Seeing that women were cloning and possibly making the male population sustain itself again possibly added to his need to escape.

Yeah, like I said, my initial thought was suicide.. but then the clone is looking out the window and there's no body to be seen.. well, who knows. I suppose like the disease, the ending is up to a bit of speculation as well.

I now understand this cover. Heh. Go figure.

Is that the issue where she dies?

From IGN.com

Interestingly, Vaughan is rather coy as to which theory is the correct one. He said, "I feel that there is a definitive explanation, but I like that people don't necessarily know what it is. In interviews we always said that we would tell people exactly what cause the plague. The thing was, we never said when we were going to tell. We weren't going to tell you when we were telling you, I should say."

Vaughn suggested that the answer could be found in the background of Issue #3

^ I'm on it!!!

LordD3r3k wrote:
I now understand this cover. Heh. Go figure.

Is that the issue where she dies?[/quote]
Yep. At the end of the issue. But her name isn't revealed until 60.

Morris Waste Disposal was the only thing that stuck out to me, and that's because we find out that fecal matter is a possible cause much later. 'Course, you could think deeper with the government conflicts and the possibility of the war-machine being part of the problem. They were both possible reasons given for the death of all the men. Maybe both?

BlueMaxx wrote:Yep. At the end of the issue. But her name isn't revealed until 60.

I thought they never revealed her name?

I freakin loved this series. One of my favorites of all time. I got the first trade one day and was hooked, so I blew through the rest of the story in like a couple of days. I did the same thing with The Walking Dead recently lol.

The series had some of the best characters in comics history. Yorick was the ultimate everyman hero and just a ridiculously likeable character, he reminded me of Peter Parker a lot. Not to mention 355...her death was like a punch in the gut.

355 made me so damned sad. All that they'd went through and they finally realized each other. Sigh...damn you, Vaughan.

LordD3r3k wrote:

BlueMaxx wrote:Yep. At the end of the issue. But her name isn't revealed until 60.

I thought they never revealed her name?

On the tree she was buried underneath, "Peace" was carved into it. She, after telling Yorick about her name in an earlier story-arc, mentioned that her parents were hippies or that it was a very hippy name and didn't want to tell him because it was too cornball, I guess. Then, on issue 58's cover (above), she's giving the peace sign. Vaughan does leave clues about a few things, but I'm still unclear about the cause of death of all the men.

I thought the story got pretty weak from Girl On Girl to Motherlands, except for those stand alone issues that delved into the past. But Whys And Wherefores was such a satisfying ending.

Did they ever give a clear cut reasoning as to why Dr. Mann's father lived through the killing of all the "Y's".

The few issues I had with it were some of the girls were illustrated similarly and it would throw me off sometimes. Also why were there 2 Beth's that looked almost exactly alike that kind of bugged me.

I thought the ending was kind of a let down because I wanted Yorick to end up with someone after all he had been through.

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:The few issues I had with it were some of the girls were illustrated similarly and it would throw me off sometimes. Also why were there 2 Beth's that looked almost exactly alike that kind of bugged me.

One of the reasons that Beth 2 was able to seduce Yorick was that she reminded him of Beth 1. Also, Beth 2 had the scar across her face, remember?

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:I thought the ending was kind of a let down because I wanted Yorick to end up with someone after all he had been through.

But who would he have ended up with? Everyone he really cared about died. It would have seemed too cookie cutter to have him to be with some random person and live happily ever after

LordD3r3k wrote:

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:I thought the ending was kind of a let down because I wanted Yorick to end up with someone after all he had been through.

But who would he have ended up with? Everyone he really cared about died. It would have seemed too cookie cutter to have him to be with some random person and live happily ever after

Yeah. Poor guy.

I thought it was funny how his ex Beth and Hero become a couple at the end.

Bigtymin504 wrote:Yeah. Poor guy.

I thought it was funny how his ex Beth and Hero become a couple at the end.

I know right? Twist the knife alittle deeper

flux336 wrote:

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:The few issues I had with it were some of the girls were illustrated similarly and it would throw me off sometimes. Also why were there 2 Beth's that looked almost exactly alike that kind of bugged me.

One of the reasons that Beth 2 was able to seduce Yorick was that she reminded him of Beth 1. Also, Beth 2 had the scar across her face, remember?

I thought she got that scar later on. They could have least given her a different name.

LordD3r3k wrote:

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:I thought the ending was kind of a let down because I wanted Yorick to end up with someone after all he had been through.

But who would he have ended up with? Everyone he really cared about died. It would have seemed too cookie cutter to have him to be with some random person and live happily ever after

I understand your point, but at least someone he could hang out with instead of sitting in a straitjacket.

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:

flux336 wrote:

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:The few issues I had with it were some of the girls were illustrated similarly and it would throw me off sometimes. Also why were there 2 Beth's that looked almost exactly alike that kind of bugged me.

One of the reasons that Beth 2 was able to seduce Yorick was that she reminded him of Beth 1. Also, Beth 2 had the scar across her face, remember?

I thought she got that scar later on. They could have least given her a different name.

When Yorick meets Beth II she's got the scar from the plane crash.

As for the name, Vaughn was being deeply and dare I say, painfully ironic. This woman is almost a perfect copy of Beth I, right down to her name. But she isn't the one for Yorick. She's a Beth, but not the Beth.
Then in a deeper twist, Beth I isn't even the perfect person for Yorick! Instead it's a woman who is the complete opposite of what Yorick has been chasing after. But 355 and Yorick had to go on that journey together and see it through to the end.

Spaced4SimonPegg wrote:
I understand your point, but at least someone he could hang out with instead of sitting in a straitjacket.

I think Vaughn was closing Yorick's personal circle here. When we met Yorick he was in a straitjacket, working on perfecting his escape. At the end of his life, he's perfected the escape and disappeared entirely. The essential part of a person never fades, the stuff that makes us who we are never leaves us. That straitjacket was part of Yorick and who he was. All he had left was himself.