Alas, poor Yorick, the last man on earth.

Second day in a row and almost no updates that interest me from Wizard again! What gives man? I guess they give equal coverage to DC and Marvel...and I really don't give two damns about DC's shit most of the time. And some Marvel stuff just doesn't really pique my interest all that much.

So I finished reading Dr Strange: The Oath yesterday and boy was it good! It just cements Brian K. Vaughan's reputation as a stellar writer (with brilliant comedic timing and humour!) and while he's already one of my favourite writers, he's quickly moving up a notch or two. I think at last count, he was my 3rd or 4th favourite writer...he's easily just behind Brian Bendis and Alan Moore now, with Ed Brubaker moving to 4th and Mark Millar just a tad out of touch at 5th.

Was desperate to read another TPB yesterday but I couldn't decide what I wanted to read: Astro City? XXXenophile? Captain America Omnibus? I didn't want something too heavy or something too light. And though I know I'm probably going to regret doing this (because I've only at the moment got Vols.1-3 and 8-9), I started Y - The Last Man...by a certain Mr Vaughan. Might have something to do with the fact that I wanted to read something written by him after reading the goodness that was Dr Strange: The Oath.

Now I've read all the TPBs of Y - The Last Man published so far...heck, I own ALL of them, though most of the TPBs are back in Singapore. Trying to rebuild my collection here a la the Preacher series, since it's just so good. The premise is simple: something happens that causes every human, foetus and mammal with a Y chromosome (that's the one that's in the MALE gender for those of you who never studied genetics) in the world to just die at the same moment. The gendercide is complete worldwide...all except for one man and his pet monkey.

Cmon...if that premise doesn't get you hooked, what will? It's the last man on earth! With his monkey! As the last man and the only one with a working...er...set of tools, doesn't that automatically make his wang hot property? Shouldn't he be some sort of Wilt Chamberlain/Hugh Hefner hybrid when it comes to number of women bedded?

On the contrary. Life isn't that rosy for the last man on earth. It's a brilliant examination of the human psyche, and everyone knows I love reading about stuff where a human (or bunch of) get thrusted into extreme situations and we get to see how they react. Yorick, our hero, doesn't quite become the love machine that one automatically assumes he would be. There are a whole bunch of femi-nazis gunning for him. Heck, seems like a LOT of people are after him, either to kill him or to sell him off in the sex trade, or to try and protect him so he could one day jumpstart humanity again.

It's a fascinating read and it's a shame the series ends with #60, which I believe is out in stores this month. I'd love to read this series back to back just like I did Preacher, though it'd take me a couple of days...at least a week, what with my working schedule. But having read the first three issues in the first TPB yesterday and this morning, I've already discovered a whole lot of other things that I didn't know about previously. It's one of my recommended reads...try it!

On another note, it's also a title published by Vertigo, the mature-readers-centric line of titles published by DC comics. Some of my FAVOURITE titles and series have been published by Vertigo. While I generally shun the DC stuff (because I just don't relate and care for the superheroes in the DC-verse...I'm a Marvel man after all!), Vertigo stuff is just so awesome.

I've got Preacher, Y - The Last Man, Ex Machina, Fables, Jack of Fables, 100 Bullets (though I've never had the time to read them...have the TPBs at home)...and then there are titles like Bite Club that they publish that I have. I'm also interested in Loveless and American Virgin and a whole lot of other titles published. Not to mention that Neil Gaiman's famous Sandman series was a Vertigo series and a lot of the popular mainstream writers all got their start on that imprint, like Grant Morrison, Mark Millar, Brian Azzarello, Ed Brubaker, Warren Ellis...and Alan Moore too!

Vertigo: A font of creative goodness.