WRITER: SALADIN AHMED | ARTIST: DAMION SCOTT | PUBLISHER: MARVEL | FORMAT: SINGLE ISSUE | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
The End is a series of one-shot comics that does what it says on the tin – it’s the last days of particular Marvel characters. As events go it’s quite a nice idea, and though it’s not particularly original, it’s still a decent way to introduce existing heroes to new readers. Miles Morales: The End takes everyone’s favourite young super-hero and flips it around. Miles Morales is an old man. There’s no sign of the rest of the Spider-man family, and it seems it’s just Miles and a small band of human beings, living on the fringes of a post-apocalyptic society. And of course, Miles has become the mayor of this city at the end of world.
Saladin Ahmed has made some excellent choices with this one-shot. It would have been easy to make the sunny and positive Miles into a bitter and lonely wasteland warrior. Instead, what we have is someone who’s clearly taken a licking and kept on ticking. This is a refreshing take on the usual ‘Old Man Hero’ cliché. It’s a fun little story that only suffers from being a little too short. Damion Scott’s art is perfect here; bright, bold, and very colourful. It reads a bit like street graffiti and makes a bigger than life situation even more powerful. Deceptively simple in appearance, each page is actually brilliantly detailed. Great art, great story.
